Character Competitive Impressions

[Ffamran]

all it sound like to me is that ur trying to use falco one way or the other. as in rush down or spacer but where his dominance lies is in his pokes.
blaster is probably the most annoying projectile in the game when used intelligently
falco preffers to be just out side opponents range when going qcq to effectivly punish. not to say he is a punish character though.( but crazy d tilt kills are awsome) falco just needs to understand his range.
and where hes effective. (somthing i dont see any falco player use is up throw where he can effectivly fish and trap\punish air dodges for the kill at higher percents since falco most dominate trait is not his horizontal chases but his vertical he can be sereiously threating from below)
falcos run speed is not to much of an issue since seriously he dose not have the strogest ground chase options anyway. other than dash attack/grab witch both have a rediculous amount of followups unlike any of falcos ariels bar uair and nair witch are not horizontal chase options.

falcos problem is not his stats since they are pretty spectacular in that all his moves have are great amount of use. it more that falco is a honest character with moves that other player can reasonably respond to. So its more on the player to shake up his play style to surprise and not the character *shiek*
falco is a character i see going up in usage once people understand that that honest dose not mean telegraphed.

plus falco is a certafied BA come on.

ps. what with this hate on foxes voice? sure its worse than brawl but like his melee voice is terrible the game where he was a very popular pic.

also come on bro iv probably never once not defended falco of being bad iv been in this thread a bit and thought you would know that i advocate falcos awsomness left and right man. *sniff* i thought wees was cool bruh.

I know Falco's strengths since I tend to visit his section a lot. I think I have a good technical understanding of him, but I lack an instinctual understanding. I know little about Ike's, Wolf's, Ganondorf's, and Fox's technical stuff, but I sure as hell know how to use them.

This goes back to real life as a martial artist. Oh, you can do side kicks, roundhouses, crescent kicks, supermen punches, Wing Chun stuff, axe kicks, etc., but that's nothing when you're fighting. Can you apply them? Do you know your range? Because of this, I tend to revert back to boxing since it's simple and it's been drilled into me over and over. One-two, hook, if this was a street fight, then stomp his foot or kick his knee in, etc.

I know what Falco's moves can do, but it's that instinct that's lacking. Over and over I'm doing stuff I shouldn't and not doing things I should. Fair on stage; should of done Bair or Nair. Side Smash; should have done Down Smash. Maybe I'm over-thinking things which I don't with everyone else. Hell, my game plan as Luigi, Sonic, Captain Falcon, and Shulk is to screw around. Anyway, I digress.

Fox's voice is annoying to me. It's also high-pitched and high-pitched voices irritate me. Fox in Brawl was perfect.

The defense thing is more of shoving Falco's bread down people's throats. Sure, not a lot of people talk about him, but I don't want to come off as this self-righteous -bleep-hat towards people. I want to defend him, but not like a freaking crusader.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

I know Falco's strengths since I tend to visit his section a lot. I think I have a good technical understanding of him, but I lack an instinctual understanding. I know little about Ike's, Wolf's, Ganondorf's, and Fox's technical stuff, but I sure as hell know how to use them.

This goes back to real life as a martial artist. Oh, you can do side kicks, roundhouses, crescent kicks, supermen punches, Wing Chun stuff, axe kicks, etc., but that's nothing when you're fighting. Can you apply them? Do you know your range? Because of this, I tend to revert back to boxing since it's simple and it's been drilled into me over and over. One-two, hook, if this was a street fight, then stomp his foot or kick his knee in, etc.

I know what Falco's moves can do, but it's that instinct that's lacking. Over and over I'm doing stuff I shouldn't and not doing things I should. Fair on stage; should of done Bair or Nair. Side Smash; should have done Down Smash. Maybe I'm over-thinking things which I don't with everyone else. Hell, my game plan as Luigi, Sonic, Captain Falcon, and Shulk is to screw around. Anyway, I digress.

Fox's voice is annoying to me. It's also high-pitched and high-pitched voices irritate me. Fox in Brawl was perfect.

The defense thing is more of shoving Falco's bread down people's throats. Sure, not a lot of people talk about him, but I don't want to come off as this self-righteous -bleep-hat towards people. I want to defend him, but not like a freaking crusader.

fk u ill white knight him like ganon and samus too.

 

[Ffamran]

fk u ill white knight him like ganon and samus too.

But Ganondorf's evil. I think he'd prefer a Darknut or an Iron Knuckle. Something more... sinister.

Speaking of Samus, I don't see, well I haven't fought a lot of good Samus's - mostly spammers -, but how's her Zair? Oh, and Link's, Toon Link's, and ZSS's Zair as well. I don't see them being used often. I might be remembering wrong, but Zair for Link and Toon Link were important tools in Brawl from what I heard.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

But Ganondorf's evil. I think he'd prefer a Darknut or an Iron Knuckle. Something more... sinister.

Speaking of Samus, I don't see, well I haven't fought a lot of good Samus's - mostly spammers -, but how's her Zair? Oh, and Link's, Toon Link's, and ZSS's Zair as well. I don't see them being used often. I might be remembering wrong, but Zair for Link and Toon Link were important tools in Brawl from what I heard.

zairs are weaker but great for spacing like really great. but most people are un practiced or un seasoned to it. it need more exploration. and yeah spamming and samus dont go to well.

 

[Ffamran]

zairs are weaker but great for spacing like really great. but most people are un practiced or un seasoned to it. it need more exploration. and yeah spamming and samus dont go to well.

Spamming in general does not go well with... Everything, except food. Spam tastes great.

Hmm... That makes sense since it's kind of early in the release. Granted - man, I've been used "granted" a lot -, not using one of your tools is wasteful even if it's just one of those spur of the moments like Falco's Dair. Anyway, what can they do out of Zair and how much of a reward is it? I can see ZSS using it well 'cause she's fast, but Samus's Zair kind of feels slow.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

Spamming in general does not go well with... Everything, except food. Spam tastes great.

Hmm... That makes sense since it's kind of early in the release. Granted - man, I've been used "granted" a lot -, not using one of your tools is wasteful even if it's just one of those spur of the moments like Falco's Dair. Anyway, what can they do out of Zair and how much of a reward is it? I can see ZSS using it well 'cause she's fast, but Samus's Zair kind of feels slow.

frame wise their the same. all zairs have 4 frames of lag yup 4 good luck trying to make that sound bad. believe it or not zzs probably has no use for is for oyher than area contol witch means alot less considering her character arc type.
the rest of the zair user can use it for effective frame traps considering thier ranged moves and options expecially since that three of them appropriate having thier space. and frame trapping with samus when she has a full charge? yeah.....

 

[Vengeance_NS]

How do you guys feel wario does against the perceived top tiers(Shiek, Diddy, rosalina, sonic, ness, yoshi, falcon, fox,and lucario)?

I feel he's even with Diddy , ness, rosalina, falcon

Beats sonic, lucario, fox

Loses to Shiek and yoshi

 

[Road Death Wheel]

How do you guys feel wario does against the perceived top tiers(Shiek, Diddy, rosalina, sonic, ness, yoshi, falcon, fox,and lucario)?

I feel he's even with Diddy , ness, rosalina, falcon

Beats sonic, lucario, fox

Loses to Shiek and yoshi

big claims care to explain?

 

[Kofu]

As far as I know Samus's ZAir is much worse in this game, doing pitiful damage and having a bit of an awkward hitbox. To be fair, 4% sourspot and 7% sweetspot on a move with that range, priority, and such minimal landing lag was a little silly. Its only shortcoming was that it was exempt from the stale move queue which prevented it from refreshing her other moves. If it did that, and it was on a character other than Samus, it would be a contender for the best move in Brawl (IMO). But I digress. The new ZAir does, what, 1-2%? It's still a good spacing tool but is nowhere near as dominant as Brawl's incarnation.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Wario vs Sonic / Fox are both even imo.

 

[Real Smooth-Like]

Eh... I'm not going to say much more, cause after testing some things, I feel you probably know Charizard better than me. Maybe I have to give him another chance. However, I will say that I'm not sure how you're getting the percentages. Unless the Wii U version is very different than the 3DS version, Flare Blitz isn't killing for me until about 115-120 on Mario. Bair isn't killing till way after 100 even sweetspotted. Offstage is a different story, but a good chunk of the game's Bairs will kill you offstage, so that's not unique.

Also, I feel that most of the situations you give for flareblitzing are off of reads, and most characters could do as much with a read or more. With Flamethrower pushing you back, its potential damage is a bit too low for the commitment it takes.

If you haven't watched this already I'd suggest that you watch it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipXpPPwrFMg Hopefully it will rekindle the flames of your love for Charizard.

Trela vs Denti Literally the only form of Charizard hype in a video haha. Charizard starts at 11:30ish. You may say that a lot of Charizard's success in this match comes from MU inexperience... And I'd have to agree with you. But keep in mind Charizard isn't even Trela's main. And also keep in mind that a top player Shiek, a character that's a tried and true top tier threat, is losing to a Charizard, perceived by most to be a bottom 10 character. That's all I have to say.

 

[Smog Frog]

i still demand explanation as to why charizard's bottom tier, he's mid to me

 

[madworlder]

I want to suggest that there are far fewer tiers in this game than any list I have seen so far would suggest. Very balanced games use as few as two tiers to separate the good characters from the bad, and from what I can tell, I would opine that at the moment there are probably three tiers-

S - strong characters
A - average characters
B - unexplored/below average characters

Right now, I don't think any character is of invalidating strength, although that could certainly change if discoveries are made that make Diddy (or another character) stronger. From what I have played and seen, even "bottom ten characters" can certainly compete against the best, and honestly, I think the gap between the weakest and strongest characters is closing instead of expanding.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

That was the intent Sakurai was likely going for in this installment: make every newcomer bring something truly new to the table. (Except and , because reasons I guess). was probably the easiest to bring in due to Smash as-of-then lacking one of the big points of Fire Emblem.

It just turned out that the big point would be constructed as a weakness, so Sakurai gave Robin basically one of, if not the strongest (in KB values) aerial kit in the game with the Levin Sword as compensation.

...
How can you even begin to say DHD doesnt' bring anything new to the series?

I mean come on.

 

[LunarWingCloud]

i still demand explanation as to why charizard's bottom tier, he's mid to me

His moves have a lot of startup which make him pretty easy to shield. He's also slow as molasses and easier to combo and punish. It's sort of hard for a character like him to be higher than low-mid when your moves take a year to hit your opponent.

He does have Flare Blitz but that causes recoil which lowers his survivability despite his weight.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

Soooo.. about that whole Shulk vs Robin thing? Anyone willing to finish that discussion because I'm genuinely interested to see how these characters fare against each other.

@Raziek Post the damn write-up already.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

How do people feel about greninja? I'm thinking he may be really bad.

 

[Smog Frog]

His moves have a lot of startup which make him pretty easy to shield. He's also slow as molasses and easier to combo and punish. It's sort of hard for a character like him to be higher than low-mid when your moves take a year to hit your opponent.

He does have Flare Blitz but that causes recoil which lowers his survivability despite his weight.

alright, the only moves i can think of with significant starting lag are flare blitz, fsmash, rock smash, and dair. he doesnt take a year to hit the opponent. and you dont flare blitz into a shield like a ******, you wait for a punish(which imo he has the best punish game of anyone in the cast) and flare blitz damage is minimal when you consider he can live to ludicrous percents by properly using rock smash(it's not uncommon for a good zard to live to 180% before he finally kicks the bucket). he also has safe kill setups(jab-upb, dtilt-blitz, and his down throw is a kill move, albeit kind of late). and he's actually pretty floaty for a heavyweight, so he isnt as easy to combo as other heavyweights.

 

[KlefkiHolder]

Zard isnt that slow on the ground.

IIRC he's faster than Pikachu, Yoshi. Something like 7th fastest (time to check!).

Still, his air speed is pretty bad, but with Dragon Rush he gains some serious maneuverability due to the nature of the move and how little end lag it has. The ability of it to cross up on shield is pretty fantastic. It's also great for Luma killing.

Rock Smash is a fantastic move imo. The amount of armor on that thing is so scary and if you get lucky with it it can go all Melee Peach Down Smash on you with over 30%. One of his Custom Up B's kills insanely early. I remember it killing Mario from the center of FD at like 65%, but I'd need to check up on the data I collected back in the 3DS version. Also, I think it had another even stronger sweetspot, so it gives Zard a great OoS option for killing. Very punishable, but also a very high reward. It also gave him a weak vertical recovery, but with his midair jumps and Dragon Rush his recovery is still solid with it.

However, his lack of autocancels from SH is very, very bad, especially when each of them have poor landing lag (except Nair, which already AC's, but its AC window is small). Also Rock Smash is very punishable of whiff, and has serious endlag so it needs to be used with moderation.

Basically, Zard wants to be able to choose his 4 moves like he can in Pokemon haha

EDIT: Zard is the 8th fastest, right after Shiek (7) and before MK (9).

And on the custom Up B:

Rising Cyclone + Dragon Rush is really good. RC can make up for the lack of kill power of DR very easily, and is still a good recovery when coupled with DR's horizontal distance.

I was able to kill Mario off the top blast zone of FD starting at 75% with RC with the side hitboxes, and that is with NO rage (Tested with Heart Containers to get rid of rage). Seriously, this thing is really powerful. However, there were times when I didn't sweet spot it, and even more interesting, if I hit Mario right on top of him (So, Zard's lower torso) I got a much stronger hit that started to kill at 64%, same conditions, no rage. This move kills VERY early.

EDIT: After doing some more testing, it seems his head and the tip of his wings is the sourspot. If you hit there then you'll be less effective than if you were using normal Fly. Good thing here is that its easy to avoid sourspotting with the move.

The main sweeptspot isn't quite as strong as I remember, but the stronger sweetspot that I was talking about was in the ballpark of what I thought the side sweetspot was.

Should be worth noting that this was in the 3DS version, and I tested on Mario from the spawn spot of FD (the middle). Post is here

 

[Hippieslayer]

which characters are worse than zard then? wanna betcha we could make similar cases for them?

people always say "nah x character isn't low tier", the only exception to this rule is Swordfighter, it always makes me wonder which characters those people actually think are the ****y ones

could smogfrog and klefki please list all the characters they think are worse than zard?

 

[Sinister Slush]

...
How can you even begin to say DHD doesnt' bring anything new to the series?

I mean come on.

Watching DHD made me feel a Snake vibe outside of the ridiculous kill/damage move that is Utilt and Ftilt

 

[~ Gheb ~]

@Raziek Post the damn write-up already.

Lemme grab my popcorn first though.

 

[Captain Norris]

People think SwordFighter is very low tier? Could someone explain why, for I didn't know this was the case.

 

[Antonykun]

people always say "nah x character isn't low tier", the only exception to this rule is Swordfighter,

I'm probably the closest one to saying that Swordfighter isn't low tier but I'm not because I realized being low tiered means very little if you are still a good character.
While this has never happened in the smash bros series as far as I know, I play a lot of the card game Yomi. In the unofficial tier list that people make from time to time there are always these two characters who are ranked the lowest. While those two are the weakest they are still strong enough to win tournament.
This is essentially how i feel about the low tiers: They may not be the strongest but they are certainly not Melee Kirby and they can and will win if used skillfully enough.
@ Captain Norris
I posted this a few pages ago if you're interested

The Swordfighter has plenty of weaknesses and non strengths that made most people write them of as horrible characters with very little testing.
Here are some of their weaknesses:
-Low mobility (taller than short Miis)
-Laggy Moves (Tall Miis): This means very few combos
-Poor Range (Shorter than Default Miis)
-Horrible Recovery (a bit mitigated by Airborne Assault)
-Bad Killing Moves that take hard reads to use)
-Most moves require some serious precision
-Cannot be used in for Glory

But at the same time the Swordfighter has some crazy strength
-Ridiculous u-air: deals 16 damage,disjointed, fast and can kill at 100%
-Kirby's D-air spike (not as good though)
-Shuriken of Light Camping (SoL is better than uncharged Water Shuriken)
-Jab Combos/U-tilt Combo (Short Miis)
-Good/Great/Amazing Mobility (Thin/Short/Short-Thin Miis)
-Good Range (Tall Mii)
-Strong Footsie Game
-A Reflector (this is the one everyone agrees with)

While there is plenty wrong with the Swordfighter there is also plenty right with them too. I genuinely believe that the swordfighter can go very far with the right skills.

Hope that helps

 

[Deathcarter]

which characters are worse than zard then? wanna betcha we could make similar cases for them?

people always say "nah x character isn't low tier", the only exception to this rule is Swordfighter, it always makes me wonder which characters those people actually think are the ****y ones

Lucina's considered to be pretty bad (that........really awful tier list 2-3 pages back aside). Dr. Mario is also largely considered to be low tier even by his defenders. No one has really suggested Zelda is mid tier either; even the posters I've seen speak positively of her didn't really comment on her in terms of tier rankings. Kirby and Wii Fit Trainer have their defenders but the outlook of them looks pretty bleak overall. Ganondorf and Dedede are interesting in that they are considered characters of absolute extremes, terrible in certain contexts but terrifying in others, so opinion of them goes from mid tier all the way to bottom.

That's what I've picked up in this thread so far.

 

[Smog Frog]

zelda, doc, swardfiter, kirby, gdubs, wii fit trainer, junior, mario, samus, d3 are imo all worse than zard

zelda- sucks at approaching, and cant force one because her projectiles are ****

doc- if he were faster he might be better, but as it stands he's too ****ing slow

swardfiter- its been explained to death earlier

kirby- read zelda, minus projectiles

gdubs- he lost his kill power, and unlike sheik he cant camp the cast AND he's really light

wft- ******* win this mu 95-5

junior- he's supposed to be a zoning character afaik but mechakoopas can be used against you and the cannonball is too slow to be of use

samus- what good normals does she have?

d3- a fatty, like zard, lives forever, like zard, but doesnt have phenomenal punish game, unlike zard(a little better defensively tho)

i wouldnt say ganon is worse than zard because 1) i use ganon as well so bias and 2) his punish game takes a small read and can potentially turn it into a stock

 

[Chuva]

What exactly is a "gdubs"?

 

[Nidtendofreak]

which characters are worse than zard then? wanna betcha we could make similar cases for them?

people always say "nah x character isn't low tier", the only exception to this rule is Swordfighter, it always makes me wonder which characters those people actually think are the ****y ones

could smogfrog and klefki please list all the characters they think are worse than zard?

Similar cases could be made for them for sure (far too early in the game to be super confident about anything), but I would absolutely put Swordfighter Mii, Mario, Dr.Mario, Kirby, Zelda all under Charizard at the moment. Samus and D3 I don't know enough about for me to say one way or another. WFT I suspect is around the same level as Charizard but I don't know if I'd rank her higher or lower. Olimar is a complete mystery to me who I have no clue how to rank, could be lower could be higher. I personally think Luigi is mad overrated and overrepresented/people haven't figured out how to fight him yet and that he'll end up under Charizard, but I know I'm in the minority on that right now.

I think people don't respect Rock Smash, Flare Blitz, and his off stage game enough. He's not a great character by any means, but he's floating above the bottom 5. He actually has tools I feel like I need to watch out for. Not so much with some of the other guys I listed.

 

[Smog Frog]

What exactly is a "gdubs"?

mr. game and watch

Similar cases could be made for them for sure (far too early in the game to be super confident about anything), but I would absolutely put Swordfighter Mii, Mario, Dr.Mario, Kirby, Zelda all under Charizard at the moment. Samus and D3 I don't know enough about for me to say one way or another. WFT I suspect is around the same level as Charizard but I don't know if I'd rank her higher or lower. Olimar is a complete mystery to me who I have no clue how to rank, could be lower could be higher. I personally think Luigi is mad overrated and overrepresented/people haven't figured out how to fight him yet and that he'll end up under Charizard, but I know I'm in the minority on that right now.

I think people don't respect Rock Smash, Flare Blitz, and his off stage game enough. He's not a great character by any means, but he's floating above the bottom 5. He actually has tools I feel like I need to watch out for. Not so much with some of the other guys I listed.

olimar in the wii u version is definitely better than zard because pikmin dont randomly suicide and you can actually do smash attacks to punish. i actually think he's top 10 in wii u, but thats another topic for another day.

 

[Mr. Johan]

...
How can you even begin to say DHD doesnt' bring anything new to the series?

I mean come on.

At the risk of moving goalposts, something new? Sure.

Something unique? Eh. He's Snake Lite with a duck and crosshairs in place of a disjointed sword.

Compared to other newcomers who come with different fighting style mechanics, like Rosalina's puppet master style, Get-Off-My-Ground Little Mac, Bowser Jr. with two different weights simultaneously, Robin's finite special kit, What-Is-CQC? Megaman, and Palutena's/Mii Fighters smorgasbord of unique special moves, and Duck Hunt doesn't really have anything that is literally outstanding. Same goes for Greninja (and Pac-Man, now that I think of it, unless you want to give the Fire Hydrant enough credit as a constant space control tool).

 

[Thinkaman]

TIL the character with the game's worst KO options is basically Snake.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

As far as I know Samus's ZAir is much worse in this game, doing pitiful damage and having a bit of an awkward hitbox. To be fair, 4% sourspot and 7% sweetspot on a move with that range, priority, and such minimal landing lag was a little silly. Its only shortcoming was that it was exempt from the stale move queue which prevented it from refreshing her other moves. If it did that, and it was on a character other than Samus, it would be a contender for the best move in Brawl (IMO). But I digress. The new ZAir does, what, 1-2%? It's still a good spacing tool but is nowhere near as dominant as Brawl's incarnation.

zairs do strictly 4 percent now witch while not good is not to bad has well. this goes 4 all zairs and not just samus though.

 

[Nobie]

I think the tricky thing about ranking Lucina is that while she's not as strong as Marth she still has most of his properties. Played in an ideal (perhaps impossible?) manner, Marth should almost never get hit, and this should also translate to Lucina. The issue with Lucina is that she takes longer to kill on average, and so because we're not all perfect machines she has more "opportunities" to mess up and get wrecked. However, if Marth has the advantage versus a particular character, I think it's unlikely that Lucina will somehow be disadvantaged except for maybe against super heavyweights like Bowser (just an example; I don't know what the Marth matchup vs. Bowser is like).

 

[David Viran]

zairs do strictly 4 percent now witch while not good is not to bad has well. this goes 4 all zairs and not just samus though.

It depends on how you hit with zair because i'm pretty sure that if you hit with it when it's extending it does 6% or maybe that was before the update.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

It depends on how you hit with zair because i'm pretty sure that if you hit with it when it's extending it does 6% or maybe that was before the update.

if thats the case i never experienced it.

 

[Deathcarter]

I think the tricky thing about ranking Lucina is that while she's not as strong as Marth she still has most of his properties. Played in an ideal (perhaps impossible?) manner, Marth should almost never get hit, and this should also translate to Lucina. The issue with Lucina is that she takes longer to kill on average, and so because we're not all perfect machines she has more "opportunities" to mess up and get wrecked. However, if Marth has the advantage versus a particular character, I think it's unlikely that Lucina will somehow be disadvantaged except for maybe against super heavyweights like Bowser (just an example; I don't know what the Marth matchup vs. Bowser is like).

The big problem with Lucina in comparison to Marth is that she's both far less safe of shield than he is due to her hit lag and that outside of gimping, she can only kill at reasonable percentages off of foward and up smashes which require commitment while Marth can kill of of things like tipper ftilt and tipper fair at higher %s while his fsmash can kill ridiculously early when properly spaced. Marth just rewards proper spacing that much more than Lucina does in terms of both power and safety.

 

[Chuva]

Do you guys really think the 2 or so frames of disadvantage from Lucina's lack of hitlag is such a big factor to the point where she would not win matchups that Marth traditionally wins (such as vs the Marios?)

 

[Ffamran]

As far as I know Samus's ZAir is much worse in this game, doing pitiful damage and having a bit of an awkward hitbox. To be fair, 4% sourspot and 7% sweetspot on a move with that range, priority, and such minimal landing lag was a little silly. Its only shortcoming was that it was exempt from the stale move queue which prevented it from refreshing her other moves. If it did that, and it was on a character other than Samus, it would be a contender for the best move in Brawl (IMO). But I digress. The new ZAir does, what, 1-2%? It's still a good spacing tool but is nowhere near as dominant as Brawl's incarnation.

zairs do strictly 4 percent now witch while not good is not to bad has well. this goes 4 all zairs and not just samus though.

That's... All right I guess. The range seems okay, but Samus's from what I remember is kinda slow and Link suffers from stupid hit box; I think they fixed the grab hit box, but his Zair doesn't have a hit box for the claw. I remember trying to use Link's and I was dead sure that the stupid claw was hitting Ike, but nope. So, I guess SSB4 trades good hit boxes for good balancing.

Hmm, I wonder what if this happened. Samus's Grapple Beam and ZSS's plasma whip are made of energy, so what if her Zair had a shock effect while Link and Toon Link gain sweet-spots for their claw and hookshots. Samus/ZSS will have consistent damage, say, 4%, and (Toon) Link's sour-spot does 3% and sweet-spot does 6%. I don't know, just a hypothetical thing.

Wario vs Sonic / Fox are both even imo.

Jaysus, this is like the third vague comment from you. We are not omniscient nor can we read your mind. Could you explain why, because there are definitely tons of people who want to know how and why Wario's MU against Sonic and Fox are even.

 

[Captain Norris]

I'm probably the closest one to saying that Swordfighter isn't low tier but I'm not because I realized being low tiered means very little if you are still a good character.
While this has never happened in the smash bros series as far as I know, I play a lot of the card game Yomi. In the unofficial tier list that people make from time to time there are always these two characters who are ranked the lowest. While those two are the weakest they are still strong enough to win tournament.
This is essentially how i feel about the low tiers: They may not be the strongest but they are certainly not Melee Kirby and they can and will win if used skillfully enough.
@ Captain Norris
I posted this a few pages ago if you're interested

Hope that helps

Thanks loads. I never really thought of them as low, low tier. I just know the community vote tier list had them inside a chasm, which is why I was confused. Thanks again.

 

[HeoandReo]

I think the tricky thing about ranking Lucina is that while she's not as strong as Marth she still has most of his properties. Played in an ideal (perhaps impossible?) manner, Marth should almost never get hit, and this should also translate to Lucina. The issue with Lucina is that she takes longer to kill on average, and so because we're not all perfect machines she has more "opportunities" to mess up and get wrecked. However, if Marth has the advantage versus a particular character, I think it's unlikely that Lucina will somehow be disadvantaged except for maybe against super heavyweights like Bowser (just an example; I don't know what the Marth matchup vs. Bowser is like).

Bowser vs. Lucina I'm inclined to say is slightly in Lucina's favour, actually. Maybe 55/45. Bowser can kill really early, but he's also super fat, easily juggled and it's hard for him to escape when he's caught so Lucina can take advantage of these aspects to rack up damage and score kills. Marth vs. Bowser is probably around the same, maybe 6/4, again because he can press the same advantage as Lucina can, only he has much more payoff for it. Other Marth/Lucina or Bowser mains might view the match differently, but this is how it looks like from my end.

The big problem with Lucina in comparison to Marth is that she's both far less safe of shield than he is due to her hit lag and that outside of gimping, she can only kill at reasonable percentages off of foward and up smashes which require commitment while Marth can kill of of things like tipper ftilt and tipper fair at higher %s while his fsmash can kill ridiculously early when properly spaced. Marth just rewards proper spacing that much more than Lucina does in terms of both power and safety.

In my experience, the lower kill options do have an effect in terms of what the endgame for Marth and Lucina should be. For Marth, his goal is to get a tipper for a kill, and he has a lot of options for doing that - fsmash, usmash, ftilt, fair, uair, bair. For Lucina, her endgame is to bring the opponent to the ledge because that's the only conceivable situation where she can kill early, either through prediction or gimping. Marth can do this too, but he's not as dependent on this tactic as Lucina.

The lack of shield stun is kind of annoying, since there are some characters who can take advantage of that and her lower range to get punishes in. Characters like Captain Falcon and Wii Fit Trainer can just run in after an attack and punish Lucina even for breathing, which they can't do as easily for Marth. I don't think it's as big of an issue as her killpower, but it doesn't help her at all. I can think of more than a few matchups where Lucina does significantly worse than Marth due to her issues of power, range and safety.

As an example, Lucina vs. Lucario is very rough compared to Marth vs. Lucario because neutering Aura by killing Lucario early is just not a possible option for her, and she's laggy enough to mean that a single whiff costs her a stock. Imo Lucina has to play perfectly and make zero mistakes if she wants to win against Lucario, or really, the majority of the cast. Other matchups that come to mind that are notably worse for Lucina would be Ike and Link, mostly because pound for pound they outclass her in range, power and attack speed whereas Marth can still use the tipper as his great equalizer. (Marth's better range also helps too in those matchups)