Character Competitive Impressions

[Luco]

Shulk using his counter on Ness' PKT2 is just broken ahahah. Kills so ridiculously early.... I hate versing Shulk. =P

I agree in that I suspect Olimar may just be the worst in the game. Could be wrong, though. :o

 

[Poxnixles]

I'm really confused that I saw a couple posts claiming that Mewtwo will suck. Claiming that or the opposite right now is pretty silly to do; we don't know what ways Mewtwo will be changed up. It could be similar to Melee or receive several buffs like Yoshi.

 

[Berserker.]

I'm really confused that I saw a couple posts claiming that Mewtwo will suck. Claiming that or the opposite right now is pretty silly to do; we don't know what ways Mewtwo will be changed up. It could be similar to Melee or receive several buffs like Yoshi.

We're joking haha. Kinda. Shaya said we should avoid talking about Mewtwo so let's start that now

Shulk using his counter on Ness' PKT2 is just broken ahahah. Kills so ridiculously early.... I hate versing Shulk. =P

I agree in that I suspect Olimar may just be the worst in the game. Could be wrong, though. :o

Full charge PK flash on Shulk's counter will kill even if he's using buster (something that reduces knockback). It's seriously nuts.

I'm not sure about Olimar being the worst. The only reason why I don't like playing as him is because his pikmins run at 30 FPS. I'm really not sure. Maybe he is. I don't know

 

[ThatLunaticFeline]

We're joking haha. Kinda. Shaya said we should avoid talking about Mewtwo so let's start that now

Full charge PK flash on Shulk's counter will kill even if he's using buster (something that reduces knockback). It's seriously nuts.

I'm not sure about Olimar being the worst. The only reason why I don't like playing as him is because his pikmins run at 30 FPS. I'm really not sure. Maybe he is. I don't know

I think with the case of Olimar being worst, it's process of elimination. Who's worse? Falco? Luigi? Both have some sort of combo power cause their aerials are their strong point, Falco has great recovery and Luigi can pressure shields well. Olimar... can't do much. I read somewhere that almost all if not all of his attacks are counted as projectiles meaning any character with a reflect ability like Palutena, Fox and Rosaluma all wreck his Pikmin.

 

[Psyant]

Up-B default seems preferable, as the Meteor Striking one has a stupidly small window to input the second dash and is shorter, and while I haven't even tried his quick-feet one, I'm not sure you'd need it anywhere?

Quick Feet has much more on stage use than normal Quick Attack; the single hit has way more hitstun than the second hit of normal Quick Attack. Once it begins to knock people off their feet they can legitimately just fall right into your arms and get up smashed while still in hitstun. It has the same recovery distance as regular Quick Attack otherwise, only being more linear, so it's worth considering for being more useful on stage.

Heavy Skull Bash is the real godsend though imo. It's crazy strong even half charge and helps Pikachu's KO problems an awful lot if you can land it. If you land a nair at like 50% and get a jab reset off of it into a partly charged Heavy Skull Bash, midweights and below are dead. It's like being jab-reset into a Warlock Punch, and Pikachu has a ton of potential jab reset set-ups at various %s. Let's not forget the Heavy Skull Bash momentum glitch either which makes recovery even more free for Pikachu, not even requiring him to use his double jump to make it back to center stage.

Pikachu got some really good customs and I think he's probably even better off in regards to the rest of the cast in customs than in standard.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

What is it that supposedly makes Olimar such a bad character?

 

[ThatLunaticFeline]

What is it that supposedly makes Olimar such a bad character?

A total of one good killmove, poor and punishable recovery, less Pikmin, weaker Pikmin, slower Pikmin. I could go on, sadly.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Oli is k. He's probably low tier but he's not the worst. He still has good range, great low damage combos, probably the best pivot grab in the game with a kill throw, kill set ups, and his jab has really good range strangely enough. His side b is awful now though, pikmin can be unresponsive at times, and he has massive problems getting in.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

I put greater than 50% odds that Olimar is the worst character in the game as we know it.

How does he kill? ...smashes? Off-stage fairs?

olimar runs on hopes and dreams, which evidently are not very strong. He has killing power but his whole style is clunky and buggy with the changes. Think Rosalina if rosalina lost half her kit when luma died, part of the kit was dedicated to resurrecting luma, luma had ai suicidal tendencies, and if she had more lag, less range and longer grab reach, an easier to deny recovery....actually dont compare him to rosalina.

I thought Hyper Monado Arts was crap

until I tried it

I KO'd Bowser with Shulk's slightly charged u-smash at 53%. Smash activated

I also KO'd him with forward power vision counter against one tick of his flame at 63%. Smash activated

Using power vision btw


It's really risky but honestly, the reward of KO'ing at ridiculously low percentages is interesting

I tinkered around with it yet again in training mode

Uncharged u-smash KO's Rosalina at 57%. U-tilt KO's at 76%. All with hyper smash (Edit: I redid it in a normal fight to make sure it's right. Yep, it's right)

Dont forget those times where they block/dodge/bait and now you are lighter than jigglypuff...and eat a ness backthrow from 60% or something nuts like that.

 

[epicgordan]

It's worth noting that while he is pretty much the safe bet for bottom tier (heck, he could reasonably be the only candidate for it since he doesn't have any good matchups as far as I can tell), I think it is going to be safe to assume that he will at least be slightly better on the Wii U version--which as a reminder, will be the more definite version when it comes to the competitive scenes.

 

[The Real Gamer]

I think it is going to be safe to assume that he will at least be slightly better on the Wii U version.

People have been saying this about virtually ever character... The entire cast is gonna improve to an extent.

 

[ThatLunaticFeline]

-EXTREME WARNING. THE POST BELOW CONTAINS MATERIAL YOU WILL PROBABLY DISAGREE WITH-

So I got bored and instead of waiting patiently for a more organized consensus on the characters, looked around the internet, added up the figures and made the following. Obviously cause it's come from such dark depths as the internet it's going to be hideously inaccurate in some places, and because I only used 10 samples it's not going to be very reliable, but this should give us at least a sort of idea of what the internet in general thinks of SSB4's balancing. (plsdon'tbanme)

NOTE: I used 10 samples for calculating this info. Selecting which samples to use was based on a mix of personal judgement and what I could find of professional opinions. Yeah, you probably won't agree with some of the things on this list, but it's only meant for analysis purposes.

Sheik 2.1 Rosalina 2.8 ZSS 3.1 Greninja 5.1
------------------------------
DHD 8.7 Yoshi 9.4 Sonic 10.1 Bowser 10.2 Robin 10.9 Lucario 12.1 Capt. Falcon 12.4 Little Mac 14.9 Diddy Kong 15
------------------------------
Fox 15.9 Bowser Jr. 16 Pacman 17.4 Peach 18 Villager 18.7 Mario 19.5 Marth 19.6 R.O.B. 19.8
------------------------------
=Metaknight 20.1 =Wario 20.1 Dedede 20.6 Shulk 22.1 Pit 22.2 Ness 22.3 Dark Pit 23.8 Pikachu 24.7 Toon Link 25
------------------------------
Lucina 25.9 Jigglypuff 26.9 Kirby 28.8 Link 30.2 DK 31.7 Dr. Mario 32 Samus 32.1 Falco 32.5
------------------------------
Palutena 33 G&W 33.5 WFT 34.7 Zelda 34.9 Megaman 35.8 Ganondorf 36.5
------------------------------
Ike 37.7 Luigi 38.5 Charizard 39
------------------------------
Olimar 42.7

So there's bound to be a few things on there that surprise you. There certainly are for me - I think Ganondorf is a considerable bit better than bottom 5th, while I'm also surprised that Toon Link turns out above standard Link. Mostly, though, I think this information will give us as analysts more ideas to debate/chew up and spit out again in a disgusting mess.

 

[The Real Gamer]

Zard bottom 2...

 

[deepseadiva]

I still think people calling Palutena low tier aren't taking custom moves into consideration. :L

Basically. No one knows the true potential of any character since no one has polished a custom moveset yet, and no one has faced a polished custom character from an experienced player.

None of those things exist yet. When reading impressions "with a grain of salt" it needs to be more like a boulder of salt since four whole moves can completely make or break a character.

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Wat.

Smooth Criminal

 

[deepseadiva]

People are playing Smash 3DS as like, a preview for the WiiIU anyway. REAL semi-usable impressions for character will be like, summer 2015 after players have customized and polished up their mains AND versus'd each other.

Anything before that and Nov is "these are the character I've most often lost to in For Glory".

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Oh no, Meno, I agree.

I'm just...scratching my head at Lunatic Feline's internet data-scrounging.

Smooth Criminal

 

[Pokedex649]

Falcon combos everything. The knee's hitstun has also been buffed equaling 0-deaths against Little Mac. He also seems to have 0-deaths against himself, DK, Link and Bowser (Due to his dair's spike combined with their low vertical recovery). His down throw combos into his nair, and the nair combos into both his up-smash and dash attack. Raptor Boost is now a good KO move too, being able to KO light characters (Like G&W) at around 80% and midweight characters (like ZSS) at around 120. The edgeguarding game for him is also great


Those are impressions from experience, though.

 

[MisterVisceral]

For the most part, those statistics actually seem pretty legit. Yeah, a couple of big surprises, like Ganondorf and Jigglypuff's lownesses, and Pac-Man and Marth's apparent highness. But I think that makes a good lick of sense. Really excited about the representation by new characters (especially Junior) seeming to do well.

Also, if you want to change the statistics for your favorites, step it up! Make them higher tier. The only reason this is as skewed as it is is because there are so few statistics out there. Go make more statistics happen.

Raptor Boost is now a good KO move too, being able to KO light characters (Like G&W) at around 80% and midweight characters (like ZSS) at around 120.

Raptor boost is so ridiculously strong now. Pretty excited to figure out how to work around that piece of gloriousness.

EDIT: I guess I should say so much better. It was already a decent move.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

statistics of what....no sources were credited.

 

[epicgordan]

-EXTREME WARNING. THE POST BELOW CONTAINS MATERIAL YOU WILL PROBABLY DISAGREE WITH-

So I got bored and instead of waiting patiently for a more organized consensus on the characters, looked around the internet, added up the figures and made the following. Obviously cause it's come from such dark depths as the internet it's going to be hideously inaccurate in some places, and because I only used 10 samples it's not going to be very reliable, but this should give us at least a sort of idea of what the internet in general thinks of SSB4's balancing. (plsdon'tbanme)

Sheik 2.1 Rosalina 2.8 ZSS 3.1 Greninja 5.1
------------------------------
DHD 8.7 Yoshi 9.4 Sonic 10.1 Bowser 10.2 Robin 10.9 Lucario 12.1 Capt. Falcon 12.4 Little Mac 14.9 Diddy Kong 15
------------------------------
Fox 15.9 Bowser Jr. 16 Pacman 17.4 Peach 18 Villager 18.7 Mario 19.5 Marth 19.6 R.O.B. 19.8
------------------------------
=Metaknight 20.1 =Wario 20.1 Dedede 20.6 Shulk 22.1 Pit 22.2 Ness 22.3 Dark Pit 23.8 Pikachu 24.7 Toon Link 25
------------------------------
Lucina 25.9 Jigglypuff 26.9 Kirby 28.8 Link 30.2 DK 31.7 Dr. Mario 32 Samus 32.1 Falco 32.5
------------------------------
Palutena 33 G&W 33.5 WFT 34.7 Zelda 34.9 Megaman 35.8 Ganondorf 36.5
------------------------------
Ike 37.7 Luigi 38.5 Charizard 39
------------------------------
Olimar 42.7

So there's bound to be a few things on there that surprise you. There certainly are for me - I think Ganondorf is a considerable bit better than bottom 5th, while I'm also surprised that Toon Link turns out above standard Link. Mostly, though, I think this information will give us as analysts more ideas to debate/chew up and spit out again in a disgusting mess.

It appears that top tier is set in stone, as well as bottom tier, with Olimar standing alone in the latter.

Now, let's check on the tier placement (and it just seems odd that there's eight places so unless this is to signify Olimar being labeled as completely worthless and Ike, Luigi, and Charizard are considered Bottom Tier, this doesn't make sense).

So with that said, let's get started:

Top Tier:

Agreed.

High Tier:

It appears that Yoshi, Sonic, Lucario, Little Mac, and Diddy Kong are definitely going to be there to stay. Maybe Duck Hunt as well, but I'm still looking out for the potential (and so far, he seems to combat Rosalina better than most, so that's a plus). Bowser will probably wind up dropping out of favor someday, but I can definitely see Bowser remaining high tier in the initial tier list. Robin is a bit of a tricky case since admittedly, I am not that good with him. I'll put him down as a counterpick option in High-Mid Tier, however; I think his uses are to be circumstantial in the long run.

High-Mid Tier:

Seems about right, although I can also see Robin and eventually, Bowser ranked here as well.

Mid Tier:

I feel that Pikachu and Ness should be ranked in High-Mid Tier as well.

Mid-Low Tier:

Seems reasonable. Though I would have had Charizard up there as well.

Low Tier:

If anything, Wii Fit Trainer and Zelda should have ranked higher on mid-low tier (Mega Man is a bit more disputable; he plays fine, but his matchups are poor). Then, I'd add Ike and Luigi.

Bottom Tier:

Simply put, Ike and Luigi should rank even higher than Ganondorf (the latter at the very least should round out the low tier). It just seems silly to have a tier list with these characters all to themselves and yet have someone else lower.

Completely Worthless:

Sadly agreed. And it is sad.

N/A:

These characters were conspicuously absent from the tier list because for some strange reason, it hasn't been decided yet if these three characters will even be playable. Personally, Brawler is Mid Tier, Gunner is Mid-Low, and Swordfighter is Low Tier.

 

[MrGame&Rock]

I dont think Lucina should be lower than Marth tbh. Yes she has no tipper but she also has no sourspot, meaning you dont have to space with her to always land that tipper. Her entire sword is pretty strong. With Marth the opponent can weaken him by playing their own spacing game and trying to prevent him from landing with his tipper; you cant do that vs Lucina. Aside from that, she has all of Marth's other strengths/weaknesses. The best place for her would probably be either in the same spot as Marth or either immediately above or below him.

 

[ThatLunaticFeline]

statistics of what....no sources were credited.

Like I said, it's the depths of the internet, and I stated it's not gonna be the most reliable collection of info at all. While I did my best to find reliable sources ie. pro player opinions directly from their mouths I did have to search through Smashboards and Reddit to get something worth adding to the list. Note: If I chose stuff from these less reliable websites it only took me a minute or two to compare listings with more verified sources and as long as they matched up somewhat well I added them in.

I dont think Lucina should be lower than Marth tbh. Yes she has no tipper but she also has no sourspot, meaning you dont have to space with her to always land that tipper. Her entire sword is pretty strong. With Marth the opponent can weaken him by playing their own spacing game and trying to prevent him from landing with his tipper; you cant do that vs Lucina. Aside from that, she has all of Marth's other strengths/weaknesses. The best place for her would probably be either in the same spot as Marth or either immediately above or below him.

There was a post earlier in this thread about Lucina being less safe on block than Marth. Have a quick flick back and you'll find it.

 

[Smog Frog]

somebody tell me how the **** charizard is anything lower than mid tier

 

[Headcrab Jackalope]

It's really depressing seeing Olimar called completely worthless, even if it might be true.

Most of my wins in For Glory are using Olimar, but I guess he's so bad that people don't know how to fight him.

I do think he can punish heavier characters quite well though.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

Everything between top and high mid can be summed up as well received. Mid- bottom as on the fence and Olimar tier as Olimar tier looking poor so far.

For all we know opinions on Olimar change overtime but he looks kinda poop to me. Shoot there is probably and likely worse...but brawlimar to this is like night and day.

 

[mimgrim]

I dont think Lucina should be lower than Marth tbh. Yes she has no tipper but she also has no sourspot, meaning you dont have to space with her to always land that tipper. Her entire sword is pretty strong. With Marth the opponent can weaken him by playing their own spacing game and trying to prevent him from landing with his tipper; you cant do that vs Lucina. Aside from that, she has all of Marth's other strengths/weaknesses. The best place for her would probably be either in the same spot as Marth or either immediately above or below him.

Lucina is objectively worse then Marth. There really is no debate to this. With tipper Marth is scarier at max range, scarier on shield, and kills better. An optimal Lucina is going to be played just like an optimal Marth in the end but she will just be worse then Marth. She really shouldn't be that close to Marth on the list, let alone above him.

 

[PK Gaming]

Like I said, it's the depths of the internet, and I stated it's not gonna be the most reliable collection of info at all. While I did my best to find reliable sources ie. pro player opinions directly from their mouths I did have to search through Smashboards and Reddit to get something worth adding to the list. Note: If I chose stuff from these less reliable websites it only took me a minute or two to compare listings with more verified sources and as long as they matched up somewhat well I added them in.

Can you be more specific? What exactly did you mean by depths of the internet? Specifically, what sites did you hit? Smashboards, Reddit and...? Gamefaqs? Neogaf? 4chan? Nsider? What criteria did you use to determine viability? What was your baseline? Did you incorporate objective data (ie tournament results and frame data) Did you do this entirely by yourself? Can you give me some excerpts from said pro players?

Help me out here.

 

[Quartzsoldier]

Olimar has a good forward smash

 

[MrGame&Rock]

There was a post earlier in this thread about Lucina being less safe on block than Marth. Have a quick flick back and you'll find it.

I saw it, and I retract my statement. That's really unfortunate, as I liked Lucina a lot because she played like Marth without the tipper mechanic. Thanks for pointing that out.

 

[EddyBearr]

I love the way Small Link plays in Smash Games: run around, throw projectiles, try to hit confirm off projectiles.

How is Toon Link looking in this game in that regard? Likewise, are there any other characters that have this style of play? Does this strategy seems competitively viable in this game so far?

 

[MrGame&Rock]

Speaking of FE characters, what's the secret to mastering Robin, as far as we can tell? I like him a lot (especially with Thunder+ and Fire Wall) but the breakable Levin Sword is frustrating and Im not really clicking with him. Sorry of this has been previously discussed

 

[ThatLunaticFeline]

Can you be more specific? What exactly did you mean by depths of the internet? Specifically, what sites did you hit? Smashboards, Reddit and...? Gamefaqs? Neogaf? 4chan? Nsider? What criteria did you use to determine viability? What was your baseline? Did you incorporate objective data (ie tournament results and frame data) Did you do this entirely by yourself? Can you give me some excerpts from said pro players?

Help me out here.

I didn't input any of my own opinion or individual character research - the whole set was collected from external sources. Including Smashboards and reddit, I can't give you an entire list of the places I searched cause I looked at LOADS... most of them, however did come from popular gaming websites like GameFAQs (I definitely got one from there) and the controversial Japanese tier list from a month or so ago was also included.

When choosing which lists to include, I usually looked for lists that had explanations for key choices. There was one list which had some matchup data underneath it, and a quick flick through looked legit in my opinion. As for professional opinions, I could only find one tier list from a 'former ex-pro' called Karmic, look it up if you want, but I was careful to take into account analyses from more respected names like ZeRo and Hungrybox when thinking about when a list I'm looking at is crap or not.

In summary, I had too much time on my hands which I should have spent playing Smash Run and getting those customs. And either way, I didn't make it to be entirely accurate or reliable, just as a guide to what a semi-consensus on certain characters are.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Speaking of FE characters, what's the secret to mastering Robin, as far as we can tell? I like him a lot (especially with Thunder+ and Fire Wall) but the breakable Levin Sword is frustrating and Im not really clicking with him. Sorry of this has been previously discussed

The Levin Sword regenerates in roughly 10 seconds, so I'm not sure there's really a point in holding back with it. Your spells regenerate just as quickly except for Nosferatu.

 

[zeldasmash]

I personally think Link is being slept on. Having the ability to pretty much cancel almost any kind of aerial end lag with Down B which also acts like a combo-breaker as well is a big benefit. Has plenty of good kill moves with a good dair spike. Has an effective Zair which extends his recovery a lot. Has i think one of the best down smashes in the game and is really hard to KO.

 

[Radical Larry]

Look, everyone's underestimating Link when he is definitely one of the more tournament viable characters, and if used in the right hands, has a shot at seeing at least Low A Tier as his lowest.

Now, I have no idea why people think all other heavyweights (save Captain Falcon) and Toon Link are better than Link. I mean, all the heavyweights, except for Captain Falcon, can be easily beaten by Link alone. And Toon Link is just a semi-clone of Link that turned out to be worse than he was in Brawl.

Honestly, give Link a chance in this game; he can be better than you expected.
He's no longer Brawl or Melee's Link, he's far better.

 

[Shaya]

If you gave us a rough estimate of how many "sources" you did have, even if they were both all sorts of places, that would help out some people.
I don't necessarily mind that type of opinion "collection" but please do provide a bit more information along with it.

On an observation level thus far, I feel like Oli is the worst in the game. I feel like he isn't a bad character design nor inherently weak, just there's so many things wrong. I feel like he's suffering from Melee Kirby-syndrome, really unpolished and not properly play tested. I'm not sure if I'm going to coin Oli definitely worst, I'll wait until WiiU. There's just way too many Pikmin interactions that don't make sense/seem random to me, that I hope will not be so... weird on the WiiU.

However, a friend of mine who is a bit of a low tier warrior feels confident Oli isn't worse, but harps more on Zelda and Luigi. I'm not so certain about Zelda, but he did suddenly force my interests towards Luigi.... who probably is quietly sitting in the background as the worst character. I don't feel like he received any buffs between Brawl and now; dash attack isn't a completely worthless move! His mobility and range specifics are disgustingly on the low side this game, as they kinda always have been, but he feels more like the odd one out than before.

Luigi is not made for a final destination game, that's for sure.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I wouldn't be surprised if either Luigi, Mario, or Doc took the spot for being the overall worst character in the game. The Marios in this game are just bad in Super Footsie Bros for the 3DS and Wii-U.

Especially when factoring they got nerfed in important ways.

 

[SonicZeroX]

The more I see of Rosalina the more ridiculous she seems.

Solo Rosalina would probably still be high/top tier because of her disjointed hitboxes on every attack, still very high KO power (I thought Luma was supposed to have all the KO power but nope Rosalina kills just fine solo), fast grab, crazy fast teleport roll, ability to nullify all projectiles, and amazing recovery.

Seriously her only weakness is she's light (but not really that light since Luma absorbs so much damage) and not that fast, which isn't really a weakness but more of a lack of a strength since it's not like she's slow either.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

I wouldn't be surprised if either Luigi, Mario, or Doc took the spot for being the overall worst character in the game. The Marios in this game are just bad in Super Footsie Bros for the 3DS and Wii-U.

Especially when factoring they got nerfed in important ways.

You keep saying Mario doc are weak but I don't see it in fact I really don't. Luigi I havent touched much no one is really playing him. If by some change some walk-off counterpicks get in I think he can hang but his vertical recov is poop.

^Rosalina is doing great all around I feel she's already started shaping things into "if my character has a bad matchup vs Rosa it isn't competitive". I don't think Sheik, Luc or Yoshi are creating the same pressure.