Character Competitive Impressions

[NachoOfCheese]

If you short hop egg roll and break out during the roll, you maintain all that momentum and can act out of it. It's a nasty edgeguarding surprise if done in tandem with Nair or Fair.

 

[Terotrous]

@ Terotrous Your talk about egg lay and egg launch is pure theorycrafting. The opponent has invincibility frames when breaking out of the egg so you can almost never follow up from that. They have more control of the game when being in the egg then you.

I know they have some invincibility, but I still don't agree that they have more control, since they're still forced to the air. If you're worried about them sticking out an nair, throwing an egg is also a decently meaty option. Short hop egg vs short hop Fair is still a decent mixup of sorts.

lol@Testing

http://smashboards.com/threads/yoshi-frame-and-misc-data-thread-wip.391441/

Uhh, if you're responding to AA, it seems like he has the same results you do. Egg Launch is a trivial one frame faster than Egg Lay.

1) Being able to spotdodge Yoshi's command grab on reaction. The command grab needs to be unreactable, to truly make people fear shielding against Yoshi's aerials.

Oddly enough 20 frame startup moves do still hit pros in competitive play. Balrog's dashing overhead is the most obvious thing in the world (I'm sure it has at least 30F startup), yet somehow PR Balrog still hits people with it. There are many other examples from SF4 and other games that are around the 20 frame mark but still hit plenty often. When people are in a pressure situation or are looking for something else they crack sometimes. Also, note that Spot dodges have slight startup so the opponent actually has to react slightly faster than 20f, unlike conventional fighters where blocking is a frame 1 action.

2) Poor throws/punishable grab. The risk:reward for Yoshi grabbing is just not very good, so shielding against a grounded Yoshi is even safer than shielding against an aerial one (at least with the aerial Yoshi you have to worry about his multihit moves that could do heavy shield damage).
3) KO confirms. Jab -> jab -> up-smash and random down-b reads are the only ways I've really managed to net kills with Yoshi. Would be nice if he had even just one more KO move, because what I usually find as Yoshi is that I've taken 60% and my opponent has taken 150%, because trades are almost always in my favor, but then I just can't land a KO move before I get killed.

I have been mentioning these for like 250 pages now. You are underrating Yoshi's kill options though. Uair is a great kill option, and while he lacks true combos into it it's fast and has a good hitbox and definitely can land. Fair is a potent spike. Nair OOS can kill around 140 or so if fresh, which is late but not atrocious for a fast OOS option. His real problem is just that his kill moves aren't braindead, not that he doesn't have them.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

I thought that egg roll custom where it jumps into the air moving forrward is pretty neat.

 

[Terotrous]

I thought that egg roll custom where it jumps into the air moving forrward is pretty neat.

The problem is you can't cancel it early enough to do anything out of it. Any time you use that move you're basically just saying to the opponent "here's where I'm going to be in 50 frames, please start charging a smash attack". The normal one is best because it gives you the most options after you activate it.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

The problem is you can't cancel it early enough to do anything out of it. Any time you use that move you're basically just saying to the opponent "here's where I'm going to be in 50 frames, please start charging a smash attack". The normal one is best because it gives you the most options after you activate it.

oh.
i just thought it was neat to follow up combos and maybe stuff some opponents air options. but if you say so.

 

[Yikarur]

I agree with Tero on Egg Roll.

 

[thehard]

We got Timber Counter on Xanadu's stream. Not really doing anything atm

 

[Thinkaman]

We got Timber Counter on Xanadu's stream. Not really doing anything atm

In the last game, neither the tree nor the sapling was relevant at all, even once iirc. Yet he landed a tree fall, at a percent that normally would have killed. Ironic!

 

[Locke 06]

Running Timber Counter against Mega Man was almost as odd of a choice as the Mega Man not running Skull Barrier in that MU. What did Leaf Shield do really accomplish in those matches?

Edit: I will say that sapling on the edge is a great ledge trap against anyone.

 

[Antonykun]

Running Timber Counter against Mega Man was almost as odd of a choice as the Mega Man not running Skull Barrier in that MU. What did Leaf Shield do really accomplish in those matches?

Seriously Megaman does not give a flying flip about Timber Counter...way too many of Villager's bad MU's don't give flips about Timber Counter ._.
Wasn't I talking about this before?
Maybe I'll make a list of who doesn't care about TC

 

[NairWizard]

Yeah, Timber Counter is overall an underwhelming custom, in my opinion. There are far worse customs to be upset over than the obvious ones.

Mario's Scalding FLUDD is absurd, but in a way that most people would never recognize it just from seeing the move.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

Yeah, Timber Counter is overall an underwhelming custom, in my opinion. There are far worse customs to be upset over than the obvious ones.

Mario's Scalding FLUDD is absurd, but in a way that most people would never recognize it just from seeing the move.

This is so true with so many customs. Fast fire bird is actually insane, i just never really thought it was all that great until i serioulsy used it.

 

[Antonykun]

Yeah, Timber Counter is overall an underwhelming custom, in my opinion. There are far worse customs to be upset over than the obvious ones.

Mario's Scalding FLUDD is absurd, but in a way that most people would never recognize it just from seeing the move.

Alone? yes TC is incredibly underwhelming
With EBT? that when Villager becomes a good character who dies later than she should.
she still loses to characters who don't approach her ._.

 

[Ffamran]

This is so true with so many customs. Fast fire bird is actually insane, i just never really thought it was all that great until i serioulsy used it.

Fire Roll and Fire Slide will be a thing!

 

[Road Death Wheel]

Fire Roll and Fire Slide will be a thing!

seriously dodge rolling becomes obsolete with this move.

 

[Thinkaman]

Mario's Scalding FLUDD is absurd, but in a way that most people would never recognize it just from seeing the move.

I am ignorant. Sell me!

 

[Ffamran]

seriously dodge rolling becomes obsolete with this move.

Falco Phantasm becomes more of a mix up burst movement, recovery, and situational spike with Fast Fire Bird since without it, Falco Phantasm was Falco's only burst movement and its endlag even when short hopped isn't as safe as Fast Fire Bird's default slide, roll, or a low angled slide that leave Falco standing and free to act.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

Falco Phantasm becomes more of a mix up burst movement, recovery, and situational spike with Fast Fire Bird since without it, Falco Phantasm was Falco's only burst movement and its endlag even when short hopped isn't as safe as Fast Fire Bird's default slide, roll, or a low angled slide that leave Falco standing and free to act.

i wana remain falco again just cuz ofthat move...
But i already got pit, samus, and Bowser damn it!

 

[thehard]

Did anyone notice how a Gyro hit DK while it was on stage, as DK was Cycloning off-stage?

 

[NairWizard]

I am ignorant. Sell me!

It gives Mario a 9% max damage disjointed aerial AND ground option that is relatively safe on block and on hit. At low percents, Scalding FLUDD combos into up-b and grab. At high percents, it combos into your KO moves. It's good for gimping (better than Mario's other FLUDDs), it's good for stuffing Luma, it's good as an anti-air, it's good as a landing option, it's good as an offstage "get away from me" anti-gimp maneuver, it's good as a replacement for default Fireball because it's less of a commitment, so you can take Fast Fireballs without worry (a buff to Mario). Just about the only thing that it can't do is reflect Dedede's Gordos, because each hit only does 1% damage, but it seriously fixes every problem that this character ever has. Range/getting walled out, KO power, landing/recovery... It's even a fantastic option for ledge pressure when your opponent is just trying to reset to the ledge repeatedly.

It shuts down Sonic's spindash, gimps Luigi, and contests Shulk's massive range.

Man, Scalding FLUDD is amazing. After playing with it in tourney, I regard it as a transformative move for Mario, similar to Super Speed with Palutena (only Super Speed is obviously way better and Mario would rather have that, of course).

 

[Unknownkid]

This sounds too good to be true. I need Pictures! Picture of Spider-Man! Umm... I mean videos of this Scalding FLUDD madness

 

[Quickhero]

@ NairWizard It's not even just Mario and Palutena; so MANY CHARACTERS have one custom move that just changes their game-plan entirely and really helps them out. Marth, Falco, Bowser, WFT, Donkey Kong, Greninja, etc..

There are also people that have a multitude of good custom moves but can really only choose one, but that's more than enough. Lucario having Piercing Aura Sphere and Snaring Aura Sphere are two very useful moves for different scenarios, and while Lucario has a few pretty niche custom options, the Aura Sphere customs alone provide really different beneficial situations that just helps out Lucario so much. :3

 

[Plain Yogurt]

Tell that to the Lucario players. Last I saw most of them seem pretty convinced that in practice 1111 ends up as the best.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

Fox's charge blaster is useful right? Certainly better than default from my expirience...

 

[Thinkaman]

At low percents, Scalding FLUDD combos into up-b and grab. At high percents, it combos into your KO moves.

Can you clarify this? Looking at the move, I see zero combo potential; what am I missing?

 

[Unknownkid]

Boss brought the Ice Balls. Looks like it is working into Luigi favor.

 

[Shaya]

So I thought I'd do another "list", everyone loves lists.
I would call this a *roughly* Tournament/Popularity Rated "tier list".

I'm using two sources primarily:
http://smashboards.com/rankings/smash-wii-u.8/league?id=64230
http://smashboards.com/rankings/smash-wii-u.8/league/teams

Spoiler

I made two lists based off the first link, up to the top 60 which you can reference here, but for the purpose of this list I looked into pages 3/4 as well (so up to top 120).
http://smashboards.com/threads/list...ective-characters.394148/page-7#post-18775964

http://smashboards.com/threads/list...ective-characters.394148/page-7#post-18776853 and this one is where I'm ordering characters by their frequency in the top 60. This type of 'sorting' would be my major means of discerning placements on this list.

I'll also keep things to a customs-off bias. The ladder doesn't discern on rulesets but a majority of brackets uploaded are concerning customs-off.
In short, consider this some sort of contrived "reflection of the meta" list more so than tier list.

Orderings should be taken with a grain of salt

S:
A:
B:
C:
~ from this point it's muddier~
D:
E:

"Low Tier Warriors"; there is a Kirby, Bowser Jr or two and a Samus with really good consistent results. Charizard has had a fair share of good representation as well. Asides from everyone's general opinion of Mac, he still seems to be of meta-relevance even if he'll likely end up with the worst match up spread, could consider him Brawl-dedede-esque. Robin has a lot of instances of use by high/top level players, but has continually waned to minimal over the past two months.
Meta Knight is solid and we all seem to know that, but only one main exists in the top 120. For his perceived strengths he is heavily underrepresented.
The Links are weird, some people still use them yet no one seems to want to use them. Toon Link only has a showing in Zan, although he doesn't have outstanding results/wins and his high placement is a bit of a reflection of how good Socal is with submitting results (other scenes should be more active too :D). I am giving both a bit of a benefit of the doubt here, as their results aren't really giving us any indication they're more usable than in E.
Truth be told I had a split in E, but I really don't have the unparalleled will to argue that X is worse than Y when their mains either think they're super-trash (and they have results [Zelda players]) or super-viable-not-bad (and have little/none). But there's been successful use of just about every character in that grouping bar Jigglypuff, Lucina and Palutena. WiiFit, Swordsman and Ike I believe have single use tournament victories in various scenes, which is kinda cool (and hence these are arguably unfair placements). After watching Trela's recent set I feel that having a workable jab and dash attack, great up tilt and up air (and generally having auto cancelled aerials) plus generally competent normals make him a lot more potent than Marth in a non-customs environment, which is kinda saddening but it's as it is. I feel happy now to some extent I can see what Swordsman can do against a range of competent players, a shoe in for last seems all but reserved for Lucina at this point.

Yoshi is really really really popular but has absolutely no results. Japan's placing of him at third (or I would prefer to say 'second tier' because I feel as if there aren't proper orderings in each section) is starting to feel really suss when there just aren't any Japanese tournament videos I'm seeing of them succeeding. A lot of it could still do with wifi reflections (he's pretty dominant in those conditions + popular) and the bugs that still exist on him that the Japanese love to make Vines for that allow him to luma warp himself into KO moves, which is why I'm assuming they're hoping those get removed and him nerfed more because they don't like him (I would say timing for this list, only a short period of time prior to the last Shi-gaming one, plus the very short period of time before the next Patch for Mewtwo [a guess, but it is Spring] is a bit too coincidental and I could see it as their communities "opinion" represented in text form that Sakurai tends to listen to *calling it now*).

As you go down past the top 60 players, some characters start to become very popular/frequent. From zero to hero, "Villager" is probably the third most popular character in the game after diddy/sheik from that (top 60) point forward. Pit's start to show up, pocket Macs and Doctor Marios. Lots and lots of Falcon too obviously. He may be the true third overall, but yeah. Seeing as how overly popular he is (without really any outstanding wins/results), he may not deserve the B-treatment, but alas.

So before anyone else says it,
Donkey Kong with customs taking a player who's apparently never placed in the money in any event into Grand Finals on winner's side in one of the most competitive tournament series. Going last hit with Boss quite a lot and having knocked him into loser's.
The move is definitely extremely potent. Are the counterplays to them developing well? Does it slow down game play ridiculously?

 

[FullMoon]

The fact that Greninja is right between Pit and Dark Pit in that tier list goes really well with my avatar =V

Also Greninja just out of Top 15 again.

 

[thehard]

The move is definitely extremely potent. Are the counterplays to them developing well? Does it slow down game play ridiculously?

Agreed, yes, and no. From what I saw, Average Joe's rise to GF (which is not to take away from his skill as a player because his DK is great, and also because using Kong Cyclone is basically just playing a good DK) was due to a combination of players not respecting Cyclone and not punishing it properly. Both are things that become easier to do as the move gets played with more. DK is still pretty obviously combo food and if he drops below the stage it's almost a guaranteed stock loss.

The proper usage of Focused Slap surprised me more.

JohnNumbers vs. Will at Smash Attack #5 is a pretty good example of proper Cyclone punishing.

Kong Cyclone is a bandaid, a really good one, but still a bandaid.

 

[S.F.L.R_9]

Zelda is the worst in the game? I would have never thought that

 

[Shaya]

Zelda is the worst in the game? I would have never thought that

You don't read things put in big large letters? Or even the small print that explicitly states my opinion of otherwise

Nairo and Scary/Ed have relevant results with her. If I'm going to get the Fire Emblem Tier (we need an F tier) foretold by our forefathers in the legends of destiny, I'm going to have to make a solid argument that Zelda's better. It'll be myself vs @Espy Rose all the way until the bitter end.
Jigglypuff is allowed in because she's always welcome in every home, but as former Hyrule Tier trash, Zelda is kicked out 5ever.

 

[S.F.L.R_9]

You don't read things put in big large letters? Or even the small print that explicitly states my opinion of otherwise

Nairo and Scary/Ed have relevant results with her. If I'm going to get the Fire Emblem Tier of heroes/destiny, I'm going to have to make a solid argument that Zelda's better.
Jigglypuff is allowed in because she's always welcome in every home, but as former Hyrule Tier trash, she's kicked out 5ever.

Oh I was just joking lol. I read what you wrote.

 

[thehard]

Off-topic, but aMSa is expressing "interest" in Charizard over twitter. Oh boy...

 

[Shaya]

Oh I was just joking lol. I read what you wrote.

I haven't heard a recent opinion from a Zelda main about how potent/viable they think she is.
What match ups do you think are good enough to be worth bringing her out in? What's the sore thumbs to her daily sacrifice by fire and brimstone rituals?

This won't be used for any insidious plots whatsoever

Everyone else is better than Fire Emblem Tier:
Fire Emblem Tier:

It's fate. Look into your heart, everyone should know it to be true.

 

[FullMoon]

Off-topic, but aMSa is expressing "interest" in Charizard over twitter. Oh boy...

Oh man, I hope he doesn't drop Greninja. Funny how aMSa is on the Pokémon side of Smash from the looks of it.

 

[S.F.L.R_9]

I haven't heard a recent opinion from a Zelda main about how potent/viable they think she is.
What match ups do you think are good enough to be worth bringing her out in? What's the sore thumbs to her daily sacrifice by fire and brimstone rituals?

This won't be used for any insidious plots whatsoever

Everyone else is better than Fire Emblem Tier:
Fire Emblem Tier:

It's fate. Look into your heart, everyone should know it to be true.

Personally, I don't think Zelda is as bad as she's made out to be. I'd go with top of bottom tier, so above Bowser on your tier list.

Zelda can actually be used for a variety of matchups. She really only struggles against rushdowns (Sheik, Diddy) or very defensive / projectile oriented characters that can wall her out or outspace her (Link, Mega Man, Marth.) She doesn't have too much of a problem against characters with the same range as her that aren't rushdowns. I.e. Mario isn't too bad of a matchup

Matchups where you should use Zelda over another character? Not too many. However, a few other Zeldas and myself concluded that Zelda actually has an advantage against Rosalina. You can see the analysis starting here.

Btw, I love Jigglypuff in the FE tier :^)

@Macchiato Have anything you want to say about Zelda?

 

[Plain Yogurt]

So who's the Toon Link of Fire Emblem tier?

 

[deepseadiva]

So who's the Toon Link of Fire Emblem tier?

Obviously Robin.

 

[Ffamran]

So... It really was Falco's Blaster. Engine changes aside, one change, folks. Reposted from the Zelda Social and the Falco GD/Q&A.

I just checked Falco's frame data throughout the games. Thanks to @Xeylode for the In-Depth Falco Frame Data and @Bones0, @Kadano, @Seikand, and @Magus420 for the Falco Hitboxes and Frame Data.

As of patch 1.05 SSB4 and this doesn't have damage output, end lag, landing lag, etc. In terms of hit frames, Falco's stayed similar.

Move Hit Frames|||
Jab|2-4, 10-12, 18-22, 23-27, 28-32, 33-37, (infinite), 42-43|2-5, 9-???, ???, (infinite)|2-3, 6-7, 7-8, 13-14, 19-20, 25-26, 31-32, (infinite)
Dash Attack|8-11 or 12-17|4-17|4-17
Ftilt|6-8|6-8|5-9
Utilt|5-9, 12-16|4-9, 12-16|5-11
Dtilt|7-9|7-9|7-9
Side Smash|17-19 or 20-20|16-20 or 21-21|12-21
Up Smash|8-12, 14-19|8-17|7-15
Down Smash|7-9|7-9|6-10
Nair|3-5, 6-9, 14-17, 21-23|3-5, 6-9, 14-17, 21-24|4-31
Fair|12-17, 18-23, 24-29, 30-34, 35-36|6-33 (multi-hits), 34-35|6-8, 16-18, 24-26, 33-35, 43-45
Bair|4-5 or 7-11|4-7 or 8-19|4-19
Uair|10-14|10-14|8-9, 11-14
Dair|16-18 or 19-31|5-7 or 8-21|5-24
Grab|8-9|6-7|7-8
Dash Grab|10-11|11-12|12-13
Pivot Grab|11-12|9-10|N/A

 

[Quickhero]

@ Shaya Correction, it's

Fire Emblem Tier: