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

[Mario766]

To be fair Zero's analysis are pretty lacking or outright wrong at times. Like, when he talked about Greninja he said he didn't have a good recovery and also didn't have very good mobility, from what I remember.

I don't think Zero knows enough about Shulk in order to be a credible source for things like this.

He actually played the character though so he should know SOMETHING >>

 

[Ffamran]

This'll never happen and it's a stupid idea, but what if Shulk was made into a floaty? People are freaking out right now: "Why? You're going to get Shulk killed!" Hear me out: as it stands, Shulk's attributes, walking, running, air speeds, air acceleration, and fall speed are pretty much identical to Ike's. With fast fallers, most of them tend to have low landing lag and/or really good auto-cancel windows like Sheik, Fox, and Ike. If they don't, they have something else, like Meta Knight having multiple jumps to make up for it. Now, Shulk doesn't really have that; he only has so-so land lag on slow aerials... So, what if we make it so he can stay in the air longer? What if we make it so Shulk can pull a Yoshi with his aerials? But Marth can do the same thing despite being an average speed faller, you'd say. Yeah, but Marth's (and Yoshi's) auto-cancel windows are better than Shulk's, especially Fair. Marth's faster startup and average air acceleration on his aerials also let him throw them out sooner and drift back or forth more easily than Shulk. Shulk wouldn't be able to drift like Yoshi either, but imagine a lingering aerial with a ton of range just floating in your way. He wouldn't be able to move well, but how will you challenge him when he's a floating fortress?

 

[Teshie U]

That doesn't sound incredibly stupid though. Sure speed mode grants a low initial reward, but Zero is right that if you use the mode that gives you the strongest neutral, you can just switch modes once you have your opponent in the juggle/corner. Then you have a better shot if making them eat the increase damage/knockback stuff. His mobility isn't so bad that you can EASILY just get around his giant sword on the ledge or in the air.

 

[FullMoon]

He actually played the character though so he should know SOMETHING >>

ZeRo also used to play Greninja according to himself (though it was back in the 3DS version where people though Greninja was top tier) and I think he has made For Glory videos of most characters. Still didn't stop him from goofing up.

Just because he has played them before doesn't mean he knows that much about them especially if it happened a long time ago or if it was for just a brief time. I've had Samus, Lucas and Falco as secondaries before but I'm far from knowledgeable about them enough to give a good analysis on them compared to the character I actually main.

If you want to get a good analysis of Shulk, you should probably look for top Shulks (or ex Shulk players like Trela) who actually know more about the character in depth. Sure, bias and all, but they're more likely to know the insides and out of Shulk than a guy who probably only played him for a brief period.

 

[Mario766]

Yes his mobility isn't THAT bad, but coupled with his rather large landing lag on his moves, leaves him more open than he should and makes it largely easier to get in or stay out. His only decent landing lag move is 12 frames on N-Air, which starts behind him and only starts frame 13, who knows what frame it'll actually be a threat in front of him. F-Air is frame 14, and also starts above him so it has the same type of problem. The moves also almost never auto cancel, so every aerial is basically you saying 'Either do this really strict timing tech...or take the landing lag' Which is really harsh for a player. Even for someone who uses the tech very often like 9B, still found zero results and switched to Ryu...kinda like the other Shulk player Trela.

 

[Teshie U]

Did ZeRo say the gameplan works at high level or did he just say thats how the character plays? I think it would very foolish and unlikely that he would suggest shulk is good at what he does, but that gameplan does seem like his best bet.

Coupled with his jump mode recovery and his resilience in shield mode, its obvious he was designed to survive being wrong alot.

 

[Locke 06]

Shulk isn't 6 different characters.

 

[Rikkhan]

ZeRo also used to play Greninja according to himself (though it was back in the 3DS version where people though Greninja was top tier) and I think he has made For Glory videos of most characters. Still didn't stop him from goofing up.

Just because he has played them before doesn't mean he knows that much about them especially if it happened a long time ago or if it was for just a brief time. I've had Samus, Lucas and Falco as secondaries before but I'm far from knowledgeable about them enough to give a good analysis on them compared to the character I actually main.

If you want to get a good analysis of Shulk, you should probably look for top Shulks (or ex Shulk players like Trela) who actually know more about the character in depth. Sure, bias and all, but they're more likely to know the insides and out of Shulk than a guy who probably only played him for a brief period.

If I remember correctly ZeRo consulted scatt for his megaman analysis and I believe he does the same for every other character analysis. About shulk I remember he used shulk at a tourney and he destroyed pools with him so I dunno.

 

[Mario766]

Okay let's be real.

You stomp pools with something doesn't mean you're good with the character, esp when you're a pro at the game.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Zero's analysis on Shulk is actually pretty solid tbh.

 

[Thinkaman]

Reminder: Shulk aerials besides nair all have dismal AC windows, but have quite good FAF timings. (Well before the AC window, like Toon Link and Roy fairs)

While I would never consider myself a "Shulk optimist", I do suspect that this key, unique aspect of the character's timings is one of the rifts between those who know him well and those who do not.

 

[LiteralGrill]

This is like, perfect. I have a 'Shulk Experts' article set for next week. Got the three best Shulks I could find. Dang it, gonna miss relevant conversation D:

In general they all seemed pretty optimistic though which isn't usual. So far every interview has had one or two negative folks. I think two things could make Shulk a lot better.

1. People learn how to use his counter a ton better. I know that sounds silly but it could stop a lot of aggressive characters if used proper.

2. People stop being one dimensional with arts. Think about a Shulks constantly shifting through arts and canceling for no lag. Literally shifting every few seconds and being able to use each shift properly. Opponents would be overwhelmed trying to keep up with what strategy they need to be pulling at any moment. It'd take some SERIOUS technical work to do though.

 

[Thinkaman]

1. People learn how to use his counter a ton better. I know that sounds silly but it could stop a lot of aggressive characters if used proper.

This. Shulk's Vision is incredible, and one of the best defensive options in the game.

I almost see it like Jigglypuff Rest, though less extreme. "Yeah, this character seems pretty bad, but this one option is so noteworthy that I can never truly write them off."

 

[Goesasu]

Reminder: Shulk aerials besides nair all have dismal AC windows, but have quite good FAF timings. (Well before the AC window, like Toon Link and Roy fairs)

While I would never consider myself a "Shulk optimist", I do suspect that this key, unique aspect of the character's timings is one of the rifts between those who know him well and those who do not.

Shulk has bad startup frame data but very good low endlag or recovery frame data. Actually when i play against someone who doesnt know shulk they usually say that they didnt know could attack so fast. The truth behind this is shulk has to ^anticipate^ his atacks because his bad startup, but after that you can make a second attack very fast.

Playing shulk is different than playing all other characters, just like palutena who is a reversed shulk ( good or ok startup but bad or high endlag or recovery)

 

[FullMoon]

If I remember correctly ZeRo consulted scatt for his megaman analysis and I believe he does the same for every other character analysis. About shulk I remember he used shulk at a tourney and he destroyed pools with him so I dunno.

He does that for some, not all. For instance I don't think he consulted anyone for Greninja and I think Villager either. That's probably due to him simply not being able to talk to their best players but still.

I haven't seen his analysis for Shulk but for the most part my point is just that ZeRo's analysis is not the most reliable source, especially for characters in the lower tiers or those that are lacking in representation.

 

[Nobie]

ZerO's Greninja and Villager videos are just older. He only started doing these new analyses much more recently, and in each case he's tried to consult top players.

Re: Shulk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPLaXyPq6rQ

This is from a completely different game (Ultra Street Fighter IV), but one comment I found fascinating was that the best players of a character make them seem faster than they actually are. That might be where Shulk's future lies.

 

[Yikarur]

Analysises like Zero does are always subjective nature and thus are just one more opinion on the internet. You should never listen to an opinion without thinking about it yourself. So it's not a "source" to begin with.

 

[Skeeter Mania]

You stomp pools with something doesn't mean you're good with the character

Define "good".

 

[Mario766]

Define "good".

Able to compete in a competitive fashion.

It just tests how you are as a player, because most pools are mediocre.

 

[Luco]

By the way guys, an Aussie major is about to go down this weekend, they should have a good stream up and it'd be amazing if peeps wanted to tune in and see our top players going head to head once again. I love when this thread gets really hype about tournaments with people tuning in and discussing stuff, so thought I'd drop that in.

Nobie I feel like it's the meta of most games to get faster as a progression. Look at old Brawl matches compared to 2014 stuff and just how much the speed changed. So too, the top players are the paramount piece of this phenomenon - whether it's smash or Starcraft, top players always move with a speed that astounds me. If Shulk gets some more top players I think his meta could expand more. He always seemed like he had more he could be doing.

 

[Thinkaman]

By the way guys, an Aussie major is about to go down this weekend, they should have a good stream up and it'd be amazing if peeps wanted to tune in and see our top players going head to head once again. I love when this thread gets really hype about tournaments with people tuning in and discussing stuff, so thought I'd drop that in.

Australia is consistently one of my favorite regions to watch. I'm excited for this event, and encourage everyone to check it out this weekend.

 

[|RK|]

He does that for some, not all. For instance I don't think he consulted anyone for Greninja and I think Villager either. That's probably due to him simply not being able to talk to their best players but still.

I haven't seen his analysis for Shulk but for the most part my point is just that ZeRo's analysis is not the most reliable source, especially for characters in the lower tiers or those that are lacking in representation.

All of ZeRo's analyses post-MLG loss have involved him consulting the best players for notes. They're much better now, and he's re-doing characters because of it. For those of you who haven't seen his videos post-MLG, I implore you to watch at least one to understand how differently he's doing this now.

Greninja has not been redone yet, BTW.

EDIT: These consultations have made his views on lower characters significantly more accurate. In the case of Shulk - he considers himself a Shulk player, so he's the one playing in the background, and he suggests sources on Smashboards to cover what he cannot.

 

[RonNewcomb]

This. Shulk's Vision is incredible, and one of the best defensive options in the game.

I almost see it like Jigglypuff Rest,"Yeah, this character seems pretty bad, but this one option is so noteworthy that I can never truly write them off."

But if I wanted to space at max range constantly, dash in for grabs with no follow-ups, and defend with a counter, why wouldn't I just play Marth? In what MUs does Shulk outperform Marth?

I haven't seen his analysis for Shulk but for the most part my point is just that ZeRo's analysis is not the most reliable source, especially for characters in the lower tiers or those that are lacking in representation.

I'm thinking Zero is a Heart player first & foremost, Body second, with Mind a distant third, especially if he needs to outsource analysis to produce anything cohesive.

 

[|RK|]

I'm thinking Zero is a Heart player first & foremost, Body second, with Mind a distant third, especially if he needs to outsource analysis to produce anything coherent.

He's making videos about characters he doesn't play. Just like every top player finds KirbyKid when they need to talk about option selects... It's the smart thing to do.

 

[Thinkaman]

Just like every top player finds KirbyKid when they need to talk about option selects... It's the smart thing to do.

I split a hotel room with @kirbykid at EVO, and he spent the entire time talking about Option Selects.

10/10, would EVO again.

 

[Wintermelon43]

I split a hotel room with @kirbykid at EVO, and he spent the entire time talking about Option Selects.

7.8/10, Too much options selects.

Fixed it for you

 

[Mario766]

How the fk can you even call a counter a good defensive option. It's high risk high reward and it's usually not a very solid option. Yes it'll heavily punish someone for being too eager and it's really good against some recoveries, but Marth/Lucina/Ike's are better at that because they don't have the super slow wind which can make you miss. The FE counters don't have this problem, they also start low so they sweep up recoveries and hit them back fast enough so they don't miss unless they super space out the recovery, which means you flubbed.

Also are we looking at the same character?

All I'm seeing on endlag/recovery is jesus lord it's high.

Jab 3 is 32 frames, jab 1 is 20.
Dash Attack is 37
F-Tilt 31
Up tilt 28
Down tilt 21
Smashes around 35-35-41
Aerials being 12,18,21,17,25
BackSlash 40
Missed Counter 27
Whiffed Vision Attack *It happens...* 49/33

Everyone compares the two, let's look at Ike. Another high recovery swordsman who relies on spacing to do the job.

Jab 1 19 Jab 3 31
Dash Attack 36
F-Tilt 28
Up Tilt 35
D-Tilt 21
F-Smash 52
Up Smash 42
Down Smash 56-38 *1st hit second hit*
Aerials 14,18,19,15,23 Except Ike's F-Air and B-Air auto cancel in short hops so they usually have little to no lag at all.
Eruption 43
QD Attack 41 QD also can auto cancel depending on height, so there's a bonus.
Aether 37
Missed Counter 25
Counter Attack 29


...I don't see where you say Shulk has good recovery...because that's..

Bad.

Coming from an Ike main

You know it's bad then. Even his Smash attacks have higher recovery, and the only move that he wins in is up tilt, but Ike's deals 14 and is a kill move while Shulk's is an anti-air.

 

[LiteralGrill]

By the way guys, an Aussie major is about to go down this weekend, they should have a good stream up and it'd be amazing if peeps wanted to tune in and see our top players going head to head once again. I love when this thread gets really hype about tournaments with people tuning in and discussing stuff, so thought I'd drop that in.

If only an amazing guys named Paper Maribro made a news post so anyone here could know about the Smash 4 threats attending. OH WAIT HE DID! <3

 

[RonNewcomb]

Australia is consistently one of my favorite regions to watch. I'm excited for this event, and encourage everyone to check it out this weekend.

When is it? The front page articles have been bad about giving times.
And please please say London \ New York \ Sydney \ Tokyo time, because deciphering what country the writer is from from an alphabet soup of timezone abbreviations is getting really old.

 

[Dakpo]

So how good did ZSS just get?

You guys are all screwed! This make zss even more broken then ever thought before! Just wait until I can hit you with the sweet spot of a slow smash attack out of neutral at 0% on a specific part of the stage facing the correct way with no rage and on a specific character and then perform the sequence pretty accurately >:] .. Hope they don't sdi!

It's super cool but we have been down B spiking people from down smash for a long time. Rage is going to make this a beast to master and adapt too. I'd love to see people actually do the full combo. Sounds hype

 

[Plain Yogurt]

I just wish Vision had an aerial variant like he does on the ground. Stupid thing is hard to use in the air anyways cause it stalls him and then he sails over their head if by some miracle they hit him. Ugh.

 

[momochuu]

i'm late but zero's videos are a good reason of why there is so much widespread misinformation about the game more than a year into the game's life.

you can tell when someone has seen one of those videos and just quotes the stuff in those vids which are just completely wrong. someone legitimately tried to tell me today that shuriken was a bad projectile and that greninja has no neutral, and i could tell he saw that video.

 

[LancerStaff]

Also, I messed up, it's Dark Pit - probably the same as Pit - who has the lowest recovery, but only in the air at 20 for his Silver Bow.

Well okay, it's not actually the lowest endlag projectile as we now know, but as far as I know it's the only one that fast that'll land 100% laglessly, no soft or hard landing lag, if you don't interrupt it out of a fullhop. Toon Link I imagine gets it too but I'm not sure.

Still, don't understand why people compare Pit's arrows to, uh, Falco's lazers...

This is an impossible rule to moderate, which just proves how stupid this argument of yours is. And i don't know what that last sentence means.

I've got something for you. Not entirely relevant, but in time i think you can learn to appreciate this (or maybe not, idk)

You see that bubble in the middle? Stop skipping it.

Basically anything that could go wrong with any form of competitive moveset in any game is present in For Glory FFA. It is garbage.

In fact, you insisting that it's A-OK is making me question even replying anymore lol

Mario doesn't excel in any situation? Are we playing the same game? You can straight-up

Here we go with Charge Shot again. It isn't even a good charge shot. I'd take Wii Fit's any day of the week, it's just objectively better, not to mention it's on a better character. Your one-track-mind idealized FFA samus is completely reliant on the other 3 characters deciding to ignore her poop throwing. You would have a much better argument using Zelda instead, but for some reason you're stuck on Samus.

She's like the basis of your argument, but you fail to realize that she's one of THE worst characters you could base it on. She isn't bad because she's designed for FFA. She's bad because she's poorly designed, the same way Zelda is poorly designed.

FFA only SEEMS more balanced to you because 1) there are too many uncontrollable variables to rate movesets objectively, and/or 2) You are just playing with really, really bad players and thus fail to see why what you're saying is silly. No, these "FFA-balanced" characters aren't FFA balanced, they just aren't having their flaws thrown at your face like in 1v1. If you were arguing "balanced for teams" i could at least side with you.

But you fail to realize that FFA is equally likely to take attention off your flaws (you vs. 3 people) as it is to make them even worse (3 people vs. you), so using that as an end-all basis for character design is just ********.

Are we really going to continue this..?

They moderate it pretty well on for Glory. That, and the chances of being backstabbed is high... Which in turn becomes a part of the metagame.

For Glory is a quick match mode. They're not going to bog it down with a counterpick system or RNG selected stages.

How inherently competitive something is doesn't really matter to those playing it. Competitive Mario Kart exists. Competitive Mario Party exists. You can dump on it all you want, they're just going to tell you to **** off like you do when your typical troll comes in and explains why you shouldn't be playing Smash at all.

The fact that you think WFT is an upgrade of Samus shows how little you know about FFAs. WFT is much lighter, and WFT lacks a tether, an actual good thing to have in FFAs, and plenty of throw combos. Unlike somebody like Mario or Sheik, Samus can attempt her combos safely because she can steal people away from a range and inherently keep some distance. Funnily enough this is similar to how ZSS functions in FFAs, although she's light and lacks a powerful projectile. You're arguing about a subject you clearly don't understand.

 

[Paper Maribro]

When is it? The front page articles have been bad about giving times.
And please please say London \ New York \ Sydney \ Tokyo time, because deciphering what country the writer is from from an alphabet soup of timezone abbreviations is getting really old.

They're kicking off with Brawl in half an hour. They don't have an exact stream schedule but I've been chatting with the TO and he said smash 4 should be starting around 4-5pm Adelaide time which is 10:30+ GMT. I hope that helps!

The tournament is SUPER stacked so you absolutely cannot sleep on anyone. A lot of Australian players also use characters you don't see very often. For example, we have two great Bowser players, a Palutena, a Wii Fit, a GnW, a Robin, a Dedede, a Bowser Jr., a Mega Man, a couple of Little Macs and even a Link who should/could all make it to top 32.

And the crew battle I mentioned in the article features some of the best talent in the country in a 5v5 format. For LHC we have M, Earl, Nikes, Googers and Waveguider and for KH we have Atyeo, Xettman, Kaion (****ashi), Rhyno and Jezmo. Should be super hype so tune in for that on Sunday!

 

[Ffamran]

He does that for some, not all. For instance I don't think he consulted anyone for Greninja and I think Villager either. That's probably due to him simply not being able to talk to their best players but still.

I haven't seen his analysis for Shulk but for the most part my point is just that ZeRo's analysis is not the most reliable source, especially for characters in the lower tiers or those that are lacking in representation.

How do you think I feel when his patch 1.0.8 Falco video has videos of just Kato and Cyro? Kato is good, but in my opinion, he's not as good as Cyro, Larry Lurr, FOW, or present day Keitaro with Falco. I mean, dude, Smashboards is an archive and a community hub. Just go to the Falco boards, check out the threads, or just ask in the boards. The thing is that, going off of memory, his videos don't involve (enough) counterpoints, the acknowledgement that he might not be entirely correct, know enough, or understand enough, and that there are opposing viewpoints or other viewpoints to acknowledge. As a counterpoint to this, who's fault is it really that people only look to one source? I would blame the people as much as the source.

i'm late but zero's videos are a good reason of why there is so much widespread misinformation about the game more than a year into the game's life.

you can tell when someone has seen one of those videos and just quotes the stuff in those vids which are just completely wrong. someone legitimately tried to tell me today that shuriken was a bad projectile and that greninja has no neutral, and i could tell he saw that video.

Man, whenever people say Falco's Nair has a windbox... *squeezes nonexistent stress ball and checks blood pressure*

Still, don't understand why people compare Pit's arrows to, uh, Falco's lazers...

Because people don't fact check for whatever reason or maybe even don't understand why certain things are too good e.g. Brawl Falco's Blaster or too bad. Exposing and providing data is the best anyone can do to try and explain stuff.

 

[|RK|]

How do you think I feel when his patch 1.0.8 Falco video has videos of just Kato and Cyro? Kato is good, but in my opinion, he's not as good as Cyro, Larry Lurr, FOW, or present day Keitaro with Falco. I mean, dude, Smashboards is an archive and a community hub. Just go to the Falco boards, check out the threads, or just ask in the boards. The thing is that, going off of memory, his videos don't involve (enough) counterpoints, the acknowledgement that he might not be entirely correct, know enough, or understand enough, and that there are opposing viewpoints or other viewpoints to acknowledge. As a counterpoint to this, who's fault is it really that people only look to one source? I would blame the people as much as the source.


Man, whenever people say Falco's Nair has a windbox... *squeezes nonexistent stress ball and checks blood pressure*


Because people don't fact check for whatever reason or maybe even don't understand why certain things are too good e.g. Brawl Falco's Blaster or too bad. Exposing and providing data is the best anyone can do to try and explain stuff.

While I'm here - his Falco re-do is coming up soon.

 

[Plain Yogurt]

So I just saw Zero's vid on Shulk and...I guess I don't see the problem with it? As a general overview it seemed pretty accurate to me. Except Buster being good for combos. The reduced knockback makes follow-ups easier but it also reduces the hitstun so you have to do the usual as far as Shulk goes and read your opponent's option unless you hit that sweetspot percentage with Utilt and can juggle another hit or two with it. Pretty good with rage though.

Now JUMP mode...man oh man does it feel good to land Nair->Fair->Air Slash. Or Nair-> Bair. Or Uair->Uair (lol jk that never happens).

But yeah not that bad a ZeRo vid imo.

 

[ILOVESMASH]

ZeRo's analyses have significantly improved in quality ever since he started consulting top players of the specific character he is covering. They are much more informative and accurate about the characters strengths and weaknesses than they were before. They aren't perfect, but I don't think they can be considered bad anymore.

 

[Ffamran]

Someone did a research on Ryu's Tatsumaki and its interactions with projectiles: https://youtu.be/txHNUo_HTK8. Source thread: http://smashboards.com/threads/ryu-tatsumaki-vs-projectiles-smash-4-wii-u.424540/.

Maybe I'm just a slowpoke, but if this wasn't common knowledge... Pretty sure Meta Knight's Mach Tornado and Drill Rush is also capable of this, right? Not exactly a subtle approach to projectiles, but given the right opportunity, Ryu could punish projectiles like no tomorrow.

 

[Y2Kay]

The sad thing is that his videos are made for new players. I remember when the greninja video came out. I was really new then, and didn't know how ignorant he was about greninja. I'm not gonna lie, I was completely dismayed when I saw it. I'm not so scrubbish and impressionable now, but ZeRo, the best player in the world, should be careful about what he says. The newer players will take what he says as 100% truth like I used to. I think ZeRo has learned after his folly with the greninja video. I rarely see him give his opinion on characters anymore, and sticks mostly to spreading info on what the respective character can do, which is overall better for the younger community.