Character Competitive Impressions

[Timbers]

Funny thing is, the top tier mains try to convince everyone that their characters are exploitable so that people stop crying over them :3

This happens a lot. I'm not sure if it's intentional, however. A character's player should obviously be aware of said character's weaknesses, and their emphasis on those weaknesses may be insight worth taking seriously. It's definitely beneficial to play as a character if you wish to understand how far they can be pushed. Probably more worthwhile than playing against that character.

Alternatively, people are also probably trying to downplay their character to keep the "OP" chants at a lowly simmer.

 

[HeavyLobster]

I have also wondered about this. l think he has a lot going for him, but why do people place him so low on their potential tier lists? Is it because of lack of knowledge about Bowser Jr or is he just not very good?

A little of both, mostly the former. Jr. is scary once he gets going, but getting going can be a problem due to his lack of mobility outside of Kart and his mediocre grab. He can't camp too effectively with his projectiles, which tend to be better for creating offensive traps. I'm not really sure exactly where Jr. belongs, but I'm going to say it's somewhere between low-mid and high-mid. He's just kind of an unknown because of how unusual he is.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

This happens a lot. I'm not sure if it's intentional, however. A character's player should obviously be aware of said character's weaknesses, and their emphasis on those weaknesses may be insight worth taking seriously. It's definitely beneficial to play as a character if you wish to understand how far they can be pushed. Probably more worthwhile than playing against that character.

Alternatively, people are also probably trying to downplay their character to keep the "OP" chants at a lowly simmer.

*cough*Abadango'sPac-Man*cough*

Seriously tho, if that's not inspiration to main whoever you want no matter what people tell you, I'm not sure what is.

 

[RIP_Lucas]

Funny thing is, the top tier mains try to convince everyone that their characters are exploitable so that people stop crying over them :3

It's definitely not intentional, like Timbers said, we're just very aware of our mains' weaknesses. If we go against someone else who mains our character, we know exactly what works and proceed to win pretty easily.

But to an extent, we are aware of just how good our characters are, and we take great pleasure in knowing we have an advantage going in,

I can say that because I mained Sonic in Brawl and still kicked some tail. I don't main him now because he's high tier, I main him cuz he's the most fun to play.

 

[Project Quarantine]

Did we ever get to see them before they were "fixed". I can only remember Kirby's U-throw being mentioned as seen and considered broken. I don't remember anything about Samus or Zelda. If anything, the only reason why I think the developers think Zelda's OP is because of her lightning kicks and holy hell are they wrong.

I think we can agree that developers making patches can be extremely detrimental to the game's balance, especially from a competitive perspective. I feel that they make changes based on things they think are broken, or are used commonly. A good set of examples of this are the Bowser and little Mac nerfs during the 3ds days. These two characters were not broken, but because of popularity (and perhaps developer bias) they have had their competitive viabilities severely lessened. I do hope they aren't absorbing complaints from inexperienced players who blow their horn all around the interwebs, insisting that littl Mac is the best character because he beat them in for glory.

I don't know if yall think I'm talking gibberish, but I'd like to hear your opinions on numerous character changes made by glorious nintendo.

 

[hey_there]

He may beat Robin when he gets up close, but how is he getting past the arcthunder/elthunder and arc fire wall so easily?
He can't down B through it due to the multiple hits, and trying to approach from the air gets you a free lemon sword to the moustache. It doesn't help that robin's neutrals have better range overall.

Fireball clashes with arcfire and all thunders except thoron. I regularly play against a Robin and I always keep in mind the amount of times fireball clashes with arcfire because once it's at 5 I start going in much harder. After that last arcfire is gone, Robin is combo food. Levin aerials hit stupid hard though, so it's something Luigi needs to look out for. The match up is probably in Luigi's favour.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Fireball clashes with arcfire and all thunders except thoron. I regularly play against a Robin and I always keep in mind the amount of times fireball clashes with arcfire because once it's at 5 I start going in much harder. After that last arcfire is gone, Robin is combo food. Levin aerials hit stupid hard though, so it's something Luigi needs to look out for. The match up is probably in Luigi's favour.

All the Marios in general do well against Robin because he has the worst mobility in the game and actually can't outcamp any of them reliably. Plus he's one of few characters that's really easy for them to harass offstage because his low recovery is extremely weak.

 

[Ffamran]

That's until you screw up and Robin meteors you with Elwind. What makes it meteor any way? Is it the first hit?

 

[TTTTTsd]

It's the hand I believe. If you get slapped by Robin you just go down into the dumpster basically.

 

[Lavani]

That's until you screw up and Robin meteors you with Elwind. What makes it meteor any way? Is it the first hit?

First five frames of the first Elwind shot spikes.

 

[Big O]

All the Marios in general do well against Robin because he has the worst mobility in the game and actually can't outcamp any of them reliably. Plus he's one of few characters that's really easy for them to harass offstage because his low recovery is extremely weak.

I don't think Robin's overall mobility is really that bad. On the ground his mobility is one of the worst, but in the air his mobility is actually pretty good (ranked 22-25th in air speed). With how crazy his Levin Sword aerials are and an aerial command grab, I think he has a lot of room to grow. Perhaps a more aerial based approach is the future for him.

 

[A2ZOMG]

First five frames of the first Elwind shot spikes.

Usually if Robin is in position to spike Mario or Doc, they get style points for inputting SideB. Most other situations where Robin is further away, he gets owned by N-airs and FLUDD offstage. Or in Doc/Luigi case, Tornados do work as well.

I don't think Robin's overall mobility is really that bad. On the ground his mobility is one of the worst, but in the air his mobility is actually pretty good (ranked 22-25th in air speed). With how crazy his Levin Sword aerials are and an aerial command grab, I think he has a lot of room to grow. Perhaps a more aerial based approach is the future for him.

It's not even just how fast he moves. Robin has extremely limited options to alter his aerial momentum. He's more easily juggled than Ike...to give an idea how awful his mobility options are.

 

[Nobie]

I think a lot of the nerfs from 1.0.4 had less to do with achieving some ideal state of "perfect balance" and more to do with keeping certain specific moves from dominating. While we like to think of certain tools being weakened as hurting balance, in the case of Bowser and Little Mac they seemed to be partly more quality of life things, like having Bowser use his flying slam for damage and not just to win matches through double suicide. Seriously, that move is a command grab with good KO power! Same goes for Little Mac's old ability to get 20% damage off of a single jab. People before were talking about how good Mach Tornado is for punishing, while Little Mac's was basically a 1-frame ground Mach Tornado.

It's like, if Nintendo had the chance to go back and re-balance Melee or Brawl, you'd better believe they'd get rid of wobbling and chain grabs (and in fact Smash 4 explicitly tries to do that already). No sane designer would think that keeping wobbling in for the Ice Climbers is fine just because it lets them compete with the top tiers. The real solution would be to remove wobbling and boost the Ice Climbers' strengths in other areas.

 

[Nster]

I feel that they nerfed meta knight a LOT. Also, they made Luigi a little overpowered. They also made Ike much stronger then in brawl.

 

[wedl!!]

I feel that they nerfed meta knight a LOT. Also, they made Luigi a little overpowered. They also made Ike much stronger then in brawl.

of course they'd bop mk, he's the best character in any smash game

no

not really; ike is the same just with some armor on upb

 

[Saturn_]

All the Marios in general do well against Robin because he has the worst mobility in the game and actually can't outcamp any of them reliably. Plus he's one of few characters that's really easy for them to harass offstage because his low recovery is extremely weak.

Much like 'spacie' and 'shoto', I believe the preferred term for Mario, Luigi, and Doc is 'plumbers'.

 

[Nster]

I kinda saw the backlash about meta knight coming, but you come off as a little fanboy(or girl)ish . Just because he's your brawl main doesn't mean he's the best in any game. I do think Ike has gotten more than an armor upgrade. He has a much better air game in my opinion (although it's still not great.) He also does more damage ( I killed a pikachu player at 30% with his up smash yesterday.)

 

[Makorel]

Much like 'spacie' and 'shoto', I believe the preferred term for Mario, Luigi, and Doc is 'plumbers'.

Spacies, Swordies, Shorties, Spaghetties.

Also what is a "shoto"?

 

[A2ZOMG]

of course they'd bop mk, he's the best character in any smash game

no

not really; ike is the same just with some armor on upb

Ike is literally the most changed character from Brawl...just saying. Plays waaaaay more different from Brawl than any other returning character except Olimar probably.

SH autocancel F-air
Tilts are actually incredibly good for spacing
Jab is universally much weaker and not very good for Jab cancels anymore though still strong in neutral
Super strong grab game with amazing combo and trap followups

 

[Saturn_]

Spacies, Swordies, Shorties, Spaghetties.

Also what is a "shoto"?

Ryu, Ken, Dark Ryu, etc. QC forward punch does a projectile, forward+qcforward punch does a shoryuken, qcback+kcik does tatsumaki.

I definitely think of the "sword fighters" as their own category in this game. Marcina, Ike, Shulk, Link. I think I like Ike the most out of that category, but Shulk is pretty good too.

 

[Pyr]

Spacies, Swordies, Shorties, Spaghetties.

Also what is a "shoto"?

A Shoto is something you REALLY don't want to misspell into google. It's a general term for a certain type of character in Street Fighter. They have a Fire Ball, an invincible on startup uppercut, and a spinning kick, Tatsu. Think Ryu, Ken, Akuma, Dark Ryu, etc. If someone says someone is like Ryu, good chance they qualify as a shoto. Edit: , 'd

Smash seems to have a few main types: Plumbers (Mario, Luigi, Doc), spacies (Fox, Falco, Wolf), sword users (think Marth, where the point is zoning with basic attacks more then anything)

 

[Big O]

It's not even just how fast he moves. Robin has extremely limited options to alter his aerial momentum. He's more easily juggled than Ike...to give an idea how awful his mobility options are.

B-Reversed Thunder charge is pretty quick and can cancel into an air dodge or a roll/shield/grab if you land while charging. If you have an item, you can even cancel the charge into an item throw. Being able to land with a command grab is also non-trivial since that beats waiting in shield for an unsafe landing.

 

[incrediblej]

Ike is literally the most changed character from Brawl...just saying. Plays waaaaay more different from Brawl than any other returning character except Olimar probably.

SH autocancel F-air
Tilts are actually incredibly good for spacing
Jab is universally much weaker and not very good for Jab cancels anymore though still strong in neutral
Super strong grab game with amazing combo and trap followups

I feel likemost characters playstyles are still the same from brawl where a few have changed and the rest just got buffs or nerfs, for me the worst nerd was olimar I would play him aggressive and campy camp abit until the opponent had like 30 damage or higher then I would attack allot especially with his arials and dash but his dash is more punishable and his arials don't have enough reach, so now he is really weird to play because he's a lot more campy now

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

I feel likemost characters playstyles are still the same from brawl where a few have changed and the rest just got buffs or nerfs, for me the worst nerd was olimar I would play him aggressive and campy camp abit until the opponent had like 30 damage or higher then I would attack allot especially with his arials and dash but his dash is more punishable and his arials don't have enough reach, so now he is really weird to play because he's a lot more campy now

That's more or less how I feel. A lot of characters seem the same as their brawl counterparts. Some I feel are worse like ganon and Zelda. Some are better like Mario. A lot of characters being "better" has a lot to do with the fall of mk like pikachu and yoshi.

 

[webbedspace]

Much like 'spacie' and 'shoto', I believe the preferred term for Mario, Luigi, and Doc is 'plumbers'.

I think "spacie" is used specifically to refer to the Lylatians + Captain Falcon. I think "Lylatians" would've been a good choice for a pure-Star Fox word, had it caught on.

Also, I feel like the word "plumbers" is a bit incorrect because it includes Wario. (Then again, he's at least got the up-smash.)

 

[Vincent21]

In hindsight, I find it hilarious that Sakurai mentioned during the promotional tournament that Samus was looking to be the best character in the game.

You see, I get the feeling this is an example "if this character is good, things go bad." A League of Legends designer by the screename of Xypherous made a pretty good description for this: "We have characters we deem impossible to buff because we'd think they'd damage the game as a whole if they were good - but the urgency has been lost in reworking them, simply because it's been too long."

Samus, in the earlier build of the game, probably had a properly linking jab, relevant combos, and just general quality of life and tools buffs, but after that observation was made by Sakurai, it was taken from her. Considering that if Samus was good (like top good) you'd have a face of MvC3 Chris G Morrgian SOOOOUL FIST ruining not only the balance of the game but the experience of frustrated players in events and on For Glory alike. Her playstyle being good isn't healthy for a party game, ya dig?

Of course... that's all speculation.

people should stop catching feelings over a collection of data, voice clips and animations being called bottom tier.

Just saiyan

shots fired

what they're actually catching feelings over is the lurking "Melee is our past; may 20XX not be our future" premonition that is casting a mist of paranoia over all of the juicy lab hours they've been putting in, which when you think about it is at least partially reasonable

He may beat Robin when he gets up close, but how is he getting past the arcthunder/elthunder and arc fire wall so easily?

Because its an easy projectile wall to get through. I am honestly going to go ahead and fire shots; is there anything good about this character besides the Levin Sword? Seriously? You've got a projectile game with arbitrary limits and poor mix-ups. Arc Fire is super slow and accomplishes very little while being seriously punishable, just like everything Robin does except certain levin hitboxes and thoron. On top of that you're horribly combo-prone for all of the cast's good close ups, your mobility is poop and as good as levin hitboxes are if your opponent respects them they have totally punishable endlags.

If people feel like Robin is good, I'd like to know why because I'm ignorant to it or at least haven't experienced it.

That's until you screw up and Robin meteors you with Elwind. What makes it meteor any way? Is it the first hit?

While the frames are the most exact answer. I basically like to think of it as "when you literally step on their face, you will achieve a meteor." That's what it's about. Stepping on their face :v

 

[Road Death Wheel]

I think "spacie" is used specifically to refer to the Lylatians + Captain Falcon. I think "Lylatians" would've been a good choice for a pure-Star Fox word, had it caught on.

Also, I feel like the word "plumbers" is a bit incorrect because it includes Wario. (Then again, he's at least got the up-smash.)

i have no problem linking wario with the plumbers. his game plan overall don't seem to different.

 

[Vincent21]

Huuuuuh? Wario is solidly different enough is kit and play to sit well outside of the plumbers group.

That'd be like calling Gouken a shoto :v

 

[Road Death Wheel]

Huuuuuh? Wario is solidly different enough is kit and play to sit well outside of the plumbers group.

That'd be like calling Gouken a shoto :v

i dunno, like ya he has some different tools. but his main objective still seems like getting in and racking damage. expecailly with his fantastic air speed to keep up juggles.

 

[Nocally]

That's more or less how I feel. A lot of characters seem the same as their brawl counterparts. Some I feel are worse like ganon and Zelda. Some are better like Mario. A lot of characters being "better" has a lot to do with the fall of mk like pikachu and yoshi.

In that case, every character should benefit from MK´s fall from glory. Yoshi in Brawl would still be bad without MK, he would be better/ more popular probably.

MK vs Pika in Brawl was a 50:50 matchup at best, probably still in MK´s favor, but the problem for Pikachu were characters like Olimar and Ice Climbers, not MK.

MK was great and easy to (ab)use in Brawl, kinda like Diddy kong in Smash 4 at the moment.

 

[Conda]

[Robin]- is there anything good about this character besides the Levin Sword? Seriously? You've got a projectile game with arbitrary limits and poor mix-ups. Arc Fire is super slow and accomplishes very little while being seriously punishable, just like everything Robin does except certain levin hitboxes and thoron. On top of that you're horribly combo-prone for all of the cast's good close ups, your mobility is poop and as good as levin hitboxes are if your opponent respects them they have totally punishable endlags.
If people feel like Robin is good, I'd like to know why because I'm ignorant to it or at least haven't experienced it.

@Nairo take this one.

 

[A2ZOMG]

That's more or less how I feel. A lot of characters seem the same as their brawl counterparts. Some I feel are worse like ganon and Zelda. Some are better like Mario. A lot of characters being "better" has a lot to do with the fall of mk like pikachu and yoshi.

I fail to see how you define "better" or "worse".

Almost every character from Brawl with small exceptions like Ike, Bowser, Ganon, and Captain Falcon if you want to count numbers and options are strictly worse than they were from Brawl. The reason why Smash 4 is able to be considered very balanced among most of the Smash games is the exact inverse of why the cast in Smash 64 is very balanced. While in 64 virtually everyone except Samus has really insane offense, most characters in this game are universally pretty weak, even the top tiers in this game are nowhere nearly as ridiculous as several characters from Brawl or Melee.

 

[Vincent21]

i dunno, like ya he has some different tools. but his main objective still seems like getting in and racking damage. expecailly with his fantasic air speed to keep up juggles.

True, but at the same time his fantastic air speed means he spends just as much time spacing you with his hitboxes as he does racking damage, and since he has early kill potential by 2nd stock (rough time estimate) via DownB and has waaaaaay more mobility options because he walks around with 10,000 bikes in his trouser pockets he strikes me as fundamentally requiring a lot less... investment? Like Wario does a lot more coming and going where typically the other plumbers really want to stick to you and have a lot less hit and run in their veins.

 

[Conda]

I fail to see how you define "better" or "worse".

Almost every character from Brawl with small exceptions like Ike, Bowser, Ganon, and Captain Falcon if you want to count numbers and options are strictly worse than they were from Brawl. The reason why Smash 4 is able to be considered very balanced among most of the Smash games is the exact inverse of why the cast in Smash 64 is very balanced. While in 64 virtually everyone except Samus has really insane offense, most characters in this game are universally pretty weak, even the top tiers in this game are nowhere nearly as ridiculous as several characters from Brawl or Melee.

Right, but defensive options now feel weaker with airdodging to the ground being a bad option (and this was a core defining aspect of Brawl).

But yeah, Brawl was not balanced at all. So many silly things in it numbers-wise that any fighting game developer would be able to notice super quickly and find a solution for. For me, Smash 4 is the first Smash game that feels more-or-less designed by professional fighting game designers who feel balancing the roster is a good use of time. Feels like the developers felt it was worthwhile to treat Smash like a fighting game and make sure they aren't leaving broken things in the game due to a cavalier "eh it doesnt matter its just a party game" attitude. Meanwhile the previous entries don't seem to have had a lot of effort, if any, in treating the cast like the cast of a fighting game (aka worth balancing and checking for infinites/etc).

 

[Road Death Wheel]

True, but at the same time his fantastic air speed means he spends just as much time spacing you with his hitboxes as he does racking damage, and since he has early kill potential by 2nd stock (rough time estimate) via DownB and has waaaaaay more mobility options because he walks around with 10,000 bikes in his trouser pockets he strikes me as fundamentally requiring a lot less... investment? Like Wario does a lot more coming and going where typically the other plumbers really want to stick to you and have a lot less hit and run in their veins.

ya i can see that i yeild

 

[Vincent21]

So there are plumbers and then there is.... the fat one.

The only one who isn't a plumber is the one with plumber's crack :v

 

[A2ZOMG]

Right, but defensive options now feel weaker with airdodging to the ground being a bad option (and this was a core defining aspect of Brawl). But yeah - monkeys balanced Brawl. Smash 4 is the first Smash game that feels more-or-less designed by professional game developers who feel tweaking numbers for character balance purposes is worth their time for Smash Bros. Meanwhile the previous entries don't seem to have had a lot of effort, if any, in treating the cast like the cast of a fighting game (aka worth balancing and checking for infinites/etc).

Defensive options aren't really "weaker" in this game. They're just much less abusive in fringe cases. In this game, I see a lot less of people getting gimped without really serious effort/hard reads, and similarly I also see people surviving to 190% considerably less often.

Airdodging is still really good, arguably better in this game. Just it doesn't force you to pick a top tier to have good options to punish it on a read. Ledge traps are also way weaker in this game overall, just ledge stalling itself is nowhere near as safe. A good competitive fighter is typically defined by very strong, reliable, but non-abusive defensive options the way I see it.

 

[Pazx]

As someone who spent a lot of time on day 1 of 1.0.4 with Luigi I can confirm he was definitely considered bad even by his faithful players. The buffs/nerfs he got seemed completely meaningless at the time and the question remained "is he bad or just weird?". Looking back at my notes I was aware of Hoo Hah, Dthrow-Tornado and Dthrow Fair before the potential in throw combos was really explored.

Also, I don't like the "bottom 5" predictions because I feel like the tiers in this game are bottom heavy, with the majority of characters falling in a C-D range and the difference between dead last and 15th from the bottom might be negligible.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

I fail to see how you define "better" or "worse".

Almost every character from Brawl with small exceptions like Ike, Bowser, Ganon, and Captain Falcon if you want to count numbers and options are strictly worse than they were from Brawl. The reason why Smash 4 is able to be considered very balanced among most of the Smash games is the exact inverse of why the cast in Smash 64 is very balanced. While in 64 virtually everyone except Samus has really insane offense, most characters in this game are universally pretty weak, even the top tiers in this game are nowhere nearly as ridiculous as several characters from Brawl or Melee.

I think it depends on the character. I don't see how bowser has improved. But I do believe that Mario is significantly better as shiek. Yeah some characters lost things basically any cg character from brawl got wrecked with the new changes. I don't see how ganon has improved but I could be wrong. They're underwhelming characters in this game. But I don't think there's as many as brawl or melee.

In that case, every character should benefit from MK´s fall from glory. Yoshi in Brawl would still be bad without MK, he would be better/ more popular probably.

MK vs Pika in Brawl was a 50:50 matchup at best, probably still in MK´s favor, but the problem for Pikachu were characters like Olimar and Ice Climbers, not MK.

MK was great and easy to (ab)use in Brawl, kinda like Diddy kong in Smash 4 at the moment.

The last I checked pika lost badly to mk 65 35 and I think he lost to marth also. I remember people saying pikachu was mk i without a sword. Disjoints were a problem for pika if I recall correctly.

 

[Nocally]

I think it depends on the character. I don't see how bowser has improved. But I do believe that Mario is significantly better as shiek. Yeah some characters lost things basically any cg character from brawl got wrecked with the new changes. I don't see how ganon has improved but I could be wrong. They're underwhelming characters in this game. But I don't think there's as many as brawl or melee.


The last I checked pika lost badly to mk 65 35 and I think he lost to marth also. I remember people saying pikachu was mk i without a sword. Disjoints were a problem for pika if I recall correctly.

It must have been a long time since you checked those match-ups then, or we have completely different data. Marth beats Pikachu theoretically, only problem is that Esam have beaten the top Marth´s consistently by using Pikachu, but that could just be because of the skill gap (player-wise) and match-up knowledge.
You are right about Pika´s problems against disjoints though, Something Pikachu still needs to be vary of in this iteration of Smash.