Character Competitive Impressions

[Nu~]

As a question, why is Kirby considering low or middle tier? He seems top tier or AT LEAST high tier to me.

A better question is why you believe that a character with poor range, bad mobility, a terrible approach, and a weakness to being camped out...

Can be a top tier or high tier?

 

[Thinkaman]

On another note RE: Tiers; perhaps we should try to push the whole two-dimensional thing that was discussed a few dozen pages ago, via "viability vs ease of use"?

@SmashCapps ?

Just need two bullet-lists, and then throw them on an x/y axis.

The problem is that player skill and experience maps non-linearly to demonstrated benefit, even if it is monotonic.

Take Brawl Snake.

• Brawl Snake is actually one of the poorest choices for both a new smash player, or someone who has played lots of other characters casually. His kit is weird, his long duration aerials can cause accidental SDs, his smashes are unconventional and slow, his side-b is trash to spam, and his other specials can damage himself. In the hands of a first time player, Snake is a hundred accidents waiting to happen.
• At a certain level of experience, Snake's performance skyrockets. "Just do tilts." Bam, way better. He has a crazy DACUS and a heavy-armor'd recovery that many moves cannot gimp. In a certain skill-level environment, Snake is probably the best character.
• Then you've got experienced players who understand how to gimp Snake, play around his grenades and tilt game, and watch out for the C4. Snake remains a potent character, but is far from the best.
• Then you've got the expert Snake mains of the world, pushing the character around many of his weaknesses with finely tuned play. Grenades get wavebounce'd, cooked, and bounced off stage geometry. C4 is used not just to recover, but to recover into stage tech mixups around the opponent. The situational aerials are leveraged more cleanly. Snake can be pushed farther than most characters in this sort of way, and he sort of re-emerges as a (a) top character at this level of mastery.
• ...but then at the highest level after years of experience, these gains also become understood and fall short of the peak performance of others, leaving Snake a merely high-tier character.

The graph of all characters benefit vs. skill level is a complex, very wiggly line that is very difficult to quantify simply, even if you could get an agreement on what it was. Undue simplification of this does the underlying information no favors.

 

[Dakpo]

Lots of characters have infinites and zero to deaths with customs. Falcon's got them on basically everyone. Pikachu does, pretty sure ZSS does too, probably many many others. If its got stun properties there is a good chance for an infinite lol.

Zss does not FYI. I would be all over that

 

[Thinkaman]

Smash 4 example: Little Mac.

Literally everything about Mac--both his strengths and weaknesses--can be construed as a property that makes him a noobs-only character or an expert-only character.

 

[Macedonian]

As a question, why is Kirby considering low or middle tier? He seems top tier or AT LEAST high tier to me.

lack of guaranteed easy to execute throw combos across multiple percents, short range, light weight, and subpar specials for the most part are kirbys limiting factors.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Smash 4 example: Little Mac.

Literally everything about Mac--both his strengths and weaknesses--can be construed as a property that makes him a noobs-only character or an expert-only character.

Am thinking that Little Mac can be the ultimate secondary / counter-picking character in the competitive scene. He is just such an "extremist" character, it's ridiculous. So basically, nobody can really solo main him but he might be ideal for 'element of surprise' moments.

 

[GeneralLedge]

Smash Bros is the only game I know of where every time I have a generalized epiphany, there's guaranteed to be at least one character who debunks it.

 

[Thinkaman]

Am thinking that Little Mac can be the ultimate secondary / counter-picking character in the competitive scene. He is just such an "extremist" character, it's ridiculous. So basically, nobody can really solo main him but he might be ideal for 'element of surprise' moments.

Well, this is a bad example not actually tied much to the discussion we were having, but if God or some guy with reaction time less than 1 frame played Smash 4, they would almost definitely play exclusively Mac.

I'm willing to bet that even in mortal hands, Mac is a top 5 character in 0.5x speed mode.

ZSS would also benefit more than most--her grab is already reactable, jab would be more valuable, and Boost Kick would become one of the game's only unreactable KO moves.

Edit: Biggest loser? Besides Ganon, Mewtwo, and Palutena (who probably become almost unplayable due to their moveset frame timings) I'd definitely say Falcon. Neuter his dash grab, and watch the character fall to pieces.

Edit 2: Fox on the other hand loves this game, because 90% of the game becomes punishable.

 

[Wintermelon43]

A better question is why you believe that a character with poor range, bad mobility, a terrible approach, and a weakness to being camped out...

Can be a top tier or high tier?

Because his air attacks and up tilt are really good.

Edit:And good matchups

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Because his air attacks and up tilt are really good.

Edit:And good matchups

Have fun getting close to a solid player to perform that.

Te only game that kirby was top tier In was smash 64 and only because of UTilt, good recovery, small size, and the shields in that game were terrible, so he landed his attacks more frequent and was closer because of dreamland and no projectile zoning characters.

 

[oldkingcroz]

A better question is why you believe that a character with poor range, bad mobility, a terrible approach, and a weakness to being camped out...

Can be a top tier or high tier?

Luigi is top tier or high tier. And he has no disjoints, slow speed in the air (and on ground), has trouble approaching (besides forcing shields with his slow fireballs), and probably has issues against the likes of Rosalina, Sheik, and Villager, who have great devensive plans and better projectiles. Luigi is also light and floaty. The two of them aren't too different.

Kirby probably doesn't have the combo potential that Luigi does, but Kirby does have great attack speed and killpower (reliable smash attacks, bair, offstage fair, custom up B, jab near the ledge, and hammer/ stone if you get a good read). He's decent, and Rosalina is his only "terrible" top tier matchup.

 

[bc1910]

Well, Kirby's recovery wasn't good in 64. It's just that he was the only character besides Pikachu and occasionally Yoshi who could sometimes survive edgeguarding. Almost everyone in that game was dead as soon as they went off stage.

In this game, Kirby is a good character who is let down by a lack of range or useful throw combos. Approach is an issue but he can at least approach from unorthodox angles and has the lowest overall aerial landing lag in the game. I still think if Kirby had his Brawl Fthrow he'd be high tier at least.

 

[Thinkaman]

Luigi is top tier or high tier. And he has no disjoints, slow speed in the air (and on ground), has trouble approaching (besides forcing shields with his slow fireballs), and probably has issues against the likes of Rosalina, Sheik, and Villager, who have great devensive plans and better projectiles.

Kirby probably doesn't have the combo potential that Luigi does, but Kirby does have great attack speed and killpower (reliable smash attacks, bair, offstage fair, custom up b, jab near the ledge, and hammer/ stone if you get a good read). He's decent, and Rosalina is his only "terrible" top tier matchup.

So, I think Kirby is really underrated (though apparently everyone does, not sure how that works?), at least as long as he has Upper Cutter to fix his recovery limitations.

But comparing him to Luigi? I mean sure, Kirby has... kinda fast ground attacks, but Luigi's moveset is on average the fastest in the game, both air and ground. Luigi has more kill power on almost every move in his kit (Kirby f-smash is a trivial amount stronger), including a frame-3 nair and a tornado that kill-combos out of d-throw.

I don't think anyone in this topic would disagree that Luigi outclasses Kirby--no matter how much we respect Kirby.

 

[deepseadiva]

The ONLY characters I might entertain as "secret high tier" (the top tier is already visible no secrets there) would be...



If not considered high already. Everyone else is waiting on that amazing new bucket brake tech discovery seemingly just around the corner.

 

[Thinkaman]

The ONLY characters I might entertain as "secret high tier" (the top tier is already visible no secrets there) would be...

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

Fox being really good is a secret?

Edit: Mario too, to a lesser extent.

 

[deepseadiva]

I dunno!! Yall flip flop all over the place in this thread. Someone briefly mentions Samus having potential or something and then a month later The Reflex Amsalink gets top 8 at a regional with her and yall are like "SEE!!! I'VE ALWAYS BEEN SAYING THIS!!!"

I understand really good tools might take time to be fully realized. But other times it sounds like people think characters just need a readjusted gameplan to suddenly start succeeding. Like I go to the character boards and its like "we just need to unleash the power of dtilt! and start edguarding!" and I'm like...

not to group anyone in a blanket. But yall know the types of smashers i'm talking about and the unrealistic expectations they may have.

Having said that: Kirby is unexpectedly good.

 

[oldkingcroz]

Luigi is much better at what he does, than Kirby is. Kirby's grab->pummel-> throw nets him 20 damage at best, and doesn't lead into anything (unlike Luigi's which can combo into a killing Down B or any other moves). That's probably the main difference between the two.

I was merely stating, the two characters have similar issues, and Kirby has good frame data and kill power, which helps him combat top/high tiers. That doesn't mean that Kirby's problems are non-existent, as there are a lot of disjoint characters among the high and mid-tier that give Kirby a tough time. Particularly Toon Link, Shulk, Pit, Villager, Mega Man, and Rosalina give me a hard time, when I play Kirby. He's not top tier, that's for sure, but has OK matchups against the top tier characters like Sheik/ Diddy/ Luigi/ Mario/ Fox/ Falcon. I can't say if they are in Kirby's favor (seeing that these characters are all good), but these matchups are definitely better than the ones against campy/disjoint heavy mid-tier (going off Zero's tier list). The other mid-tiers are all pretty good against Kirby (and Ness/Rosalina just walk all over Kirby). Zero placing him in mid-tier seems about right.

 

[Zelder]

The ONLY characters I might entertain as "secret high tier" (the top tier is already visible no secrets there) would be...



If not considered high already. Everyone else is waiting on that amazing new bucket brake tech discovery seemingly just around the corner.

Mario and Fox (especially Fox) are top tier, guv.

 

[Gawain]

Mario and Fox (especially Fox) are top tier, guv.

I thought that they were more or less high tier, not top. They're probably borderline like Captain in melee is

 

[wedl!!]

someone would need to write me a masters thesis on to convince me hes above mid tier in a meta with characters who stomp neutral stance () are popular.

and the uptilt pals ( is also included in this union, but hes the lepidus to 's mark antony and 's octavius) are high tier, fam. less so .

is really close to top 15 i feel, prob 20ish. her mus with mobile characters like are basically setting her back from a certain top 15 character*

has too many problems with fast campy characters like and to ever be a solo main, but he is extremely strong in the right hands, just unforgiving. think of him as with the same amount of dtilts, das, and sh aerials. except has a mayweather grab game

like the rest of the world i know nothing about so i'm not voicing my opinion.

customs is dumb af and really fun, probably a borderline top, in the vein of .

*R I O T A T Z E R O ' S H O U S E T O N I G H T

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Mario and Fox (especially Fox) are top tier, guv.

People overrate Mario in general but this definitely takes the cake.

Mario isn't very good. He's pretty good but nothing more than that.

 

[Wintermelon43]

So, I think Kirby is really underrated (though apparently everyone does, not sure how that works?), at least as long as he has Upper Cutter to fix his recovery limitations.

But comparing him to Luigi? I mean sure, Kirby has... kinda fast ground attacks, but Luigi's moveset is on average the fastest in the game, both air and ground. Luigi has more kill power on almost every move in his kit (Kirby f-smash is a trivial amount stronger), including a frame-3 nair and a tornado that kill-combos out of d-throw.

I don't think anyone in this topic would disagree that Luigi outclasses Kirby--no matter how much we respect Kirby.

When I made my own tier list, Luigi WAS above Kirby. Although Kirby was still in 10th place. (Luigi's 5th).

Also, to anyone thinking that Kirby is bad aganist top tier charcters, He has an EVEN matchup aganist SHEIK

 

[wedl!!]

so what if he goes even with ? that's one character. he still loses to ,,,,,, etc. his kit isn't strong enough to compete with other characters. everyone else in the top 10 has good neutral/camping ability and can force to approach (with his bad mobility) and murder him (early due to being a featherweight). "going even" with (which is probably a fallacy, i have no idea how this mu works but i doubt it's even) doesn't actually make him a borderline top 10 character, he still has to do well against everyone above him.

this is sort of similar to a few brawl characters; namely who had decent high tier mus but the mythical gatekeeper of gave him the gift of the worst (non-/) mu in the game (thanks @ Luco !!)

sidenote: can we see this tier list, @ Wintermelon43 ? i'm quite curious.

 

[Luco]

It was more that did okay against several top tiers but got wrecked so hard by that it barely mattered.

 

[Ikes]

Luigi is top tier or high tier. And he has no disjoints, slow speed in the air (and on ground), has trouble approaching (besides forcing shields with his slow fireballs), and probably has issues against the likes of Rosalina, Sheik, and Villager, who have great devensive plans and better projectiles. Luigi is also light and floaty. The two of them aren't too different.

Kirby probably doesn't have the combo potential that Luigi does, but Kirby does have great attack speed and killpower (reliable smash attacks, bair, offstage fair, custom up B, jab near the ledge, and hammer/ stone if you get a good read). He's decent, and Rosalina is his only "terrible" top tier matchup.

dair true combos into utilt from my experience, which becomes a free aerial string. so the "no combo game" is partially untrue. if you can punish with dair, you get a free 30+%

 

[Ffamran]

Also, to anyone thinking that Kirby is bad aganist top tier charcters, He has an EVEN matchup aganist SHEIK

That kind of doesn't mean a lot. In Brawl, Wolf had an even MU against Meta Knight, but was ranked 14 and struggled against the game because of stupid stuff like a 60 frame meteor cancel - more than twice as almost everyone's meteor cancel -, fast fall not working for him, and stuff like chaingrabbing wrecking him. Zelda could have an even MU against Sheik and Rosalina, but if she loses to everyone else, then whatever for her, or say, Dr. Mario could go even with everyone, but that means it's always a struggle to win as he wouldn't have any advantages against anyone and his fights would always be about skill where he has to outplay every fight while having a slight advantage against even one character is nice.

 

[Wintermelon43]

so what if he goes even with ? that's one character. he still loses to ,,,,,, etc. his kit isn't strong enough to compete with other characters. everyone else in the top 10 has good neutral/camping ability and can force to approach (with his bad mobility) and murder him (early due to being a featherweight). "going even" with (which is probably a fallacy, i have no idea how this mu works but i doubt it's even) doesn't actually make him a borderline top 10 character, he still has to do well against everyone above him.

this is sort of similar to a few brawl characters; namely who iirc didn't have that bad of a mu (or was it someone else? correct me, i didn't play brawl competitively) but got totally destroyed by everyone else.

sidenote: can we see this tier list, @ Wintermelon43 ? i'm quite curious.

I WOULD have posted more even or advantageous matchups, but the matchup thread only had two more. Those were Fox (also even) and Pikachu (40:60)

Rosalina and Ness apprantatly were even matchups in the old thread too, Diddy Kong 40:60 and Yoshi 35:65. Sonic and Zero wren't mentioned

Anyway...

S:

A:

B:

C;

D: ()

E+:

E:

E-:

F:

 

[Wintermelon43]

That kind of doesn't mean a lot. In Brawl, Wolf had an even MU against Meta Knight, but was ranked 14 and struggled against the game because of stupid stuff like a 60 frame meteor cancel - more than twice as almost everyone's meteor cancel -, fast fall not working for him, and stuff like chaingrabbing wrecking him. Zelda could have an even MU against Sheik and Rosalina, but if she loses to everyone else, then whatever for her, or say, Dr. Mario could go even with everyone, but that means it's always a struggle to win as he wouldn't have any advantages against anyone and his fights would always be about skill where he has to outplay every fight while having a slight advantage against even one character is nice.

Even matchups aganist Fox, Rosalina, and Ness as well.

 

[warionumbah2]

has too many problems with fast campy characters like and to ever be a solo main

I really don't understand this community, there's video evidence of MKs placing high against characters above yet they still insist that he can't be solo mained. You're literally going against cold hard facts and kicking the users in the nuts, if it was only 1 MK in a blue moon i'd agree but the numbers are rising and the results are getting better(even in Japan).

FYI + are his worst MUs, not + . should no longer be mentioned when default MK can put up a fight and win against his insane custom incarnation. The problems Falcon and ZSS pose is range,strong ground game comparable to MK,better mobility,good sh aerials and most notably damage output.

Luckily Falcon has a poor recovery and ZSS is light but both weaknesses aren't exactly braindead to exploit. Sheik has everything but range and damage, MK never fears her combo's or edgeguarding capability.

Lets not compare MK to other characters we already got the Falcon = MK stuff. This new Mac comparison is bad and makes no sense whatsoever.

@everyone Which other top tier does Kirby do well against? Cause i only read Sheik Sheik Crouch Sheik Crouch. inb4 shaya infracts me

 

[Smooth Criminal]

I WOULD have posted more even or advantageous matchups, but the matchup thread only had two more. Those were Fox (also even) and Pikachu (40:60)

Rosalina and Ness apprantatly were even matchups in the old thread too, Diddy Kong 40:60 and Yoshi 35:65. Sonic and Zero wren't mentioned

Anyway...

S:

A:

B:

C;

D: ()

E+:

E:

E-:

F:

Get that ****ing penguin outta mid/C tier.

Smooth Criminal

 

[Wintermelon43]

I really don't understand this community, there's video evidence of MKs placing high against characters above yet they still insist that he can't be solo mained. You're literally going against cold hard facts and kicking the users in the nuts, if it was only 1 MK in a blue moon i'd agree but the numbers are rising and the results are getting better(even in Japan).

FYI + are his worst MUs, not + . should no longer be mentioned when default MK can put up a fight and win against his insane custom incarnation. The problems Falcon and ZSS pose is range,strong ground game comparable to MK,better mobility,good sh aerials and most notably damage output.

Luckily Falcon has a poor recovery and ZSS is light but both weaknesses aren't exactly braindead to exploit. Sheik has everything but range and damage, MK never fears her combo's or edgeguarding capability.

Lets not compare MK to other characters we already got the Falcon = MK stuff. This new Mac comparison is bad and makes no sense whatsoever.

@everyone Which other top tier does Kirby do well against? Cause i only read Sheik Sheik Crouch Sheik Crouch. inb4 shaya infracts me

Rosalina, Ness and Fox are even as well. Any other good or even matchups wren't discussed

Get that ****ing penguin outta mid/C tier.

Smooth Criminal

Do you mean it's too high or too low?

 

[Luco]

I think is surprisingly good, but I'm not ready for that level of good just yet Winter. I also believe is lower than he's placed (I think people keep forgetting his MU when they put him in top 5), Zelda is last and both and need to go up, even with customs off.

Oh, yeah, and Smooth's right. just isn't good enough to be in C tier, as much as we love the king.

Also I'd keep Ness in A tier but I'm biased okay?

And come to think of it, you've put this list with customs off (I presume, seeing as Brawler is in bottom tier along with Palutena), but put Kirby in top tier. At least some of Kirby's success comes from customs IMO.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Yeah, I agree that Kirby vs Fox is pretty even.

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Do you mean it's too high or too low?

Too HIGH.

He is low tier in this gaaaaaaaame, barely able to compete. The power of jank is on his side; nothing more, nothing less!

Smooth Criminal

 

[Wintermelon43]

Reasons for questioned placement:

:Great comboing, Grewt air attacks, good up tilt, good ko power, great matchups

:The other charcters are worse (Rather than him being too good in it)

:GREAT comboing

:Slightly worse than A tier

Miis:Coudn't fund any customs videos to see how good they are with them, thats why they're low

 

[FullMoon]

Honestly I just

I WOULD have posted more even or advantageous matchups, but the matchup thread only had two more. Those were Fox (also even) and Pikachu (40:60)

Rosalina and Ness apprantatly were even matchups in the old thread too, Diddy Kong 40:60 and Yoshi 35:65. Sonic and Zero wren't mentioned

Anyway...

S:

A:

B:

C;

D: ()

E+:

E:

E-:

F:

Lol Greninja E-

 

[irokex13]

Reasons for questioned placement:

:Great comboing, Grewt air attacks, good up tilt, good ko power, great matchups

:The other charcters are worse (Rather than him being too good in it)

:GREAT comboing

:Slightly worse than A tier

Miis:Coudn't fund any customs videos to see how good they are with them, thats why they're low

are worse than ? Are you really being serious right now?

 

[Unknownkid]

As a Kirby main, this is funny to watch.

 

[Appledees]

Greninja below characters like Ganon,Dedede and Mewtwo......

Excuse me

 

[Luco]

I didn't even notice Greninja down there.

I think Kirby has some decent MUs but nothing spectacular enough to be above Mario and Falcon. Luigi's great combo-ability means little if he can't get in, and some characters can effectively keep him out. It's like saying Ness has amazing KO power and good combo-ability without mentioning his recovery weaknesses and slight aversion to being juggled among a couple other things.