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

[Mazdamaxsti]

even hitting them with one turnip is huge because it knocks them offstage against the best edguarder in the game

True, but the discussion is about d-air meteors, not just d-air utility. Wario and Villager have amazing utility with d-air but they aren't the best spikes so it doesn't really matter to an extent in this discussion.

 

[Antonykun]

True, but the discussion is about d-air meteors, not just d-air utility. Wario and Villager have amazing utility with d-air but they aren't the best spikes so it doesn't really matter to an extent in this discussion.

well-

You know meteors are more lethal in general when even Zelda's weak dair can be lethal. And another likely reason for the riskiness of meteors is likely the huge hitstun that results from failing the tech.

Actually, aside from 64 and it's ridiculous blockstun, I can't think of a lot of dairs that are actually very good in neutral throughout the series, and the few that are tend to be benefitted by the traits of the character using them, like Peach's floating, Meta Knight's multi-jumps or being really safe on a fastfaller (not to mention 64 and Melee's L-cancelling).

The only real standout dairs in my mind are /'s and 's.

And I think it's kind of hilarious how Mewtwo kicks his opponents upwards when he sourspots his.

^
|
(sorry for the shout-out)
even still the fact that Villager only has a 33% chance of d-airing due to both how the move works and Villager's floatiess villager gets another chance to land another D-air which that might be a 3 turnip spike which is more than what most spikes can ask for on top of being one of if not the fastest d-air meteor in the game

 

[LiteralGrill]

so we just had a discussion on d-airs and meteors without mentioning Villager once?
well that sucks

Even worse, without Mii Swordfighter? (I know he 'doesn't actually exist' but still )

 

[Mazdamaxsti]

Even worse, without Mii Swordfighter? (I know he 'doesn't actually exist' but still )

what's a me swordy???

I didn't even think about mii swordsman, his d-air is def good. How strong is the spike on it?

 

[TriTails]

A meteor utility is also important. Luigi's D-air is better than Mario's F-air because the latter is slow and laggy, and Luigi can spam it offstage as long as he still has his double jump and Cyclone rise and still make it back from the depths of hell.

Luigi's D-air is also a combo tool when unteched, and SHFF D-air works great. SHAC F-air + D-air can be used to create basically lagless walls of hitbox (Albeit, it has to be frame perfect).

For what it's worth, D-throw D-air still works, just less effective. D-air chaingrab strings pretty much has vanished tho. But for gimping, the sourspot sends people at semi-spike angle and jumped D-air catches so much recoveries, and is deadly due to how low Luigi can go.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

If we are talking about d-air meteors, I think the best ones go to .

Kirby's meteor is small but it true combos into footstool unless they're a mega-floaty, all hits link to the last hit (meteor) also, which means he technically has a meteor with about 18 active frames. This can kill at 0% if you're low enough and demolishes no hitbox recoveries.

Falcon's kills early, has little recovery, and can be landed after an air dodge bait. The sourspot also kills stupidly early as well, and the hitbox is pretty big.

Ryu's is obvious. Strong spike with combos into it.

Some other good ones I would think ( could be wrong) are good are and simply for the strength and the area they cover, and for the speed (comes out on frame 10). Thoughts?

You were spot on until Palutena. Her Dair is really bad.

 

[LightLV]

Marth's not a fair comparison considering the hitbox, so let's go to Ike whose Dair is pretty much the same hit-wise. Ike's has the same hit frame, same active frames, and the same 15% sweet-spot. The difference? Ike's does 15% no matter what since he doesn't have a sweet-spot/sour-spot for damage on his Dair, the growth on the regular hit is 10 more to Roy's 90 - not much of a big deal, but it's there -, takes just 3 more frames to recover, but has 5 less frames of landing lag, and auto-cancels before 5 and after 48. I have no evidence for this, but I'm going to assume that Ike's Dair also has more range even if it's slightly, so something like maybe Marth's vs. Lucina's.

If we go purely by landing lag for the frame 16 Dair users, it's, in order of descending, Ganondorf and Roy at 28, Yoshi at 24, Falco and Ike at 23, and Captain Falcon at 21. We can argue if Captain Falcon's Dair is a bit silly - platform don't exist for him -, but that's another story. So, what we can observe not compare is that Roy's Dair has the worse landing lag and the worse auto-cancel windows. Closest to Roy's auto-cancel windows is Yoshi's before 14 and after 50. The after's just 5 frames shy of Roy's, but the before is pretty much phenomenal compared to Roy's; everyone else auto-cancels before 4 or 5 in Ike's case and after ~40: Ganondorf's after is 32, Falco's after is 38, Captain Falcon's after is 39, and Ike's is noted above at after 48. Each other Dair has merit or something "defining": Ganondorf's is just stupidly strong and cannot be teched on ground while having a good auto-cancel window, Captain Falcon's coupled with his speed, maybe a bit too generous hitbox if he uses it while landing, and his infamous speed probably makes his the most reliable while pretty safe considering the 21 frames of landing lag, Falco and Yoshi's have high active frames with differences being that Falco's cannot be teched on the ground, has the most active frames for spiking, 4 to the Capt. and Ganondorf's 3 and Ike and Roy's 2, and his high jump means he doesn't really have to worry if he decides it's a "great" idea to use Dair on-stage... Dair out of hop on the other hand... Anyway, Yoshi's isn't a spike, but can semi-spike because auto-link angle shenanigans and it does a lot of damage if you manage to connect all the hits and with the way shields were changed in 1.1.0, sort of frightening if he hits your shield, and Ike's due to the way he and his moves works, can manage to use his from footstool setups and just compared to Roy's, it's kind of better in all ways outside of Roy having better ground speed and air speed (and air mobility?) to make use of his Dair, but Roy's got much higher landing lag, worse auto-cancels, a weaker sour-spot, and shorter range? that just goes against all the good Roy's got to make his Dair work.

So, we end with this question from this observation: is Roy's Dair under-tuned?

I don't know if it's very useful to rank Dairs by their landing lag, since they're intended usually to be used offstage unless you're Ganon, who gets a good advantage from using it onstage unless its power shielded.

Of course some people have Dairs that are super useful everywhere. But we also have characters who can combo you to 40% with Ftilt and Fair, so meh. >_>

You were spot on until Palutena. Her Dair is really bad.

Palutena has no bad aerials. Her Dair is great. It's speedy and it works (which is more than you can say for most characters), and she has a really good offstage game.

 

[Mazdamaxsti]

You were spot on until Palutena. Her Dair is really bad.

Is it? I wasn't really sure about her

 

[Wintropy]

palutena's d-air is not good, at least not compared to the rest of her airs. it's kinda fast, but the hitbox isn't even that big and the sweetspot is even more unforgiving. the endlag makes it even more dangerous to use off-stage, since you've got about half a second before you can act out of it; if you've used your second jump or gone too deep to get the spike, you're at an unnecessary risk. it honestly reminds me of marth's d-air more than anything.

it's pretty good if you can use it to spike out of a warp-cancel, but otherwise it's mediocre at best. except for that very specific tech, there's no reason why you'd use it off-stage instead of her other (definitely good) airs if you're not entirely sure you can get the spike.

it's a decent move on-stage though, since you're at no risk of self-destructing if you miss, but i don't think that's really what we're discussing.

 

[Sonicninja115]

Mewtwo's dair is pretty good, it also true combos into other moves so I'm fine with it.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

Palutena has no bad aerials. Her Dair is great. It's speedy and it works

So is Little Mac's

 

[Antonykun]

Even worse, without Mii Swordfighter? (I know he 'doesn't actually exist' but still )

what's a me swordy???

I didn't even think about mii swordsman, his d-air is def good. How strong is the spike on it?

Really i don't even consider His D-air a "spike" as much as "dragging the opponent to Hell"

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Palutena's dair also has exactly 1 active frame. You need to be super precise with your timing to hit with it.

 

[wpwood]

1 active frame with decent damage and bad hit box size is not a good dair. The move has it's uses, don't misunderstand. It's just those uses are hard to get with how bad the move is. Maybe if the move gets a few more active frames and little less end lag I'll say it's a good dair. Until then it's a bad dair.

 

[DunnoBro]

Her bair and uair are "great" aerials. Fair is... "okay". Being quick, safe frontal aerial coverage is pretty big. So while it isn't that strong or absurd it is an above average tool for coverage reasons I think.

Having a bad dair doesn't mean your aerials aren't great honestly. (See Sheik, ZSS, Ness)

 

[Amadeus9]

It's pretty rare I see someone who hasn't mained palu at some point say something correct about palu

but yeah dair is really bad

 

[Nobie]

Mewtwo's Dair can actually hit below the platform, and it's actually slightly stronger than Captain Falcon's (faster too, but with fewer active frames).

 

[Y2Kay]

Wanna know how to beat ten year olds with Kirby? Just throw them off stage off stage and dair! Worked everytime, back in the day.....

I swear Kirby's dair is my favorite.

 

[wpwood]

All Palu's aerials are great aside from dair. I say fair or bair or her best best moves. Uair can kill, but it is harder to land. Fair and bair get used way more often because they're good enough for that and can rack up damage pretty well.

 

[Mario766]

I just want a 14 active frame d air on Ike again...

 

[Vipermoon]

Zelda has a top tier Dair. Low landing lag for any aerial at that damage level, short hop autocancel, 16% damage or it has many active frames of the weaker 4 or 5% spike (which will jab lock, lead into a footstool, or another Dair depending on application). Its end lag is low for a Dair.

Even the rising autocancel Dair combos into all of her extremely powerful aerials or another Dair. Landing Dair obviously has the same deadly combos into aerials except with move leeway. Or combo into any of her tilts, smash attacks, grab. Even a tech can be punished with landing lag this low. Landing Dair into full hop elevator combo is my favorite.

Total frames 44
4, 5, or 16%
Frame 14 (16%) and 15-24
Landing lag 18
Autocancel on 1-3 and 40

There's only one 16% frame but it's extremely easy to connect. Her hitboxes are very generous throughout the entire move.

This Dair would be broken on most characters.

 

[meleebrawler]

Even worse, without Mii Swordfighter? (I know he 'doesn't actually exist' but still )

Or how about Cloud, who REALLY doesn't exist yet? (Seriously his dair looks like it'll put all the other thrusting dairs to shame, unless he has killer landing lag on it.)

what's a me swordy???

I didn't even think about mii swordsman, his d-air is def good. How strong is the spike on it?

The spike itself isn't strong but the autolinks drag the opponent down. Same deal with Kirby (and Mewtwo's nair).

 

[Man Li Gi]

"dragging the opponent to Hell"

Ganon has that trait the best tho. His move goes through shields, autowins, and is somewhat generous with the hit box. FC is very important to Ganon mains.

 

[Thinkaman]

Is DH dair the only dair in the game that is pretty much trash as an aerial, but frankly fantastic as a SH option? The only comparable SH dairs are Zelda and I guess Diddy? Zelda's is higher reward in virtually all cases, but Duck Hunt's is by far the safest.

An optimal DH SHFFAC fresh dair is -5 on block and -4 on optimal (worst-case) spotdodge. That's... really good, particularly since we're talking about a move that leads to ~25% total in the base case. The only down side is that it's a close range frame 14 move, and that Duck Hunt dealing 25% is like any other character doing 15%..

 

[DunnoBro]

Mario's dair is the only one with similar utility, but it's due to how active it is and his mobility. DH's dair is great even in a vaccuum. At least in terms of connecting, the reward is so inconsistent.

If it was stronger so it functioned like it does for floaties on EVERYONE then it'd be good. (Puts them at an angle where they can't air dodge, dragon punch, or jump away as uair beats all of those for one reason or another.)

The most similar comparison would be to brawl ganon's dair. Stuffs certain approaches/attacks and sets up for combos.

 

[outfoxd]

Is DH dair the only dair in the game that is pretty much trash as an aerial, but frankly fantastic as a SH option? The only comparable SH dairs are Zelda and I guess Diddy? Zelda's is higher reward in virtually all cases, but Duck Hunt's is by far the safest.

An optimal DH SHFFAC fresh dair is -5 on block and -4 on optimal (worst-case) spotdodge. That's... really good, particularly since we're talking about a move that leads to ~25% total in the base case. The only down side is that it's a close range frame 14 move, and that Duck Hunt dealing 25% is like any other character doing 15%..

It seems to hit shields pretty hard too, but I'm not sure. I want to find some way to set up shield breaks but idk.

 

[BBP]

Hands???: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKZLbc0H64c

 

[Mr. Johan]

Is DH dair the only dair in the game that is pretty much trash as an aerial, but frankly fantastic as a SH option?

Peach Dair would count, wouldn't it? Float Dair is technically done out of a short hop first, and Peach won't exactly be trying to land with the move.

 

[DunnoBro]

I want to find some way to set up shield breaks but idk.

When they grab the ledge, trick shot > buffer smash toss frisbee. This leaves the can in place and hovers the frisbee nearby, if they standard get-up go over and dair while activating frisbee and mash for can, you need to ensure you get ONE shot to hit their shield before exploding. Luckily, just mashing is often enough to accomplish this in a ledge hang situation.

But, in this situation they're more likely to hang there. The frisbee's position is crucial and hanging even a little bit disallows this to work. It's better to just go for the dair and then fsmash if they still didn't get up. It's likely to poke with all the shield damage and they can't roll behind you because of the can. Or it can catch their jump/hang/get-up raw.

Peach Dair would count, wouldn't it? Float Dair is technically done out of a short hop first, and Peach won't exactly be trying to land with the move.

Definitely in the same vein at least. Completely forgot about it.

 

[Halifax?]

I love all zoning characters except for Rosalina & Luma. In a rushdown centered meta, why does she perform so well? I want to know. Melee Marth's top tier but struggles to kill sometimes whereas she kills whenever. Is this why?

 

[Thinkaman]

Peach dair is, by frame timings, the second safest aerial in the game after Sheik fair. FAF, landing lag and auto-cancel windows (relative to the final hitbox) are really, really good. (8, 13, and 7 respectively.)

 

[Antonykun]

I love all zoning characters except for Rosalina & Luma. In a rushdown centered meta, why does she perform so well? I want to know. Melee Marth's top tier but struggles to kill sometimes whereas she kills whenever. Is this why?

luma has frame data to rivals the likes of sheik and kills like a heavy.
imagine if Melee marth had frame 3 jabs and and upair that always tippered

 

[Routa]

luma has frame data to rivals the likes of sheik and kills like a heavy.
imagine if Melee marth had frame 3 jabs and and upair that always tippered

Oh and don't forget the meat shield.

 

[LancerStaff]

The logic in saying "I think smash 4 is balanced for FFA" is fine. Your opinion is valid, and you bring up points of "balance."

The logic in using "they didn't say they didn't do prioritize FFA balance" to support "Smash 4 prioritizes FFA balanced [fact]" is irrational.

The truth is, we don't know the developer's intention unless we talk to the developer. And even then, they could lie to us, we can choose not to believe them, and you're still stuck at square 1.

Pro tip for life: you never truly know someone's intentions, even if you ask them.

The logic is that the game is actually more balanced for FFAs, and that they haven't done a thing to say otherwise doesn't hurt it whatsoever.

Either A: They tried to make both "equal" but they ended up with 1v1s as the lesser of the two and have done little to even them out (such as nerfing the heck out of Sheik or giving Zelda a neutral, yaknow the whole casuals don't care about balance thing) in the year since, or B: They just prioritized FFAs, like they did in the promotional materia, every other Smash game ever, and even made the 1v1 button smaller then the FFA button. Either way, the game is currently prioritized to FFAs regardless of intent. Assuming that the game conforms to this priority is completely sane.

Unless you have a reason to believe FFAs aren't balanced, which I would gladly like to hear because nobody's made an attempt to go for the jugular of my argument. But also remember you're the instigator here. I brought up the idea that Rosalina and Luma were designed to be at minimum usable in FFAs, which wasn't really opposed. It wasn't until somebody else attempted to call me out did this argument start, and you're perpetuating it by calling it a fallacy.

 

[TheMiSP]

Well, 's dair is also good when you have gyro setups into it.

 

[Wintermelon43]

Wanna know how to beat ten year olds with Kirby? Just throw them off stage off stage and dair! Worked everytime, back in the day.....

I swear Kirby's dair is my favorite.

And how to beat a for glory little mac:

1:Go to the edge of the stage

2:Shield

3:Little Mac will Side-B off the stage and die.

 

[Trifroze]

This is out of nowhere, but someone mentioned a while back that ZSS is one of the characters who really benefits from rage.

I honestly think it's the exact opposite. You absolutely cannot go for grabs anymore so her 2x uair to up b combo cheesing characters off the top is as irrelevant as it is relevant, up b in general completely stops connecting properly removing your only true OoS option, utilt stops connecting properly, fsmash becomes less reliable, fair becomes less reliable, dthrow stops leading into uair kills at high percents if you do go for/get a grab, and the only relevant moves that objectively benefit from rage are bair, uair and flip kick.

You really have to play her to just genuinely feel how your options start decreasing as your percent increases, which is of course much more apparent in some MUs than others. For anyone skeptical, I suggest ZSS dittos. It's silly when you're both at 120%+ and all you can do is back airs, and connecting with an up b generally means you're the one who will die.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

luma has frame data to rivals the likes of sheik and kills like a heavy.
imagine if Melee marth had frame 3 jabs and and upair that always tippered

Luma's frame data is way, way worse than Sheik's. Luma kills well but also does horrible damage, and Luma doesn't exactly extend its "limbs" very far when it attacks. I think literally every one of Luma's moves is really unsafe on block too; if Luma is pressuring you without Rosalina being there, you probably have windows where you can just kill Luma.

Again, I'm not saying Rosalina is bad (she's very good), but I think a lot of people really overestimate what she can do mostly just a drastic overestimation of her speed since she's really not a fast character in any way at all. She's actually a pretty well balanced character in the current build; she's super punishing to opponents who don't know what to do, but seeing as she requires a substantial effort investment to play at a high enough level to take advantage of that, that's a reasonable dynamic for her to have.

 

[LightLV]

PSA

palu's dair is bad

sorry

as you were

The logic is that the game is actually more balanced for FFAs, and that they haven't done a thing to say otherwise doesn't hurt it whatsoever.

Either A: They tried to make both "equal" but they ended up with 1v1s as the lesser of the two and have done little to even them out (such as nerfing the heck out of Sheik or giving Zelda a neutral, yaknow the whole casuals don't care about balance thing) in the year since, or B: They just prioritized FFAs, like they did in the promotional materia, every other Smash game ever, and even made the 1v1 button smaller then the FFA button. Either way, the game is currently prioritized to FFAs regardless of intent. Assuming that the game conforms to this priority is completely sane.

Unless you have a reason to believe FFAs aren't balanced, which I would gladly like to hear because nobody's made an attempt to go for the jugular of my argument. But also remember you're the instigator here. I brought up the idea that Rosalina and Luma were designed to be at minimum usable in FFAs, which wasn't really opposed. It wasn't until somebody else attempted to call me out did this argument start, and you're perpetuating it by calling it a fallacy.

......siighh....

 

[Trifroze]

That's a fine option-select you have there.

The game is balanced mainly for FFAs because all the balance changes point towards it

Someone brings up how this is untrue because character x is clearly really good in FFAs and still keeps getting buffs

It's because they're bad at FFAs, proving balance changes are made with mainly FFAs in mind

???????????????????