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

[DunnoBro]

Or, he could just dash powershield and shieldgrab you. Which is mario's main and most rewarding approach.

Despite how good it is, Mario's usmash isn't a valid approach option.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Or, he could just dash shield and shieldgrab you. Which is mario's main and most rewarding approach.

Despite how good it is, Mario's usmash isn't a valid approach option.

But Mario doesn't kill you with grab nearly as early as he does with U-smash. And this isn't so much an approach option as opposed to a counterpoke option.

Mario also can B-air oos against people who try to wall him with aerials, and this can be made significantly more reliable with the momentum you get out of perfect pivot.

 

[DunnoBro]

But Mario doesn't kill you with grab nearly as early as he does with U-smash. And this isn't so much an approach option as opposed to a counterpoke option.

He'll convert more reliably off of it and remain much safer, however. You're trading all your neutral options to bank on a split-second power shield usmash, it's not a good strategy regardless of what you wanna call it.

 

[Skeeter Mania]

Or, he could just dash powershield and shieldgrab you. Which is mario's main and most rewarding approach.

Despite how good it is, Mario's usmash isn't a valid approach option.

Reversing up smash is actually quite safe, and you can't be ultra punished for just simply spamming it towards an opponent who can't find your blind spot.

Assume that you were to hit with one of the initial frames (due to an FAF of 40, I will be subtracting from all but the active frames). Mario's up smash is active for 4 frames (9 through 12). Using the formula, the attack can have a frame advantage from -21 to -18. Given that Mario usually turns to do up smash, you would have to turn again and attack with a fast option. Pretty much every character can punish on block.

So yeah, I don't really get why people say this move is super safe when it's very punishable on block (exacerbated by reversing if you choose to do so).

 

[Ghostbone]

You can buffer SH uairs by tilting the control stick very slightly upwards.

There's a small angle between just getting a buffered nair or getting a u-smash in the middle of your jumpsquat.

Maybe for Mario that's particularly important to learn, I'd say it's too precise to do consistently but platform shield dropping is pretty meta defining in melee and it's a similarly precise input.
(And smash stick is too important to give up for Mario in particular)

 

[DunnoBro]

You can buffer SH uairs by tilting the control stick very slightly upwards.

Are you referring to with tap jump? Because he loses too much with that, too.

 

[bc1910]

No, it doesn't matter if tap jump is on. He means if you hold your joystick slightly up, in the position where just pressing A on the ground would cause an Utilt, you can press X then press A during jumpsquat (like any buffered SH aerial) to buffer SH Uair.

Though I think the best way to buffer SH Uair without resorting to tap jump is to use a shoulder button for jump and set C-stick to attack. I don't think this control scheme hurts anyone; I can't think of a single top/high tier who wouldn't rather have access to quick tilts than quick smashes. Not only are quick tilts generally more applicable to a greater number of situations, it's really easy to do quick smashes without using the C-stick anyway (A+B method or just, y'know, smash the control stick), whereas performing quick tilts is really finicky.

Melee players have been able to cope with tap jump on for over a decade. I feel like we could learn to do the same. Having it on does provide some nifty advantages such as easy Usmash and Up B OoS, easy hyphen Usmash and double sticking aerials. However, you are pretty much forced to use your double jump when you Up B in the air, which can be crippling when trying to recover. Also you're just susceptible to random jumps when you move the stick up by accident.

 

[Lavani]

You don't need tap jump on for it.

'd

 

[Yikarur]

You can buffer SH uairs by tilting the control stick very slightly upwards.

There's a small angle between just getting a buffered nair or getting a u-smash in the middle of your jumpsquat.

Maybe for Mario that's particularly important to learn, I'd say it's too precise to do consistently but platform shield dropping is pretty meta defining in melee and it's a similarly precise input.
(And smash stick is too important to give up for Mario in particular)

just use Tilt Sticking. There is no reason to "need" Smash Sticking.

 

[Ghostbone]

just use Tilt Sticking. There is no reason to "need" Smash Sticking.

Faster pivot up-smashes, faster up-smashes out of a run without losing any momentum (there is always going to be time between holding forward and moving the control stick to up to get an up-smash).
Perfect Pivot f-smash or u-smash. Plain familiarity with control schemes, etc.

There's no reason to "need' tilt sticking either, that's a stupid argument. You can do everything with either control scheme, some stuff is just harder with either one.

I can't think of a single top/high tier who wouldn't rather have access to quick tilts than quick smashes.

Diddy and Mario

 

[HeavyLobster]

Did I just hear Bowser having halfway decent landing options?

Excuse me while I laugh myself into a coma.

Having better landing options than DK or Ganon means you're the best of the worst.

Which is still terrible.

He doesn't even have better landing options than them, definitely not Ganon. Bowser's landing options and combo breakers are complete trash and easy to react to. Ganon you do have to be somewhat more careful against.

 

[DunnoBro]

No, it doesn't matter if tap jump is on. He means if you hold your joystick slightly up, in the position where just pressing A on the ground would cause an Utilt, you can press X then press A during jumpsquat (like any buffered SH aerial) to buffer SH Uair.

Though I think the best way to buffer SH Uair without resorting to tap jump is to use a shoulder button for jump and set C-stick to attack. I don't think this control scheme hurts anyone; I can't think of a single top/high tier who wouldn't rather have access to quick tilts than quick smashes. Not only are quick tilts generally more applicable to a greater number of situations, it's really easy to do quick smashes without using the C-stick anyway (A+B method or just, y'know, smash the control stick), whereas performing quick tilts is really finicky.

Melee players have been able to cope with tap jump on for over a decade. I feel like we could learn to do the same. Having it on does provide some nifty advantages such as easy Usmash and Up B OoS, easy hyphen Usmash and double sticking aerials. However, you are pretty much forced to use your double jump when you Up B in the air, which can be crippling when trying to recover. Also you're just susceptible to random jumps when you move the stick up by accident.

No yea, Shoulder Jumper (specifically Z) + C-stick attack is the best/easiest way to do this. But then you can't do easy pivot usmashes, which mario needs. Walking fsmash/usmash option select to punish floaty air dodges on reaction (really only relevant vs ness/lucas) is harder too.

Also, melee players cope with tap jump because EVERYONE copes with it equally.

There's no reason to "need' tilt sticking either, that's a stupid argument. You can do everything with either control scheme, some stuff is just harder with either one.

"Harder" also means "less consistency" which translates to "needing more if you want better results"

Diddy and Mario

ZeRo and MVD use tilt stick with diddy. Though I also would assume if any other character would want smash stick, it'd be him.

(I imagine it's due to kill confirms off dtilt.)

 

[bc1910]

Diddy and Mario

I meant other than Mario.

Diddy, no way. Quick Dtilt alone is more valuable than all his C-stick smashes combined.

You can make an argument for Luigi preferring smash stick. These days, I usually forget him when I scan through the high tiers in my head.

 

[DunnoBro]

Considering Luigi has the best smash frame data in the game (even quicker with sooner FAFs than little mac), I'd be surprised if he didn't want smash stick.

Boss uses smash stick.

 

[Ghostbone]

ZeRo and MVD use tilt stick with diddy. Though I also would assume if any other character would want smash stick, it'd be him.

(I imagine it's due to kill confirms off dtilt.)

I mean both have advantages.

D-tilt > JC u-smash is the main reason i use smash stick. (also banana toss > dash > peanut cancel f-smash might be a thing which is unreasonably harder without smash stick)
Zero mostly relies on d-tilt > bair for kills so he doesn't need smash stick I guess.

 

[KingKong_ad]

Bowser vs Ganon in terms of viability is somewhat debatable, but what results does Bowser even get? Ganon still has several mains who place top 8 or better in stacked events. They both have dumb matchups against certain top tiers, but I'm almost certain Bowser has more explicit unwinnable matchups due to his aerials generally being worse and due to his size.

Since you asked...

These are my results these 4 Last weeks:

2/61
3/39
4/67
5/75
5/96

There are mostly locals but with players like Ally, Holy, SuperGirlKels and Venom coming times to times its not easy at all.

Im not saying Bowser is good, Just saying he has some results.

Also I started playing Bowser competitively in smash 4 this october

 

[Mazdamaxsti]

Honestly I just think perfect pivoting is wildly overrated. For an awkward 1-frame input that can get you killed but doesn't really secure you stocks itself doesn't seem worth it. Only character it does is little mac because it offers him kill confirms with utilt > upb and he's a very grounded character anyway who has little reason to approach with shield.

I remember ESAM raved about pp utilt with pikachu for a while and now just roll > utilts anyway. In this situation, you try to perfect pivot power shield and fail, you're now in a positional disadvantage because you're in shield, facing away from your opponent(can't grab or jab to stuff their grab), and just moved in towards them. You essentially just rolled into them.

That doesn't seem like a meta-changing approach to me. But feel free to keep thinking such.

Characters that heavily rely on tilts (Kirby comes to mind) this really helps them. Actually speaking of my main, PPing extremely helps him with approaching, punishing, and even combos (n-air pp u-tilt, d-tilt pp u-tilt). Overrated as a spacing move tho.

 

[Dre89]

I don't get how Ganondorf is better at landing. You can just shield and punish anything he does. At worst he just resets to his terrible neutral.

Vermanubis basically half agreed with me that if you play really anal and don't commit to anything there is very little Ganon can do. The character can't threaten shields, it's totally safe against him.

You can't do that with Bowser because he has several unreactable options that aren't blocked by shields, which all kill. He also kills pre100 way easier.

Honestly no one who has played a proper Bowser thinks he's bottom tier. It's just the people relying on theorycraft. They don't realise how much of his stuff actually works in reality.

 

[momochuu]

Honestly I just think perfect pivoting is wildly overrated. For an awkward 1-frame input that can get you killed but doesn't really secure you stocks itself doesn't seem worth it. Only character it does is little mac because it offers him kill confirms with utilt > upb and he's a very grounded character anyway who has little reason to approach with shield.

I remember ESAM raved about pp utilt with pikachu for a while and now just roll > utilts anyway. In this situation, you try to perfect pivot power shield and fail, you're now in a positional disadvantage because you're in shield, facing away from your opponent(can't grab or jab to stuff their grab), and just moved in towards them. You essentially just rolled into them.

That doesn't seem like a meta-changing approach to me. But feel free to keep thinking such.

PP with Greninja is incredibly important. PP shurikens, PP Utilt, etc. I think it's pretty good on MK too but not mandatory.

 

[Skeeter Mania]

I don't get how Ganondorf is better at landing. You can just shield and punish anything he does. At worst he just resets to his terrible neutral.

Vermanubis basically half agreed with me that if you play really anal and don't commit to anything there is very little Ganon can do. The character can't threaten shields, it's totally safe against him.

You can't do that with Bowser because he has several unreactable options that aren't blocked by shields, which all kill. He also kills pre100 way easier.

Honestly no one who has played a proper Bowser thinks he's bottom tier. It's just the people relying on theorycraft. They don't realise how much of his stuff actually works in reality.

People like A2ZOMG are also Ganon mains, and he's actually somewhat right about saying that Wizkick can be used as a mixup when landing as it heavily damages shields and pokes them (unless you're Yoshi), and if you don't shield and are predicting something else, you take massive damage and knockback (I believe it can KO certain characters well before 100%).

Though given that he's pretty much pure theorycraft, I generally take his claims with a grain of salt.

 

[adom4]

People like A2ZOMG are also Ganon mains, and he's actually somewhat right about saying that Wizkick can be used as a mixup when landing as it heavily damages shields and pokes them (unless you're Yoshi), and if you don't shield and are predicting something else, you take massive damage and knockback (I believe it can KO certain characters well before 100%).

Though given that he's pretty much pure theorycraft, I generally take his claims with a grain of salt.

Air wizkick is a good mixup for landing (and in general a good mixup), and yeah the sourspot generally KOs around 90% give or take depending on characters & rage, the sweetspot does less knockback but it's still pretty powerful.
Also it does a TON of shield damage, if you shield both hits 80% of your shield is pretty much gone.

 

[Ikes]

I almost exclusively use smash stick even as wario but only because ive grown accustomed to quarter-circling ftilt and both the other tilts are easy for me. I dont see the huge importance of c-stick tilts, tbh, it comes down to how you're comfortable pressing your buttons.

It's like the difference between a good D-Pad and a fight stick in traditional fighters. Both are good, Fight Stick is generally considered the best option, but there are plenty of top players that run controllers like Saturn controllers or similar 6-button controllers with good d-pads.

I wouldn't really turn it into an argument.

 

[Mazdamaxsti]

++-++

I almost exclusively use smash stick even as wario but only because ive grown accustomed to quarter-circling ftilt and both the other tilts are easy for me. I dont see the huge importance of c-stick tilts, tbh, it comes down to how you're comfortable pressing your buttons.

It's like the difference between a good D-Pad and a fight stick in traditional fighters. Both are good, Fight Stick is generally considered the best option, but there are plenty of top players that run controllers like Saturn controllers or similar 6-button controllers with good d-pads.

I wouldn't really turn it into an argument.

Perfect Pivot tilts can be amazing with some characters, thats the main reason I use it. Also, apparently you lose your momentum in the air if you use c-stick for aerials on smashes.

 

[David Viran]

++-++

Perfect Pivot tilts can be amazing with some characters, thats the main reason I use it. Also, apparently you lose your momentum in the air if you use c-stick for aerials on smashes.

You won't lose momentum with smash stick if you flick it. You just have to get used to that.

 

[Dre89]

People like A2ZOMG are also Ganon mains, and he's actually somewhat right about saying that Wizkick can be used as a mixup when landing as it heavily damages shields and pokes them (unless you're Yoshi), and if you don't shield and are predicting something else, you take massive damage and knockback (I believe it can KO certain characters well before 100%).

Though given that he's pretty much pure theorycraft, I generally take his claims with a grain of salt.

Except that vs Ganondorf you never have to do anything other than shield his landing and you'll always maintain advantage. If downb can poke then I suppose you can just position yourself to avoid that and you're golden.

Verm also half agreed with me that people don't play optimally against Ganon. Going for anything that he has a chance to punish (eg. going for an aerial that isn't guaranteed or completely safe regardless of what he does) is sub optimal because sitting in shield is guaranteed to maintain your advantage. His neutral is so bad against non-committal players that it practically is disadvantage for him.

So yeah, if you do something that's punishable by downb mixups then you're already not playing the MU properly. This doesn't work on Bowser because he can threaten shields, and has high reward answers for every defensive option if he predicts correctly.

That's why his disadvantage isn't 'good', because you need to predict correctly. But it's not as bad as people make out because you can literally kill people if they try pressure you with the wrong option.

The 'he can kill you if you mispredict' doesn't work for Ganon assuming optimal play because you can just shield and he'll be left in a bad position.

 

[The Legendary DJXYZ]

Tier lists go here, or nah?
My idea of a Sm4sh tier list works a little different, so I thought it would be relevant in this thread. Characters are in no specific order within their tier. They're mostly usage-based, so they're bound to change if some epiphany like the Meta Knight combo happens again.

Tier 1 "Top Tier":
Tier 2 "High Tier":
Tier 3 "Mid Tier":
Tier 4 "Rare Tier": / / /
Tier 5 "Low Tier":
Tier X "Special Characteristics":

Characters in Tier X, mostly because of their playstyle, can't fit definitively into any 1 tier.
Low Tier characters aren't bad in any way, just not as useful/popular in the current tournament metagame as compared to those above them. This in mostly because of underdevelopment in the competitive scene.
Yeah, some of the Rare Tier characters are indistinguishably close to mid tier, and can be used as such, but those selected for the Rare Tier are a bit less used/developed, and take a bit more dedicated training to play as.
And as always, remember these are personal views, and I'm sure most of yours will differ.

 

[Rashyboy05]

Tier lists go here, or nah?

Please read the rules in the first page before asking this question. But to make things easier.

Finally, there are also special Tier List Posting Rules. Tier lists are a helpful way to quickly summarize and compare opinions+experience across the community, as well as provide historical snapshots of the metagame. However, the posting of tier lists often spreads like a virus and leads to a race-to-the-bottom in which discussion focuses more and more on stating opinions without substance. As such:

• If there is already a tier list post on the current 50-post page, no one else may post one.
  • No exceptions.
• They may only be posted by regular members of the discussion, or extremely well-respected players.
  • If you have to ask, the answer is no.
• We don't care about your opinions. We care about your observations, reflections, and conclusions. Never, ever post just a list.
  • Why did you need to post this list? What is different? What does it mean?
• Similarly, replies to a personal tier list are held to the same standard.
  • In particular, non-constructive criticism will be moderated harshly.
  • The correct response to a poor tier list, like most bad content, is to not respond.
• The creator of a list may answer single replies asking for clarifications, but further discussion of the list itself ends there.
  • If a personal tier list and any clarifications lead to discussion of Green Topics, great! But discussion will never be allowed to continue on a list itself, for its own sake.

 

[DblCrest]

You should really explain why you put the characters in specific tiers or less you'll get jumped on.

Also Kirbeh is too high

 

[Mazdamaxsti]

You won't lose momentum with smash stick if you flick it. You just have to get used to that.

Oh ok, didn't know that. Thanks!

 

[A2ZOMG]

I don't get how Ganondorf is better at landing. You can just shield and punish anything he does. At worst he just resets to his terrible neutral.

Vermanubis basically half agreed with me that if you play really anal and don't commit to anything there is very little Ganon can do. The character can't threaten shields, it's totally safe against him.

You can't do that with Bowser because he has several unreactable options that aren't blocked by shields, which all kill. He also kills pre100 way easier.

Honestly no one who has played a proper Bowser thinks he's bottom tier. It's just the people relying on theorycraft. They don't realise how much of his stuff actually works in reality.

Unreactable?

SideB from Bowser is frame 17 and the hitbox in this game is nowhere nearly as generous as it was in Brawl making it easy to directly anti-air. Down-B is like over 30 frames startup. This is not hard at all to spotdodge realistically.

And no, Verm didn't actually say Ganon can't threaten shields. More specifically he cites that people who run away from Ganon are hard to play against. I don't think you actually read what he said carefully.

Nextoff, Ganon has aerials that actually can be used safely on shield. N-air and B-air both have good frame data on shield and can be safe against dashgrabs, spaced accurately enough (B-air and N-air both can be spaced to around -10 on block), and even raw D-air on shield isn't completely awful thanks to the universal hitlag changes (-15 on block in a best case scenario is hard for a lot of DAs to punish reliably). You also completely downplay how important it is that aerial Wizkick travels at an angle. This allows Ganondorf to threaten people from a zone that most characters cannot really cover trivially, whereas almost all characters in this game explicitly are better at either hitting things right next to them or above them, which Bowser's landing options don't directly address if you simply choose to react without shielding unnecessarily.

Worth noting that Bowser's best aerials on shield have the same frame disadvantage as Ganon's D-air on block, but notably less pushback. Well spaced Ganon aerials at the very least have to be taken seriously when Ganon is trying to land.

If you want to talk theorycrafting, frankly, I'm explaining from experience what good Ganon players actually accomplish in tournament, while you're pretty desperately grasping without citing much data. Ganon actually has landing options that can situationally threaten unconventional blind spots, which forces awkward spacing to punish his landing (specifically, the best way to punish Ganon's landing is to get behind and below him, which is not always trivial in a competitive setting). With Bowser, you either stay directly under him or right next to his landing location, which every character in the game has a good way of taking advantage of pretty consistently.

 

[wedl!!]

Why do people still consider Ryu this super imposing character that only a master can properly play? Is it because 99% of people who play this game have never played Street Fighter?

How are Peach and Greninja not "specialist" characters? Why is this tier list based on usage amount to begin with?

 

[A2ZOMG]

Why do people still consider Ryu this super imposing character that only a master can properly play? Is it because 99% of people who play this game have never played Street Fighter?

How are Peach and Greninja not "specialist" characters? Why is this tier list based on usage amount to begin with?

It's not even the SF inputs that make Ryu hard to play. Actually spacing correctly with him is easily one of the hardest things to do in this game given not only do you have to plan out his jumps carefully, you need to master different specific inputs to space at different distances.

 

[wedl!!]

I wasn't talking about the inputs. I was talking about SF fundamentals, something most Smash players don't have a grasp on. Really not super hard.

 

[Dre89]

Unreactable?

SideB from Bowser is frame 17 and the hitbox in this game is nowhere nearly as generous as it was in Brawl making it easy to directly anti-air. Down-B is like over 30 frames startup. This is not hard at all to spotdodge realistically.

And no, Verm didn't actually say Ganon can't threaten shields. More specifically he cites that people who run away from Ganon are hard to play against. I don't think you actually read what he said carefully.

Nextoff, Ganon has aerials that actually can be used safely on shield. N-air and B-air both have good frame data on shield and can be safe against dashgrabs, spaced accurately enough, and even raw D-air on shield isn't completely awful thanks to the universal hitlag changes. You also completely downplay how important it is that aerial Wizkick travels at an angle. This allows Ganondorf to threaten people from a zone that most characters cannot really cover trivially, whereas almost all characters in this game explicitly are better at either hitting things right next to them or above them, which Bowser's landing options don't directly address if you simply choose to react without shielding unnecessarily.

If you want to talk theorycrafting, frankly, I'm explaining from experience what good Ganon players actually accomplish in tournament, while you're pretty desperately grasping without citing much data. Ganon actually has landing options that can situationally threaten unconventional blind spots, which forces awkward spacing to punish his landing (specifically, the best way to punish Ganon's landing is to get behind and below him, which is not always trivial in a competitive setting unless you have a backwards hitting move like Ganon D-smash or Sonic B-throw). With Bowser, you either stay directly under him or right next to him, which every character in the game has a good way of taking advantage of pretty consistently.

I was talking more about dash grab or dash attack in terms of unreactable options.

Sideb isn't that good. It's one of those moves who save as a one-off mix up when they're at kill percent because it's too much of a commitment. You can use it earlier if they're shielding too much because it does 18%, but I prefer saving it for kills.

If you stand directly under Bowser you risk him doing a late downb, which will one shot a shield. The stall means that the timing to powershield or spotdodge is later than if he were to dair. So you'd actually have to predict the downb, because you'll have to wait until he's low enough that dair is unreactable. And if you think he'll dair, he'll either downb your spotdodge or break your shield (if you try powershield it'll be mistimed).

People experienced in the MU simply don't go underneath Bowser because it's way too risky. They just wait to the side and try punish from there

With regards to Ganondorf, it doesn't matter if he's safe on shield. His neutral is so bad you're still in advantage anyway.

I've watched some of Verm's matches. People do not play the MU optimally. In a single grand finals game I saw a Lucario commit uneccesarily at least 10-15 times, and he got punished for it. If people played the MU properly Verm's results would be much worse despite being an amazing player

 

[Vipermoon]

A2ZOMG

On the ground, Bowser's side B is frame 8 which is faster than his grabs.

 

[Blobface]

I've watched some of Verm's matches. People do not play the MU optimally. In a single grand finals game I saw a Lucario commit uneccesarily at least 10-15 times, and he got punished for it. If people played the MU properly Verm's results would be much worse despite being an amazing player

What optimal playstyle are you talking about? Please elaborate.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I was talking more about dash grab or dash attack in terms of unreactable options.

Sideb isn't that good. It's one of those moves who save as a one-off mix up when they're at kill percent because it's too much of a commitment. You can use it earlier if they're shielding too much because it does 18%, but I prefer saving it for kills.

If you stand directly under Bowser you risk him doing a late downb, which will one shot a shield. The stall means that the timing to powershield or spotdodge is later than if he were to dair. So you'd actually have to predict the downb, because you'll have to wait until he's low enough that dair is unreactable. And if you think he'll dair, he'll either downb your spotdodge or break your shield (if you try powershield it'll be mistimed).

People experienced in the MU simply don't go underneath Bowser because it's way too risky. They just wait to the side and try punish from there

With regards to Ganondorf, it doesn't matter if he's safe on shield. His neutral is so bad you're still in advantage anyway.

I've watched some of Verm's matches. People do not play the MU optimally. In a single grand finals game I saw a Lucario commit uneccesarily at least 10-15 times, and he got punished for it. If people played the MU properly Verm's results would be much worse despite being an amazing player

D-air is also like a 20+ frame commitment to hit people with and the animation is drastically different than DownB and thus seeable, so...frankly I think you have very contradictory standards as to what constitutes good matchup knowledge.

And last time I watched someone like Gungnir play Ganon vs Bowser, he had no trouble simply just spotdodging Bowser for committing to those landing options, and getting a free F-smash. Just saying, if you know the matchup and your reaction's don't fail, that's ACTUALLY the right way to punish Bowser's landing.

I don't consider Ganon's neutral great, but frankly you're overstating how good Bowser's neutral is too. Bowser has a good dashgrab, but his DA is not exactly a very compelling punish. Ganon DA is much better, same startup, better followups at low percents and kills earlier too. Yeah Ganon has bad regular grabs, but Flame Choke is really good in this game and is not exactly that hard to pressure people into when you have Ganon's amazing D-tilt and B-air as pokes to force people to respect him. Bowser has better ground moves, but his aerials aren't as safe as Ganon's and have worse hitboxes, which gives him other problems containing people who try to pick on his huge frame in footsies when he doesn't exactly have the same ability to anti-air people as other heavies.

A2ZOMG

On the ground, Bowser's side B is frame 8 which is faster than his grabs.

The subject was landing options, and frankly I do believe grounded SideB is an insane move in a vacuum (like if Tough Guy wasn't a gimmick, SideB legitimately would probably need tonedowns). The aerial version sucks in this game though.

 

[Ghostbone]

Bowser's ground game is a lot better than Ganon's tbh.

The fact that he actually has a run, a dash grab, a jab and OoS options is pretty important lol

Bowser's u-smash is also a pretty good anti-air (fair kill power and damage for its speed, and intangibility for trading).

 

[Dre89]

What optimal playstyle are you talking about? Please elaborate.

You basically just shield and don't commit to anything. Obviously you need to mix up your movement but you just wait until he commits to something and punish it.

This works on Ganon because his dashgrab is too short ranged to be threatening in neutral and sideb is reactable if you're not committing to anything unless he's very close to you. That's why it's important to mix up your movement. It's a good to throw out random attacks at a safe distance every now and then. Because if you don't Ganon will cotton on and it'll be easy to set up dtilt spacing, or get close enough where stuff like dash grab or a movement into sideb is unreactable.

Then when you punish something he does, unless you have a guaranteed follow up or a completely safe option, just shield his landing. You'll either get a punish or he'll reset to his horrible neutral.

I don't even bother try gimp him as DK anymore, because even though he's vulnerable, his neutral is so bad that going offstage isn't worth the risk.

The reason why people don't play like this is because it's super anal. It's just not fun to do because you have to be patient and constantly focus on not doing things you normally do in other MUs.

It's not that you can't be aggressive against him, it's that you don't need to take the risk when you can just play reactively and virtually be guaranteed to win.

In the matches I've seen of Verm, no one has played like this. If Ganon became a major threat everywhere people would lab the MU and probably start playing like this.

 

[Vipermoon]

The subject was landing options

Ah, okay. Carry on.