Character Competitive Impressions

[Jams.]

I have to disagree with you on his customs being "Cheese". He is no more cheese than ZSS or any other risk reward character. With Helicopter Kick he has a small window in terms of percent where he can get the true combo and kill with it and he needs to be very close to the edge.

If you can get that setup against someone who knows that's all they need to avoid than you have earned it "honestly." Outside of that kill setup is one of the most honest of characters.

He is a good character, certainly not a overpowered or cheesy character IMO.

Of course it's cheese. The definition of cheese is a strategy that is very effective if the opponent is unprepared, but can easily be beaten by preparation and knowledge. Mii Brawler absolutely crushes players that don't understand the matchup. The only difference is that he remains a good character even if the opponent understands his options.

 

[-RedX-]

More Omni logic. I generally agree with this.

What the hell? I actually like Yamcha.
Playing as him in Budokai games at least. heh

 

[Speed Boost]

Of course it's cheese. The definition of cheese is a strategy that is very effective if the opponent is unprepared, but can easily be beaten by preparation and knowledge. Mii Brawler absolutely crushes players that don't understand the matchup. The only difference is that he remains a good character even if the opponent understands his options.

Every strategy can be mitigated to some extent by knowledge and preparation. That does not make every strategy cheese. Most good characters have something that will wreck unprepared players. Cheese is a word filled with salt. Don't worry, we all get salty now and then.

 

[bc1910]

I always thought cheese was just a way to say "cheap" without actually having to use that word because it's so frowned upon nowadays.

Hoo hah was described as cheese but even when you knew what to it was a really strong option. It wasn't something that was easily beaten no matter how prepared you were. Sonic is often described as cheesey, same goes.

People like to compare. Her killpower is far from bad but it's much worse than almost every patch prior. It's the Greninja effect. So many people say greninja sucks because they "nerfed him so many times." But they only actually nerfed him once (Up smash and N spec). Everything else was just removing exploits. If Greninja were the was he is now back at launch, he'd probably seem a lot better and that joke wouldn't exist. Same goes for Sheik's killpower. Bouncing fish still kills hella early even if it isn't as hella early as 1.0.

I agree with this. Having shurikens and Up Smash the way they were at release was probably the worst thing to happen to Greninja in terms of public opinion. Both are still very good moves, shurikens are a bit clunky but in terms of total start-to-end frames the uncharged ones are still among the quickest projectiles in the game (faster than Pika's Thunder Jolt and Sheik throwing a single needle). Plus they have a really nice feature that I think is oft-overlooked; being chargeable and thrown fast when B is released makes them harder to powershield on reaction than most projectiles.

Public opinion doesn't matter much though. The more I play him the more I think he's the Brawl ZSS of this game with the way he's slept on. His mobility lets him control the pace of the match so well. He's oozing options in most situations. Also Hydro Pump has the potential "jank" factor, there are lots of silly ways that move can be used especially around ledges.

 

[Vipermoon]

What the hell? I actually like Yamcha.
Playing as him in Budokai games at least. heh

- He started off as a bandit/thief in Dragon Ball.

- Then we saw he was a horrible boyfriend.

- He used his super human skills to cheat in baseball for fame and money . Like WTF come on Yamcha!!

- He wasn't even alert enough to think "hey I can stop the hover car from plummeting to everyone's death by flying under it and carrying it to safety." Eighteen had to do it.

- The difference between him and Krillin is Krillin has actual balls. Krillin is actually one of my favorite characters in the series.

- I don't even think he was married at the end of DBZ. Unless he married Puar that is.

Z-Fighter Status/Standing:
Overall he's a character who is barely brave enough to even show up let alone actually help in some way.

Yamcha = waste of dragonball wishes for resurrection

 

[FullMoon]

Something I find kinda funny is how Greninja's footstool setups really need that odd quirk of Water Shuriken of making him stall in the air as he fires it. It's the kind of thing that you don't think would be that useful, though sometimes I do throw some shurikens in the air to throw my opponent off when they're trying to catch my landing.

Sheik's killpower isn't that bad but she's usually one of the characters I can often live to high percentages against. I think the only other characters where I see my % get ridiculously high frequently are Duck Hunt and to a lesser extent Pac-Man. I realize that good Sheik players most likely won't let their opponent live too much longer than any other character would though.

 

[shadowmm151]

- He started off as a bandit/thief in Dragon Ball.

- Then we saw he was a horrible boyfriend.

- He used his super human skills to cheat in baseball for fame and money . Like WTF come on Yamcha!!

- He wasn't even alert enough to think "hey I can stop the hover car from plummeting to everyone's death by flying under it and carrying it to safety." Eighteen had to do it.

- The difference between him and Krillin is Krillin has actual balls. Krillin is actually one of my favorite characters in the series.

- I don't even think he was married at the end of DBZ. Unless he married Puar that is.

Z-Fighter Status/Standing:
Overall he's a character who is barely brave enough to even show up let alone actually help in some way.

Yamcha = waste of dragonball wishes for resurrection

LOL. Wholeheartedly agree. Yamcha is just...meh.

On topic: A couple of questions.
First: My brother mains . He gets completely owned by and to a lesser extent . Would seconding fill in these two MUs? I'm pretty sure I keep hearing good things about the plumber and while ESAM says he has no problem with I don't hear this from most mains. I feel like it's more that ESAM is just really, really good and knows the MU well. Any other advice would be nice.
Second: I main and the other day, the same who bodied my brother's over and over got wrecked by my . Just an FYI, I never beat my brother...like ever so since I KNOW my brother is better than I am, I'm curious if 's MU with has gotten better or if 's MU is just THAT bad. The player is a solid player with solid fundamentals, so I feel that might actually have a good MU against . Maybe 55:45 or at best even. BTW this is customs off. With customs on I don't think the MU actually changes as CC and heavy skull bash sort of balance each other out.

What do you guys think?

 

[Jords2Good]

I would guess captain falcon really struggles fighting very small Pikachu. He would have to be on point with most of his attacks. And I could imagine captain falcon missing alot of attacks and getting punished because he's too small.

 

[Teshie U]

I'm calling it cheese because its low risk high reward. The move clearly has a bigger hitbox than ZSS Up B and lets him wiggle around VERY freely in the end lag making it hard to punish him as hard as he deserves (imo). And thats just if you look at the moves in a vacuum. When you look at who the moves are attached to, you can clearly see ZSS can't set it up as easily (needs to land committed options first) and Mii Brawler can basically just go for it repeatedly.

Tbh "cheese" is probably too nice a word for safe spammable and overly rewardingly stuff like Diddy 1.04 Uair or Mii Brawler Up B.
Cheese used to describe "all in" types of strategies that make be initially tricky for the average player, but backfire horribly when countered or avoided (like YOLO Dair spiking with falco).

I consider "gimmicks" to be the things that don't have a reliable success rate when understood. Like Ryu's heavy ftilt.

 

[TriTails]

Did someone here mentioned 'Bouncing fish kills hella early'?

I have hit my opponents at 140% and they still don't die.

 

[PUK]

Did someone here mentioned 'Bouncing fish kills hella early'?

I have hit my opponents at 140% and they still don't die.

Yes, and a lot of the "kill set-up" are weird. Most sheik's games are fair until the opposent reach a fair kill percent. I saw aerial needle ->BF but i couldn't make it work as the ennemy can AD every time.

 

[meleebrawler]

Did someone here mentioned 'Bouncing fish kills hella early'?

I have hit my opponents at 140% and they still don't die.

It only kills below that in edgeguards.

 

[TriTails]

Yes, and a lot of the "kill set-up" are weird. Most sheik's games are fair until the opposent reach a fair kill percent. I saw aerial needle ->BF but i couldn't make it work as the ennemy can AD every time.

What I've found while second-ing Sheik:
F-throw + U-air = This is one of the easiest, but the reward is low. Kills at... 130%-140%-ish with rage if I'm not mistaken. Good luck killing D3 with this.
F-throw + BF = Not guaranteed at certain percents, but it sometimes works. And also, put that double jump to work in conjuction!
B-throw + BF = Surprisingly. Sheik's B-throw is amusingly weak, but it can combo to BF! And it kills at 100% at the edge of the stage.
F-throw + F-air = Lel. I don't remember when it kills but this is basically a last-resort.
F-tilt + U-air = Read F-throw to U-air.
U-tilt + Tipper U-smash = Yes. You read it freaking right. She can combo to tipper U-smash. I have only seen this at Sheik boards but it works on 70%-ish... And doesn't work on higher percents I believe.

D-throw is basically useless at kill setups. It works as combo starter but F-throw does better overall. I haven't looked much on needles, but I'm having a hard time believing she can combo to BF given its end lag.

And also:

Most sheik's games are fair

Put a middleline between [f] and [air] and I'll believe you.

Sheik DOES struggle to kill. It doesn't matter how many bazillion kill set-ups she has if she can't kill onstage before 130%-140%.

BTW, this is a question I've been meaning to ask, but how would you guys balance Sheik and Rosalina (Because both of them trash on some characters)? Sheik I've been playing as, and I find her needles, call me crazy, quite honest. I mean, yeah sure. She taps B twice, you take 1%. So? 1% buddy. Fully charged? 7%. That's barely higher than Luigi's Fireballs... Unless I can find evidence that she can combo to BF somehow because I suck and can never get it work I don't think nerfing it hard would be neccesary... The end lag is fairly justifiable too (But then again. I look at Falco's Blaster. Ugh). But I disagree on 'making it so it doesn't flinch'. ANY projectile that doesn't flinch people would basically end up as a worse Fox's Blaster unless they do 20% per hit.

The only thing I disagree on Sheik's needles are on how they do knockback at higher percents. I think they can do something like 'decrease their knockback growth so they don't do knockback till 300%' so Sheik doesn't juggle people like mad even though they're miles away from her feet. I think simple flinch can make it good already... or flinching is something I've been underestimating lately?

Rosalina... it's hard to balance her honestly. Solo Rosalina suck, sure, but Luma adds an entire whole new gameplay on her. Nerfing Luma would be understandable since it... just seem too strong as of now, but I'm not sure where to hit it. Crazy knockback, sure. I have heard tales of people dying at 40% to Rosalina's U-air (Not sure how that even happened. Maybe they got hit by both of them at the same time?), but perhaps that would do alone since I don't remember Luma having Ganon-tier knockback on any other of its attacks. Maybe reduce its health? Or make it so it acts slower when Rosalina is in hitstun?

I'd be interested to hear people's opinions.

 

[Yikarur]

D-throw is basically useless at kill setups. It works as combo starter but F-throw does better overall. I haven't looked much on needles, but I'm having a hard time believing she can combo to BF given its end lag.

This is very wrong. Dthrow is one of Sheiks strongest kill set-ups. Dthrow -> upair in kill% is a 50:50 situation..
The hitstun is long enough to make upair a true combo if the opponent doesn't air dodge. If the opponent does airdodge to avoid upair you can kill with Vanish.

Needles to bouncing fish are a true combo off-stage at least.

 

[TriTails]

This is very wrong. Dthrow is one of Sheiks strongest kill set-ups. Dthrow -> upair in kill% is a 50:50 situation..
The hitstun is long enough to make upair a true combo if the opponent doesn't air dodge. If the opponent does airdodge to avoid upair you can kill with Vanish.

Needles to bouncing fish are a true combo off-stage at least.

News to me. Thanks for alerting.

I never been able to land an U-air off a D-throw at kill percents because they fly off too high for me to reach, but I guess I underrated Vanish.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

This is very wrong. Dthrow is one of Sheiks strongest kill set-ups. Dthrow -> upair in kill% is a 50:50 situation..
The hitstun is long enough to make upair a true combo if the opponent doesn't air dodge. If the opponent does airdodge to avoid upair you can kill with Vanish.

Is there any known, specific data for this? I remember plenty of instances where I could just jump after the dthrow and Sheik couldn't actually do anything. I'm guessing that a lot of it depends on percent, rage, DI and character specific physics but I could never tell when it's guaranteed or not.

I also had people in For Glory escape the combo on me by DIing out before the final hit of uair connects which I still can't quite believe to be actually possible.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

What I've found while second-ing Sheik:
F-throw + U-air = This is one of the easiest, but the reward is low. Kills at... 130%-140%-ish with rage if I'm not mistaken. Good luck killing D3 with this.
F-throw + BF = Not guaranteed at certain percents, but it sometimes works. And also, put that double jump to work in conjuction!
B-throw + BF = Surprisingly. Sheik's B-throw is amusingly weak, but it can combo to BF! And it kills at 100% at the edge of the stage.
F-throw + F-air = Lel. I don't remember when it kills but this is basically a last-resort.
F-tilt + U-air = Read F-throw to U-air.
U-tilt + Tipper U-smash = Yes. You read it freaking right. She can combo to tipper U-smash. I have only seen this at Sheik boards but it works on 70%-ish... And doesn't work on higher percents I believe.

D-throw is basically useless at kill setups. It works as combo starter but F-throw does better overall. I haven't looked much on needles, but I'm having a hard time believing she can combo to BF given its end lag.

And also:

Put a middleline between [f] and [air] and I'll believe you.

Sheik DOES struggle to kill. It doesn't matter how many bazillion kill set-ups she has if she can't kill onstage before 130%-140%.

BTW, this is a question I've been meaning to ask, but how would you guys balance Sheik and Rosalina (Because both of them trash on some characters)? Sheik I've been playing as, and I find her needles, call me crazy, quite honest. I mean, yeah sure. She taps B twice, you take 1%. So? 1% buddy. Fully charged? 7%. That's barely higher than Luigi's Fireballs... Unless I can find evidence that she can combo to BF somehow because I suck and can never get it work I don't think nerfing it hard would be neccesary... The end lag is fairly justifiable too (But then again. I look at Falco's Blaster. Ugh). But I disagree on 'making it so it doesn't flinch'. ANY projectile that doesn't flinch people would basically end up as a worse Fox's Blaster unless they do 20% per hit.

The only thing I disagree on Sheik's needles are on how they do knockback at higher percents. I think they can do something like 'decrease their knockback growth so they don't do knockback till 300%' so Sheik doesn't juggle people like mad even though they're miles away from her feet. I think simple flinch can make it good already... or flinching is something I've been underestimating lately?

Rosalina... it's hard to balance her honestly. Solo Rosalina suck, sure, but Luma adds an entire whole new gameplay on her. Nerfing Luma would be understandable since it... just seem too strong as of now, but I'm not sure where to hit it. Crazy knockback, sure. I have heard tales of people dying at 40% to Rosalina's U-air (Not sure how that even happened. Maybe they got hit by both of them at the same time?), but perhaps that would do alone since I don't remember Luma having Ganon-tier knockback on any other of its attacks. Maybe reduce its health? Or make it so it acts slower when Rosalina is in hitstun?

I'd be interested to hear people's opinions.

I'm mostly fine with Sheik minus needles. The idea of such a fast, safe rushdown character getting one of the best zoning projectiles on top of that is just absurd IMO. There are a bunch of dials that can be tweaked there.

Rosalina is harder, and I'm biased because I use her. I'll agree that Luma is the big offender, but don't forget that it's the one with the KO power in general, so if you nerf that aspect too hard she'll end up as Sheik-with-a-puppet. Edit: In the sense of easy damage but little raw kill power.

 

[Luco]

I don't mind the damage on needles being buffed if it really has to, but the idea that 'it would be a worse fox blaster' being a problem is something I don't agree with. Falcon's Usmash is plain worse than Ganon's Usmash (probably), but he has a slew of other character strengths to more than make up for it. Sheik having a worse Fox blaster would be okay if she was still great in footsies like she's supposed to be imo.

 

[TriTails]

I'm mostly fine with Sheik minus needles. The idea of such a fast, safe rushdown character getting one of the best zoning projectiles on top of that is just absurd IMO. There are a bunch of dials that can be tweaked there.

I agree. But somehow, it's hard to balance her.

Rosalina is harder, and I'm biased because I use her. I'll agree that Luma is the big offender, but don't forget that it's the one with the KO power in general, so if you nerf that aspect too hard she'll end up as Sheik-with-a-puppet.

Rosalina doesn't need above average KO power when she has Luma that does basically everything beautifully. Nerfing her KO power would be justifiable since she already does so much with Luma together (You can't combo her without getting slapped by Luma. And some characters can't get in for what).

IMO, I don't think nerfing Luma's KO power will drop Rosalina much. Not when it kills with jab 3. Not that it kills absurdly early, it's just that it can be done without any real risk to Rosalina because Luma can be separated, and basically has no end lag. And oh, yeah. It sends people to the air. U-air fodders right there.

I know Luma is like 'lol send it off-stage lol' but in reality, few characters can do that without getting punished.

I don't mind the damage on needles being buffed if it really has to, but the idea that 'it would be a worse fox blaster' being a problem is something I don't agree with. Falcon's Usmash is plain worse than Ganon's Usmash (probably), but he has a slew of other character strengths to more than make up for it. Sheik having a worse Fox blaster would be okay if she was still great in footsies like she's supposed to be imo.

Perhaps. Sheik still has her safe approaches I assume.

But needles aren't the only thing that made her what she is. Her safetiness is the one, and taking that away would... drop Sheik like an upside-down rocket. That's the tricky thing.

 

[Thinkaman]

..and whew, caught up.

Out of curiosity, how many people here read every post? Am I unusual, or is this normal, or what? I have no idea.

Explosive Flame is a great long-distance poke / damage-dealer that pierces shield on the last frame, essentially making it (to quote a user on this very site that I can't for the life of me recall) a "ranged command grab".

Hi!

So I've been hearing MK is LM's worst MU. I'd like to hear someone's reasoning on why.

MK has a VERY rewarding dashgrab and juggle game and can camp any aerial position on demand for a short time. MK's dash speed keeps LM f-smash unsafe on block. Offstage, normally the deal is that Mac sucks but in return is actually pretty advantageous against the opponent too (when the shoes are swapped); not only is MK the worst-case scenario for LM off-stage (there's basically no mixup LM can do to deal with a MK floating in his way), but MK's up-b is totally safe + pokes the ledge liberally without risk.

Much of this is also true of other characters, but MK has it all + this ace card: MK is floaty.

All those generous low % combos LM gets on Sheik, Falcon, Fox, and fast-falling friends? Nope, nothing.

And also, LM seem to be also wrecked by Sheik. Welp. All Sheik need is one F-throw at mid percents to end LM's stock.

I need to play this more, but I have started to turn more optimistic about this MU than I was previously. (For full context, I originally thought Sheik was LM's second worst, only to MK)

• LM loves hitting fast-fallers
• Having a high-reward frame-1 option against Sheik is really nice
• A high run speed goes a long way against Sheik
• Jolt Haymaker is the single strongest punish of a ranged Needles read in the game

The last time I played a decent Sheik, I was performing better with my Mac than my Ness (or Ganon) after several games.

 

[Gunla]

..and whew, caught up.

Out of curiosity, how many people here read every post? Am I unusual, or is this normal, or what? I have no idea.

Definitely not; I certainly do it myself. And it can take a while.

Something I find kinda funny is how Greninja's footstool setups really need that odd quirk of Water Shuriken of making him stall in the air as he fires it. It's the kind of thing that you don't think would be that useful, though sometimes I do throw some shurikens in the air to throw my opponent off when they're trying to catch my landing.

I didn't really think others did this, but yeah, it's a nice stall to bait out some moves. We also do get those footstool combos from it, so it's a really nice bonus.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I agree. But somehow, it's hard to balance her.


Rosalina doesn't need above average KO power when she has Luma that does basically everything beautifully. Nerfing her KO power would be justifiable since she already does so much with Luma together (You can't combo her without getting slapped by Luma. And some characters can't get in for what).

IMO, I don't think nerfing Luma's KO power will drop Rosalina much. Not when it kills with jab 3. Not that it kills absurdly early, it's just that it can be done without any real risk to Rosalina because Luma can be separated, and basically has no end lag. And oh, yeah. It sends people to the air. U-air fodders right there.

I know Luma is like 'lol send it off-stage lol' but in reality, few characters can do that without getting punished.


Perhaps. Sheik still has her safe approaches I assume.

But needles aren't the only thing that made her what she is. Her safetiness is the one, and taking that away would... drop Sheik like an upside-down rocket. That's the tricky thing.

I was talking about Luma in the first place. People love to complain about it's kill power, but forget that Rosalina herself doesn't have a lot of it. Nerfing Luma's ability to kill, if taken to an extreme, risks neutering it as a threat entirely. It's raw damage is rather pitiful, I don't think it has a single move that does more than 6% or so. Maybe charged smashes?

Like I said earlier, I can agree that Luma-as-is presents something of a problem. Gentleman as a kill threat is admittedly a bit absurd. Hilarious, but absurd. It's just that if Luma is nerfed to the point where it can't kill, and it's damage remains bad, then what reason would it have to exist? Just a glorified damage sponge?

 

[Cassio]

Is there any known, specific data for this? I remember plenty of instances where I could just jump after the dthrow and Sheik couldn't actually do anything. I'm guessing that a lot of it depends on percent, rage, DI and character specific physics but I could never tell when it's guaranteed or not.

I also had people in For Glory escape the combo on me by DIing out before the final hit of uair connects which I still can't quite believe to be actually possible.

I highly doubt this is a real mix-up, the percents where up-air is guaranteed like that won't kill you until vanish becomes unfeasible

But I think mixing up the timing of upair itself to read an airdodge or non-air dodge might set up a real 50-50, though the percent range seems fairly specific.

 

[Kofu]

I was talking about Luma in the first place. People love to complain about it's kill power, but forget that Rosalina herself doesn't have a lot of it. Nerfing Luma's ability to kill, if taken to an extreme, risks neutering it as a threat entirely. It's raw damage is rather pitiful, I don't think it has a single move that does more than 6% or so. Maybe charged smashes?

Like I said earlier, I can agree that Luma-as-is presents something of a problem. Gentleman as a kill threat is admittedly a bit absurd. Hilarious, but absurd. It's just that if Luma is nerfed to the point where it can't kill, and it's damage remains bad, then what reason would it have to exist? Just a glorified damage sponge?

Luma needs range/hitbox tweaks more than KO power changes IMO. Although the early kills it can get with rage are a little dumb. Probably wouldn't hurt to lower its BKB values slightly.

 

[Smog Frog]

i'd make jump lower+make her fall a little faster so she cant link uairs with such ease.

 

[PUK]

BTW, this is a question I've been meaning to ask, but how would you guys balance Sheik and Rosalina (Because both of them trash on some characters)?

Nerf rolls. Actually i would nerf every roll of 4>16 and make them longer (17 min), and i would nerf every roll lag to make it >14 frame. This would put more pressure on character who abuses roll to punish, move, avoid, dance, etc. It would nerf a lot of character, but rosalina would have a harder time avoidng confrontation, falcon wouldn't be able to roll jab dash grab roll into safety if miss, and sheik too.

 

[Luigi player]

I highly doubt this is a real mix-up, the percents where up-air is guaranteed like that won't kill you until vanish becomes unfeasible

But I think mixing up the timing of upair itself to read an airdodge or non-air dodge might set up a real 50-50, though the percent range seems fairly specific.

It's definitely a true mixup. There were SO many instances where my doublejump never came out while I was mashing jump, and the uair killed me. Of course airdodge comes out a little sooner which makes you able to avoid that, but if Sheik goes for a vanish she can catch you with that. It's of course %-specific, but it's not that small of a range. And keeping in mind how easily she racks up %, and how little % her attacks do and how easy it is for her to get grabs it's definitely very easily possible for her to grab you at these %s. Guess wrong and you're dead, basically. It's really a terrible feeling to die off of this, but there's nothing you can do besides guessing right... or not getting grabbed (good luck on that while not being wrecked by fairs that put you into terrible edgeguard positions, and avoiding needles).

It seems like Sheik has even more than that. Just recently I got bthrown by Sheik and "true combo mixup'd" into bouncing fish for the kill... on Dreamland. I had like 134 % or something like that (Diddy). I could've air dodged, but I wanted to jump and the jump never came out. But I guess I could've DIed better. But the point is Sheik has more of these, not just one setup. She can also fthrow instead of dthrow and get a fair etc. There's a lot of stuff she can do to you, it's just really scary against her if you're at kill-% and get grabbed.

 

[Vipermoon]

How to balance Sheik:

Instead of autocancel Fair on frame 11, increase to say frame 21 so Sheik can't land with a falling AC Fair which is currently very dumb. She can take 10 frames of landing lag like normal characters, it isn't a big deal.

Also, a very very slight decrease in Fair range. Very slight.

Increase needle start-up by a couple of frames. Just a couple.

To compensate, increase Bair damage to 8% and 9% up from 7 and 8. Bair should be stronger than Fair, it's rediculous how weak it is.

Do this and nothing drastic will happen to Sheik. She'll remain the best if not then among the best.

 

[A_Kae]

Isn't balancing discussion banned in this thread?

Sheik mainly needs the knockback on needle storm reduced. And other needles related nerfs. There are lots of different ways to adjust them.

Fair having a worse autocancel would be good as well, but it's not as important.

 

[GeneralLedge]

If we're talking Sheik balance again, here's a reminder idea from ~hundred pages ago.

What if Sheik Needles traveled in a ground-hitting sort of 'sweep' forward instead of straight-ahead? Short/medium range would act the same as currently, but further away would require a higher needle charge to hit at all, and would hit only as many times as the range permits.

It would make aerial usage more interesting too.

Range definitely not to scale. Perhaps the fifth needle simply goes straight.

 

[oldkingcroz]

..and whew, caught up.

Out of curiosity, how many people here read every post? Am I unusual, or is this normal, or what? I have no idea.

I read a good portion- 4/5th or so. I often skip a half page, like the weird cannon debate about Roy's non-cannon sword wielding or when people complain for buffs to Marth/ Samus/ etc.


Anyway- what characters are decent against Sheik? Who goes even/ wins the MU? Rosalina, Yoshi, Kirby, Fox, Customs Palutina, Mario, Custom Wii Fit, Small-brawler, Toon Link, Meta Knight, etc? Who do the Sheik mains hate fighting?
I'd rather play as Kirby against her than my other co-mains, Ike and ROB, that's for sure.

 

[Illuminose]

Spoiler: Why I think Link is overrated

- Poor all-around mobility specs. This actually limits his projectile walling, as it's more difficult for him to be mobile around the stage, especially with lots of platforms and against characters that are more mobile.

- Projectiles are extremely vulnerable to dash -> powershield (more noticeable offline). Gale Boomerang is especially affected by this seeing as it has no return hitbox. Arrows are very linear (Gale Boomerang kinda is too) and telegraphed. His bombs are versatile, but his confirms aren't as good as what Toon Link has. Overall, his projectiles are slow.

- Mediocre/linear recovery. Link's Up B, though it has ok distance, really doesn't go that high and has poor horizontal range. He has a tether but blegh. For characters like Sheik and Pikachu that have powerful edgeguarding tools, it's very easy to edgeguard Link.

- Poor at getting out of combos. He's heavy, doesn't have a slow fall speed, is a medium-sized target, and lacks fast aerials to interrupt combos/strings (his sex kick nair is frame 7, lol). Also has rather meh landing options in general outside of, like, dair, which is very punishable.

- Has to land hard reads, or characters basically have to walk into him, to get kill confirms. Link is only really killing with fsmash, usmash, and uair. He's lacking in overall kill setups, which is pretty detrimental. He has a ****load of kill power, but putting it to use can be very difficult against opponents with safe options.

- Crappy grab. Seriously, idc what you say about his buffs, it's still a slow ass tether. All these dthrow confirms are nice but he can't really set up grabs and doesn't have the sheer mobility like say ZSS to obtain grabs. This makes grab very risky and punishable, although its range is very good. This is especially significant because it means that Link's on-shield game is altogether terrible, which is bad since shields are a dominant mechanic in this game.

- Slow kit overall. He doesn't really have any options that are fast enough to compete with all of this game's top and high tiers, which tend to have really fast frame data overall.

- Limited guaranteed combos/follow-ups, which means he struggles for guaranteed damage outside of maybe 1 follow-up out of dthrow with a garbage grab.

Anyways

What I've found while second-ing Sheik:
F-throw + U-air = This is one of the easiest, but the reward is low. Kills at... 130%-140%-ish with rage if I'm not mistaken. Good luck killing D3 with this.
F-throw + BF = Not guaranteed at certain percents, but it sometimes works. And also, put that double jump to work in conjuction!
B-throw + BF = Surprisingly. Sheik's B-throw is amusingly weak, but it can combo to BF! And it kills at 100% at the edge of the stage.
F-throw + F-air = Lel. I don't remember when it kills but this is basically a last-resort.
F-tilt + U-air = Read F-throw to U-air.
U-tilt + Tipper U-smash = Yes. You read it freaking right. She can combo to tipper U-smash. I have only seen this at Sheik boards but it works on 70%-ish... And doesn't work on higher percents I believe.

D-throw is basically useless at kill setups. It works as combo starter but F-throw does better overall. I haven't looked much on needles, but I'm having a hard time believing she can combo to BF given its end lag.

And also:

Put a middleline between [f] and [air] and I'll believe you.

Sheik DOES struggle to kill. It doesn't matter how many bazillion kill set-ups she has if she can't kill onstage before 130%-140%.

BTW, this is a question I've been meaning to ask, but how would you guys balance Sheik and Rosalina (Because both of them trash on some characters)? Sheik I've been playing as, and I find her needles, call me crazy, quite honest. I mean, yeah sure. She taps B twice, you take 1%. So? 1% buddy. Fully charged? 7%. That's barely higher than Luigi's Fireballs... Unless I can find evidence that she can combo to BF somehow because I suck and can never get it work I don't think nerfing it hard would be neccesary... The end lag is fairly justifiable too (But then again. I look at Falco's Blaster. Ugh). But I disagree on 'making it so it doesn't flinch'. ANY projectile that doesn't flinch people would basically end up as a worse Fox's Blaster unless they do 20% per hit.

The only thing I disagree on Sheik's needles are on how they do knockback at higher percents. I think they can do something like 'decrease their knockback growth so they don't do knockback till 300%' so Sheik doesn't juggle people like mad even though they're miles away from her feet. I think simple flinch can make it good already... or flinching is something I've been underestimating lately?

Rosalina... it's hard to balance her honestly. Solo Rosalina suck, sure, but Luma adds an entire whole new gameplay on her. Nerfing Luma would be understandable since it... just seem too strong as of now, but I'm not sure where to hit it. Crazy knockback, sure. I have heard tales of people dying at 40% to Rosalina's U-air (Not sure how that even happened. Maybe they got hit by both of them at the same time?), but perhaps that would do alone since I don't remember Luma having Ganon-tier knockback on any other of its attacks. Maybe reduce its health? Or make it so it acts slower when Rosalina is in hitstun?

I'd be interested to hear people's opinions.

Sheik's kill options/setups:

dthrow

-> double jump rising uair
-> vanish
-> empty hop -> double jump to the side where they end up after their air dodge -> uair
-> fair (amusingly this can work at very decent percentages by the ledge depending on rage, like 130% or so)

fthrow (all are mixups based on conditioning/reads)
-> uair
-> vanish
-> full hop -> bouncing fish

ftilt (mixup based on whether they air dodge though it's noteworthy that uair is a true combo up until ~125% depending on character if you're fast enough)
-> uair
-> vanish

weak nair -> bouncing fish
full hop rising needles -> bouncing fish
any baited air dodge -> tipper usmash (best case is out of fthrow usually or threatening an aerial as they land)
tipper usmash through platforms
fsmash

If you really can't kill, ftilt starts to kill at ~170% with rage, fair/bair start to become incredibly potent at ~140-150% or so, and dash attack can kill at ~180-190%. Sheik has a really easy time living for long and not getting hit by kill moves, so it's not actually that bad if you can't land a kill beforehand. bthrow -> bouncing fish doesn't work against anyone who knows how to air dodge, utilt -> tipper usmash is very situational/tricky to land. burst grenade -> bouncing fish is also a thing although again hard to land.

I definitely agree with the nerf you proposed though, it's by far the simplest nerf to make Sheik's needles less of an issue. Let's face it, Sheik's needle zoning has a limit and isn't really as free as people like to say it is. The only thing that's really 'broken' about needles is the kb at high percents. Reduce needle king and they're fine. Also do something in terms of slightly decreasing fair range. Nerfing landing lag means she can't do ****, i.e. she can't combo effectively and loses her whole safety aspect. That is a ridiculous nerf, lol. As far as Rosaluma is concerned...I think it's kinda clear that the bkb of uair is too much, it should kill at higher percents but it can kill way too early, hence being 'cheese'. Maybe also do something to the Jab 3 kb which is kinda silly. I can live with the rest of Rosaluma, but current uair and Jab 3 are kinda cheese lol and that's putting it lightly. The ability of Luma to act while Rosa is in hitstun/grab/shieldbreak is also kinda silly though I think that can be dealt with fine if you are aware of Luma.

 

[Wintropy]

Hi!

Ha, having a tiny fan-gush moment here.

Seriously, though, I love your posts. I learn so much from your insights. Cheers for that, friend.

Every strategy can be mitigated to some extent by knowledge and preparation. That does not make every strategy cheese. Most good characters have something that will wreck unprepared players. Cheese is a word for filled with salt. Don't worry, we all get salty now and then.

Wise words. And anyway, an opponent that relies on cheese is an opponent that tends to crumble when the cheese is exposed.

God that was a strange sentence to type.

On-topic, my main concern with Rosalina is that she's essentially an average character with a unique gimmick attached to her. Without the mobile weapon / meat shield to help her out, she'd just be Peach with more sparkles and a magic wand.

On a less theorycrafting note, I've known good Rosalina players to fall apart after not playing her for a while, with any inherent knowledge of the puppet mechanic collapsing with it. It reminds me of the Olimar matchup, in that people tend to struggle due to not understanding how Rosie operates; the difference here being that Rosie has more than enough tools in her kit to hold her own even if her opponent knows how to counter her. That simultaneously intrigues and terrifies me. I wonder where she will go when her metagame advances and players start to discover more of what she can really do.

 

[TheReflexWonder]

Serious question: Is Falco really missing anything to be considered an actively good character? He has reliable combos off of grab up to triple-digit percents, above-average follow-ups on many low-risk pokes, great range and safety in neutral, multiple burst range options, a perfectly-serviceable recovery, nice edgeguarding options, KO options in a variety of situations, a good tool for avoiding juggles in Forward-B...

He is somewhat slow but holds his ground quite well. The only thing that sticks out is that KO setups are hard to come by, but he has good and fast (if risky) KO tools all across his moveset.

What the hell? I actually like Yamcha.
Playing as him in Budokai games at least. heh

Same here. "How do you feel now, idiot?"

 

[Luco]

..and whew, caught up.

Out of curiosity, how many people here read every post? Am I unusual, or is this normal, or what? I have no idea.



Hi!



MK has a VERY rewarding dashgrab and juggle game and can camp any aerial position on demand for a short time. MK's dash speed keeps LM f-smash unsafe on block. Offstage, normally the deal is that Mac sucks but in return is actually pretty advantageous against the opponent too (when the shoes are swapped); not only is MK the worst-case scenario for LM off-stage (there's basically no mixup LM can do to deal with a MK floating in his way), but MK's up-b is totally safe + pokes the ledge liberally without risk.

Much of this is also true of other characters, but MK has it all + this ace card: MK is floaty.

All those generous low % combos LM gets on Sheik, Falcon, Fox, and fast-falling friends? Nope, nothing.



I need to play this more, but I have started to turn more optimistic about this MU than I was previously. (For full context, I originally thought Sheik was LM's second worst, only to MK)

• LM loves hitting fast-fallers
• Having a high-reward frame-1 option against Sheik is really nice
• A high run speed goes a long way against Sheik
• Jolt Haymaker is the single strongest punish of a ranged Needles read in the game

The last time I played a decent Sheik, I was performing better with my Mac than my Ness (or Ganon) after several games.

Nope, I take a while catching up too and it can be arduous!


Also, personally I think Falco's phantasm is..... not that great. If he uses it in neutral, good job, you did below 10% to your opponent at best and at worst you put yourself in a bad position. Offstage, it's so predictable even when it shouldn't be - SH Nair it with half the cast because its hitboxes are... kinda bad imo. There are times when it's useful but for the most part I'm just not afraid of it.

 

[FullMoon]

I have heard tales of people dying at 40% to Rosalina's U-air (Not sure how that even happened. Maybe they got hit by both of them at the same time?)

Luma's Up-Air is very very silly.

I mean yeah it was Mewtwo but come on.

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Also, personally I think Falco's phantasm is..... not that great. If he uses it in neutral, good job, you did below 10% to your opponent at best and at worst you put yourself in a bad position. Offstage, it's so predictable even when it shouldn't be - SH Nair it with half the cast because its hitboxes are... kinda bad imo. There are times when it's useful but for the most part I'm just not afraid of it.

It's not meant to instill fear, Luco. It's a tool for Falco to get out of hairy situations, and depending on the character, it works. At least that's what I've seen out of smart Falcos, anyway.

Smooth Criminal

 

[DungeonMaster]

Luma's Up-Air is very very silly. I mean yeah it was Mewtwo but come on.

It's absurd that Rosaluma even got past any amount of quality control / balance checks. She's floaty so avoids combos. Massive disjoints so wins trades. Way, way too much kill power for a lightweight.
That's not even a low-blast zone stage and she has barely any rage.
I absolutely would not shed a tear to see Shiek and Rosa hit with a nerf bat. Profoundly bad design. I'm amazed they missed the nerf bat this past round of balancing.

 

[Yikarur]

I read every post but I feel dumb if I want to answer to something 10 pages ago..

 

[Routa]

I read every post but I feel dumb if I want to answer to something 10 pages ago..

You are not the only one...