Character Competitive Impressions

[~ Gheb ~]

Unfortunately, toon link got stupid strong kill confirms from boomerang and bomb (and fire arrows with customs).

Seriously wtf were the devs thinking giving TL one of the top 5 strongest fsmashes in the game. Bthrow and usmash are also way too strong and even random uair/fair closes ou stocks pretty reliably and can be comboed into. I think the character is ... ridiculous.

 

[Ikes]

Seriously wtf were the devs thinking giving TL one of the top 5 strongest fsmashes in the game. Bthrow and usmash are also way too strong and even random uair/fair closes ou stocks pretty reliably and can be comboed into. I think the character is ... ridiculous.

I personally think he is a contender for high tier, maybe not top tier but I would put him around the likes of Mario and Falcon

 

[~ Gheb ~]

... Mario?

Why is that character given so much credit? Like, he ain't bad by any means but same leage as Falcon? You sure about that?

 

[Teshie U]

so I've been testing out Ryu

his true specials are really lenient to pull off. his true shoryuken requires very little precision and all of his hadouken variants can be very easily spammed

I might give him a try, see how I like him

I actually struggle to do the fire...fireball thing. Doesn't seem to matter really. They all get slapped out of the air if you even look at them too hard so they all just control space and bait the same stuff.

Toon Link upsmash OP? It feels so much weaker than in Brawl. Fsmash is stupid strong though. And Fair kills so freaking early by the ledge. The only thing keeping him from just rolling around in shield is bombs blowing up eventually.

Like seriously can we talk about this Fair? I feel like its as strong as Ganondorf's.

 

[Ikes]

I actually struggle to do the fire...fireball thing. Doesn't seem to matter really. They all get slapped out of the air if you even look at them too hard so they all just control space and bait the same stuff.

Toon Link upsmash OP? It feels so much weaker than in Brawl. Fsmash is stupid strong though. And Fair kills so freaking early by the ledge. The only thing keeping him from just rolling around in shield is bombs blowing up eventually.

Like seriously can we talk about this Fair? I feel like its as strong as Ganondorf's.

it's too bad that his fmash whiffs half the time at percentages where it kills

... Mario?

Why is that character given so much credit? Like, he ain't bad by any means but same leage as Falcon? You sure about that?

He's basically "autocombos: the character"

it's almost stupid how easily he racks up damage and deals combos/strings, not luigi tier but mario also has **** like cape and fludd which are amazing in their own right

not better than luigi, still, but really insane nonetheless

 

[Teshie U]

Is Mario really not better than Luigi? Luigi seems like a strong counterpick character but clearly not viable on his own. Does Mario have even have any matchups as bad as what can happen to Luigi.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Is Mario really not better than Luigi? Luigi seems like a strong counterpick character but clearly not viable on his own. Does Mario have even have any matchups as bad as what can happen to Luigi.

I think they would make for a very solid duo main characters. I think Mario covers up much of Luigi's worse matchups, and vice versa. But still believe that Luigi is overall better, just more exploitable with his weaknesses.

 

[bc1910]

No, I just meant throws. Ness's dthrow leads to combos not significantly worse than Lucas's (Lucas is not able to force any kind of 0-death out of dthrow; those are training dummy only shenanigans). Ness's bthrow kills significantly earlier than Lucas's... or anyone else's throw of any sort really. Ness's fthrow is an excellent throw, almost always putting his opponent off-stage in the awkward percent range between combos off dthrow and kills off bthrow. Ness's uthrow is rarely used but not even bad; it sets up for juggle chases pretty well, but Ness's other three throws are just so incredible in covering almost every conceivable situation that he rarely needs it.

EDIT: Obviously you don't assess all four throws equally. You assess average reward off throwing. There isn't a medal for using all four throws equally.

It is true that Lucas's grab is so uniquely horrible that he struggles to use his excellent throws, but I wasn't holding that against him at that time. I was factoring in the chase options though, and Lucas's dthrow is definitely held back by him not having a move as good as Ness fair to combo with (his combo options aren't bad, but against an opponent who is using things like DI, he will rarely get aerial chains as long as what Ness will get with fairs). I do think Lucas's dthrow chases work at better percent ranges than Ness's which is a plus, but Lucas doesn't have a good mid-percent throw like Ness fthrow (Ness fthrow is really a very unique tool) and Lucas's three kill throws all kill later than Ness's one which means for practical purposes Lucas has to wait to higher percents to end a stock off a grab. To be honest, I wasn't thinking of Lucas, I would agree his set of throws are pretty high ranking, but I still value what Ness and Charizard have more.

If you're assessing a set of throws you should obviously consider the set as a whole, weighting on each throw should be equal, why wouldn't it be? Why would you say like "a good Dthrow is better than a good Uthrow" when each character will appreciate different throws more?

Lucas' Dthrow is better IMO. He kills from it, gets more damage on average and it combos for longer. DI does not affect followups if properly read or reacted to. Ness gets Fair chains on specific characters at specific percents and that's the only thing his Dthrow does better outside raw damage. The Fair chains can be DI'd much of the time and DI-ing away from the throw itself causes it to stop true comboing pretty early, Ness cannot chase DI as well as Lucas because his throw has more ending lag.

Lucas' Bthrow is clearly worse.

Lucas' Uthrow and Fthrow are the same as Ness' but they trade base knockback for knockback scaling. Ness' versions are more useful at low percents and Lucas' are more useful at high percents. Both of Lucas' can kill. They are better than Ness'. Ness' Bthrow being better than both (which is true, except Lucas' throws might kill slightly earlier in specific locations where Ness is far from the blastzone) doesn't mean his throw set overall is better. Just means he has the best or second best kill throw in the game.

Yeah, I am not considering their grabs because we were discussing a set of throws. If you consider grabs, Lucas' are obviously worse (and worse than a large chunk of characters).

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

... Mario?

Why is that character given so much credit? Like, he ain't bad by any means but same leage as Falcon? You sure about that?

Mario reminds me a bit of falcon. He's definitely up there his combo game is ridiculous to go along with that mobility. To go along with ridiculous frame data.

 

[Kofu]

He's a lot better than Robin. Robin sucks.

I was specifically referring to mobility, not general efficacy.

Like seriously can we talk about this Fair? I feel like its as strong as Ganondorf's.

It's a crazy meaty FSmash that does 13% IIRC. Kind of slow at 14 frames (if I'm reading the data correctly) and doesn't low jump autocancel but can be interrupted before he lands with a jump or special (possibly another aerial, don't remember if any of his aerials come out fast enough).

 

[A2ZOMG]

Seriously wtf were the devs thinking giving TL one of the top 5 strongest fsmashes in the game. Bthrow and usmash are also way too strong and even random uair/fair closes ou stocks pretty reliably and can be comboed into. I think the character is ... ridiculous.

How do you consider any of that ridiculous when Toon Link is competing with Mario for bad damage per hit, but his grab and throw setups are infinitely worse, his range isn't really better but his aerials are both slower and less safe, his recovery is worse (and Mario's recovery isn't exactly great), and the combos Toon Link needs to confirm into U-air and F-air depend on him hitting extremely telegraphed moves. The percents TL can KO are at best average (and not even on particularly safe attacks), but his damage dealing is really bad.

If anything he's mostly a terrible character. Only thing keeping him remotely usable is Bombs, which are his one very good move (and it by no means really solves his fundamental problem: shields). Otherwise he has basically the worst moveset in the game. Even Zelda doesn't envy Toon Link's moveset when her pokes have more range and better reward, her negative state is better, and her throws and dashgrab are actually really good.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

How do you consider any of that ridiculous when Toon Link is competing with Mario for bad damage per hit, but his grab and throw setups are infinitely worse, his range isn't really better but his aerials are both slower and less safe, his recovery is worse (and Mario's recovery isn't exactly great), and the combos Toon Link needs to confirm into U-air and F-air depend on him hitting extremely telegraphed moves. The percents TL can KO are at best average (and not even on particularly safe attacks), but his damage dealing is really bad.

If anything he's mostly a terrible character. Only thing keeping him remotely usable is Bombs, which are his one very good move (and it by no means really solves his fundamental problem: shields). Otherwise he has basically the worst moveset in the game. Even Zelda doesn't envy Toon Link's moveset when her pokes have more range and better reward, her negative state is better, and her throws and dashgrab are actually really good.

If he can outzone almost everyone in the game, he DEFINITLY not mostly a terrible character. You're just simply not going to touch him.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

First pacman hype now toon link...

 

[A2ZOMG]

If he can outzone almost everyone in the game, he DEFINITLY not mostly a terrible character. You're just simply not going to touch him.

Dhalsim outzoned everyone in USF4. Low tier character.

Toon Link...definitely does not have exceptional zoning by any means. Most stuff that isn't Bombs are easily perfect shielded. And the rest of his moveset aside from Bombs is really awful.

 

[TriTails]

I don't believe Samus beats Luigi. It probably comes down to even. Luigis also don't seem to think Samus beats us either.

BTW, it's just a single match. If we are going to seriously base our opinions straight on that, then Luigi counters ZSS because NickRiddle got 2-stocked by the same Luigi and in the same tourney. Which he doesn't.

And also, I may be just crazy, but I no longer think Mega Man is a complete hell for Luigi. Shield beats pellets (Mega mains plz confirm, but in theory it seems to), and we combo him hard. We gimp him, we kill setup him, and it's not impossible to approach.

It's still in Mega's favor though. Pellets are annoying, but they are workable and don't create an unbreakable barrier. Luigi can and WILL get in with proper shield usage. We don't use Fireballs much, but we do rely on shields a lot, and thanks to shield regeneration's speed, we can keep this up for pretty long with one shield.

If he can outzone almost everyone in the game, he DEFINITLY not mostly a terrible character. You're just simply not going to touch him.

If you don't know how to shield, sure.

 

[Joeyd123]

I actually struggle to do the fire...fireball thing. Doesn't seem to matter really. They all get slapped out of the air if you even look at them too hard so they all just control space and bait the same stuff.

Toon Link upsmash OP? It feels so much weaker than in Brawl. Fsmash is stupid strong though. And Fair kills so freaking early by the ledge. The only thing keeping him from just rolling around in shield is bombs blowing up eventually.

Like seriously can we talk about this Fair? I feel like its as strong as Ganondorf's.

Yeah I was messing around with him and was like wowww his fair is good

 

[Illuminose]

Skipping back a bit and then some recent stuff.

Rosalina doesn't slightly lose to sheik it's Rosalina's worst MU. You're overrating Rosalina's strengths and understating her weaknesses. Rosalina is a strong character but she's not what you're making her out to be.

Rosalina slso struggles to kill. She doesn't have kill set ups. If you die early vs rosalina it's because she read your air dodge or gimped you. She can put people in bad situations and exploit that but it's not something that's broken. It's on the players tbh.

There is no way in hell Sheik destroys Rosalina. At best it's maybe like 58:42 or something, I still hold that its 55:45 though. Rosalina is kind of a pain for Sheik. Sure, Sheik has a really good tool to get rid of Luma (forward air), but as long as Luma is around she's a pretty big thorn in the side for Sheik. Rosalina can use Luma as basically a shield in front of her that is really annoying for Sheik's approaches. Bottom line, she has to be more careful and precise than with other characters because it's much harder to get away with things due to Luma. There's also a pretty major kill power mismatch. The reason Sheik can do well against Rosalina is because she can fair off Luma efficiently and do some stuff to her recovery like bouncing fish rebound or a dropzone nair or something, but the advantages of Sheik are way overstated in this case. Especially because needle zoning is absolute ass against Rosalina, lol. In reality Rosalina has the tools to compete against Sheik. I didn't say that it was easy, but she's far from bodied by Sheik. It's even with customs on because Rosalina is a straight up better character with customs on. Having Shooting Star Bit to pressure pretty much the whole stage in neutral and zone is really huge. Penetrating Needles bypass Luma, sure, but Sheik has to get a hell of a lot closer to land Penetrating Needles than Rosalina does to land Shooting Star Bit. It's a range mismatch.

this
Needles have more end lag that i thought. While partially charged come faster, between the last needle and the last frame there is 35 frame of lag. If the move is fully charged you still have 28 frame of lag. Now the last needle hits at full distance at frame 19 (5 needles) or 31 (6) while dealing the min amount of shieldstun.
Of course nobody can punish fully charged needle storm at full distance, there is only a 22 frame window to cross 2/3 of FD. Idk maybe sonic can.
But at half the distance anyone with decent run speed or fast projectile can punish because the window is bigger and easier.
Now the custom question: piercing needles. It seems they shared the same frames, but i can't be sure. 3 needle max, less than half FD of range. No more shieldstun. The last needle hit on frame 22 (fully charged) so there is a freaking 31 frame window.
And with 2 needles there is 34 frames. Why this custom is used again? I can bet it's unsafe on hit at low percent, and on shield at any. It can't be used to combo or zone so no more needle into BF. I mean it doesn't matter if it eat shield if you end punished against anyone with a decent dash speed (aka everyone in the top part of the tier list bar rosa and luigi).

You can't run a long distance and punish needle zoning from long range really. That's not how it works. However you're right, about one-third the length of FD or so is around where needles become unsafe on block. Single needles aren't safe on hit at low percents at those ranges. Just tested btw, it's kinda rudimentary because I used a stopwatch but it takes approximately 6/10 of a second, or 36 frames for Sonic to cross 2/3 of FD. And that's Sonic, whose dash speed is the fastest in the game. No characters are doing that, plain and simple. Also I think you might be exaggerating the window unless you're taking into account shield drop frames and I didn't notice (you have to take into account 7 frames of lag since you're dropping shield). This is probably why 1/3 or 1/4 the distance of FD seems to be around the max distance for punishing needles on block. What Sheik does have at that close range though is a mixup, which is needle cancel into dash grab so running up to Sheik and shielding at that range is kind of a risk. If you're trying to get close and block my needles, I can just grab you and combo you, so this isn't really a perfect answer to needles anyways. If I have fully charged needles, I'm taking full advantage of the fact that you're scared as hell and don't want to get hit. While Sheik can't needle forever, her close range game and mixup potential are so good that it doesn't even really matter. That said, if your goal is getting in on Sheik and around her needle zoning, you can definitely do this because her zoning has a limit so long as you mix up your options properly and are prepared to react to her mixups so that you don't get caught off guard.

Is Mario really not better than Luigi? Luigi seems like a strong counterpick character but clearly not viable on his own. Does Mario have even have any matchups as bad as what can happen to Luigi.

Luigi is in this weird position where he loses pretty bad to Sheik and loses kinda bad to Rosa plus having rough matchups against certain zoning characters (Mega Man and Villager are really rough, most others aren't really that bad), but he kinda dumps on almost everyone else. Luigi is regarded, from what I understand, as one of Pikachu's worst matchups. Luigi kinda wrecks Mario. His neutral is just so solid and disgustingly effective that it's really hard to handle. Yes, his neutral is literally fireballs combined with dash grab and maybe some spacing aerials, but it works and it's really difficult to deal with. If you block the fireball, you get grabbed. If you get hit by the fireball, you're also probably getting grabbed and you're at the least taking the damage. It's a win-win for Luigi.

Luigi's reward off a grab is just ridiculous though. Luigi getting a grab means you're about to be taken for one hell of a ride if the Luigi combos properly and follows your DI. A few of those grab follow-ups and now you're at kill percent, get grabbed then and Luigi hits you with a back air or tornado. This is also why you can pretty much never count Luigi out of a match because he can completely turn the tables off the momentum of just one grab. ZSS has this trait as well, but the difference is that her grab is balanced so that she isn't broken as all hell and Luigi's isn't. I'm not saying Luigi is broken, but what I am saying is that he can even turn supposedly bad matchups around because his grab combos work on everyone. Like Sheik for instance? Sure, you should mop the floor with Luigi, but you had better not make any mistakes anywhere near Luigi's shield because Sheik is a fast faller -- she gets comboed. This matchup is still bad, but Luigi can still take it if you're not really careful and completely stick to zoning out Luigi. Fireball isn't even his only setup into grab. He can get fairs into grabs and weak nairs into grabs, not really /that/ one-dimensional in that sense.

Luigi also has low cooldown, fast smashes that are really powerful. His frame 3 nair? Yeah, it does 12% and kills at percents that aren't even really that high. His bair that's like Mario's? It does 14% and kills at normal kill percents, like 100-120% depending on stage positioning. His recovery isn't even that bad, it's sort of linear but at the same time hard to challenge and pretty difficult to gimp for characters that don't have a great off-stage game, especially if the Luigi has good mashing. He can recover from anywhere and Luigis save their jump almost religiously, so you're not getting that jump gone easily.

I actually heavily agree that Luigi needs a secondary for certain matchups. Relying on Luigi doesn't work because Luigi is not getting you through Sheik and you really don't want to be losing to random Mega Mans/Villagers? So you pick another character that can do this. The thing about this is that Luigi is really easy, lol. He's probably the easiest top tier to pick up and do well with. You don't have to be constantly refining Luigi; you can develop another character to aid for problematic matchups and lose pretty much no skill on your Luigi because it's not a major challenge to keep up your Luigi. Larry Lurr's CEO performance shows this more than anything. Sure, he plays Luigi often and his Luigi is very practiced, but he's a Fox main. His Luigi did exceptionally well in Top 8, pretty much giving him a win against ESAM who was stuck in a bad counterpicking scenario and being really crucial for him against a lot of other players -- almost moreso than Fox. That's a testament to Larry's skill but it's also one hell of a testament to what Luigi can pull off when you have other characters that are covering those few problematic matchups. The only reason Luigi doesn't just dump on everyone is his subpar mobility, which is mitigated by his good options to navigate neutral but definitely limits him in some matchups (give Luigi Mario's mobility specs and I bet you he beats Sheik because mobility is why he loses to Sheik), which is healthy for the game because I think he'd probably be OP if that was the case.

Why is Mario not an overall better character. He's more honest, as in he has to work harder to find things. I'm not insinuating that Mario is an honest character; his combos and overall frame data/options are out of this world and far from honest. However, Mario has to work harder to kill because he doesn't have grab kill confirms and he has to work harder to set up his grabs because his fireball isn't as good for that as Luigi's. Mario is amazing still though lol don't get me wrong. His matchup spread is probably overall better, including the key head-to-head vs Sheik against which he goes even or like 55:45. His mobility is solid, his recovery is pretty good, and he has great all-around tools like a reflector, a strong spike, ridiculous combos out of dthrow, powerful/reliable smashes that he can set up into with jab locks, a good projectile that he can use to aid his approach, a frame 3 nair, and a kill throw. His major weaknesses are lack of range on his normals, lack of a solid frontal approach (yes, he can do his full hop fireball and follow it but he doesn't have something like a fair or nair to really space/approach with), and sort of having difficulty setting up kills because he can't do so out of his grab unless he gets his bthrow by the ledge.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Dhalsim outzoned everyone in USF4. Low tier character.

Toon Link...definitely does not have exceptional zoning by any means. Most stuff that isn't Bombs are easily perfect shielded. And the rest of his moveset aside from Bombs is really awful.

Power shielding = prediction. You have to guess when toon link is gonna throw his next item, not to mention he can throw boomerang behind you, JC bomb towards you, and you have to block the boomerang coming back, while grabs you. Very static situation I'm creating, but there's ones very similar to it. Toon link isn't just stuck to throwing garbage to cover approach when he can use it to get closer and land grab.

And no, dhalsim had top tier zoning, but he just falls apart when people get in on him. Toon link is floaty, when helps escaped combos and he has bombs to cover his landing, not to mention a frame 3? Nair.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Power shielding = prediction. You have to guess when toon link is gonna throw his next item, not to mention he can throw boomerang behind you, JC bomb towards you, and you have to block the boomerang coming back, while grabs you. Very static situation I'm creating, but there's ones very similar to it. Toon link isn't just stuck to throwing garbage to cover approach when he can use it to get closer and land grab.

And no, dhalsim had top tier zoning, but he just falls apart when people get in on him. Toon link is floaty, when helps escaped combos and he has bombs to cover his landing, not to mention a frame 3? Nair.

What?

You don't need to predict ANYTHING to powershield Arrows or Boomerang. Nonsense is like 20+ frames. And Bombs are not hard to react to except in really close range either.

And the point you missed: TL's grab reward is GARBAGE. So for every time he misses a grab, he definitely gets punished a lot harder than the reward he gets from landing his terrible grab. And furthermore like Dhalsim, TL falls apart in the negative state. Terrible options to land, mediocre recovery. Being floaty actually is a major downside for landing safely when it gives your opponent more time to chase your landing, and while Bombs do offer some cover, they can be caught. TL's N-air is frame 6 for reference, and doesn't hit anywhere below him making it garbage defensively.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

What the hell?

You don't need to predict ANYTHING to powershield Arrows or Boomerang. Nonsense is like 20+ frames. And Bombs are not hard to react to except in really close range either.

And the point you missed: TL's grab reward is GARBAGE. So for every time he misses a grab, he definitely gets punished a lot harder than the reward he gets from landing his terrible grab. And furthermore like Dhalsim, TL falls apart in the negative state. Terrible options to land, mediocre recovery.

Dthrow --> Nair exist I think, and you can't just power shield everything if the TL mixes it up.
That's like saying I can jump over ryu's fireballs all day in sf2.

EDIT: you also mentioned terrible disadvantaged state and horrible recovery. Being floaty just mean you're best landing option is the ledge mostly, and more importantly, how can a character have a. Terrible recovery if they are floaty? Doesn't make sense, not to mention trademark bomb --> up-b ---> bomb explodes. And up b returns trick

 

[Yikarur]

What?

You don't need to predict ANYTHING to powershield Arrows or Boomerang. Nonsense is like 20+ frames. And Bombs are not hard to react to except in really close range either.

And the point you missed: TL's grab reward is GARBAGE. So for every time he misses a grab, he definitely gets punished a lot harder than the reward he gets from landing his terrible grab. And furthermore like Dhalsim, TL falls apart in the negative state. Terrible options to land, mediocre recovery. Being floaty actually is a major downside for landing safely when it gives your opponent more time to chase your landing, and while Bombs do offer some cover, they can be caught. TL's N-air is frame 6 for reference, and doesn't hit anywhere below him making it garbage defensively.

Sounds like you didn't ever face a good Toon Link.

 

[Luco]

If you're assessing a set of throws you should obviously consider the set as a whole, weighting on each throw should be equal, why wouldn't it be? Why would you say like "a good Dthrow is better than a good Uthrow" when each character will appreciate different throws more?

Lucas' Dthrow is better IMO. He kills from it, gets more damage on average and it combos for longer. DI does not affect followups if properly read or reacted to. Ness gets Fair chains on specific characters at specific percents and that's the only thing his Dthrow does better outside raw damage. The Fair chains can be DI'd much of the time and DI-ing away from the throw itself causes it to stop true comboing pretty early, Ness cannot chase DI as well as Lucas because his throw has more ending lag.

Lucas' Bthrow is clearly worse.

Lucas' Uthrow and Fthrow are the same as Ness' but they trade base knockback for knockback scaling. Ness' versions are more useful at low percents and Lucas' are more useful at high percents. Both of Lucas' can kill. They are better than Ness'. Ness' Bthrow being better than both (which is true, except Lucas' throws might kill slightly earlier in specific locations where Ness is far from the blastzone) doesn't mean his throw set overall is better. Just means he has the best or second best kill throw in the game.

Yeah, I am not considering their grabs because we were discussing a set of throws. If you consider grabs, Lucas' are obviously worse (and worse than a large chunk of characters).

I dunno, I think I have to agree with Ampharos here. The reward for being able to use Lucas' throws in a more varied set of situations (so both Fthrow and Bthrow will kill at the edge so you don't have to worry about where you're facing/grabbing from) somewhat pales to the sheer importance of having a throw that kills the majority of the cast at around the 120% mark on average (less though because lol rage) as opposed to having four different ways to kill at 150/160% (again, less with rage), another throw that leads into combos that force the opponent into a more awkward position (Ness' Fair gets people off-stage more often) and another throw that merely by itself puts the opponent into a very awkward position (Fthrow, which, granted, Lucas has this as well with Bthrow and Fthrow). Ampharos said it right here, you're trying to assess the reward off throwing. Lucas has a brilliant set of combos that Ness doesn't have, great, but Ness gets such an incredible reward off Dthrow, Bthrow and even Fthrow that it pretty much beats out everything Lucas has off his throws.

In other words, let's pretend Ness and Lucas were literally the same character with the same stats in everything except for their throws. Even Lucas' grab was like Ness'. Ness would still be higher because the ability to seal off the stocks anywhere between 30/50% earlier reliably means more than the marginally better combo throw and the unreliable way to end stocks at a slightly later percent (I need to emphasise that PK Hoohah works within a limited percents range and stops working as soon as like 10% after it starts killing).

 

[TriTails]

People need to stop saying 'Luigi loses hard to Villager'. That MU is no worse than 40:60. Mega is also manageable with proper knowledge and execution.

Problem I'm having: If Luigi really lose that bad against Sheik... then why Mr. CC can keep up with ZeRo's ninja?

Y'know. THAT ZeRo. The best player of Smash 4. I doubt if Mr. CC is really in ZeRo's levels. Even if he is, there's no way he can take stocks from ZeRo if Luigi really fares that bad. Perhaps Mr. CC is better than ZeRo? That's kinda too far. Last I checked, Mr. CC was able to take stocks (Or when he got 2-stocked on Duck Hunt, ZeRo was about 120%~-ish) fairly consistently, especially if he went to Halberd. So he didn't got flat out erased like nothing. I may be wrong on my observations though.

 

[Kunai KazeKun]

Seriously wtf were the devs thinking giving TL one of the top 5 strongest fsmashes in the game. Bthrow and usmash are also way too strong and even random uair/fair closes ou stocks pretty reliably and can be comboed into. I think the character is ... ridiculous.

You know I play TL since Brawl and i must say, I feel like he is Mid-Tier for some obvious reasons.

First TLs Struggle:
My opinion is that TLs most Problem MU is everyone who can make a good use of his own shield (Out of Shield Options and Powershield Options). Thats one of the most problems, when TL is facing anyone. His hitconfirms with projectiles leads into Combos and everything else is unsafe. Just play defensive and make good choices in your OoS Options and Powershield, to rack up damage all the time against TL. If you play safe vs him, he will get under pressure and will take some stupid decision to break your def, which can easily punish, also you can catch the bomb to instant throw it against us and use the properties to your advantage.
TLs play will be just throw stuff and hope you get nervous and use stupid decision which get punished, if you keep your mind calm, its really hard to win with TL. Sometimes I feel helpless cause all options I choice are easy to punish if your opponent stay calm. Nothing, except for Spam is safe, so you will keep up spamming a lot to get the opponent nervous, if he understands to go through it, its over.

Another problem which he got is his neutral game, its useless and no help for TL, Bair, Uair, Dair, F-Smash, D-Smash are really laggy and will always get punished, if you use it near the opponent.
To compensate the lags of his moves you have to use the boomerang, which needs a lot of skills time it correctly and its as long the round

In my opinion TLs Playstyle will exhaust the player by time, so just play defensive and wait until TL is trying to go aggro, which you can punish him really easily.

Second Killoptions:
You wont get an F-Smash Kill, if you dont have a hard read, even the second hit is not guarantee after first hit-confirm. B-Throw is ok as a killmove, but not OP, because to get the grab is really hard with him (Teather Grab Problems), so the reward is ok in my opinion.

The Up-Smash is one of TLs good moves which can be used sometimes against shield, but if your opponent can powershield it, its punishable. So dont use it very often. Another good Combo Starter is uptilt which comes out in frame 8 and combos into itself. The problem with this move is to land it, which is also very easy to punish and very predictable, but the reward is good, if you can make it. Uptilt leads also in Uptilt > Uair, which can set the deal.
Fair is a good killmove and does only work, if you hit a projectile otherwise this move wont hit, except you have a good read, the same goes to upair. You cant do that moves just for the lolz without getting punished.


Third Recovery is bad:
TLs recovery is horrible like in Brawl. You can easily punish him for getting back, so its impossible to get back on stage if your are good enough. His Up-B doesnt have any prio to get through attacks, it will always get beaten by any attacks. Zair Recovery is longer now, but that means he will need more time to get onto the edge as well and this will get easily punished.



Conclusion:
He is not that bad, but he isnt that overrated. The problem is, that the most people doesnt know how to play against TL, so its easy for TL to get the opponent nervous and lead him into bad options, which gets punished. IF you stay calm and wait a bit for the gaps, you can punish him easily. Just make a good use of your shield and TL will feel helpless, after some time. Also the playstyle will exhaust the player by time, so wait a bit.

His killoptions are ok, but his combo potential and the way he rack up damage is really bad. Bomb to arrow to boomerang = 12% which you get with aerials from your opponent. So you have a lot to work for some procent, which any other character can do with 1 hit, if you play safe. If you play aggressive you can make a lot of damage, but thats not area where TL is shining, some mixup can rack up the damage a lot faster but can also lead to lose really early, if the opponent find the gaps quick.



Thats the opinion of a TL player, which play him since release.
I hope I could gave you an insight in TLs Game. He is ok, but no design fail. Maybe you should play him a bit to get a feel how difficult he is to play good all the time.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Sounds like you didn't ever face a good Toon Link.

I've heard Zan explain enough times that "shield is really strong against TL". And I don't think the available tournament TL footage really contradicts anything I've said. TL almost entirely functions because Bombs are really good, and the rest of his movepool is horrible.

Dthrow --> Nair exist I think, and you can't just power shield everything if the TL mixes it up.
That's like saying I can jump over ryu's fireballs all day in sf2.

EDIT: you also mentioned terrible disadvantaged state and horrible recovery. Being floaty just mean you're best landing option is the ledge mostly, and more importantly, how can a character have a. Terrible recovery if they are floaty? Doesn't make sense, not to mention trademark bomb --> up-b ---> bomb explodes. And up b returns trick

You don't have to powershield everything. TL however isn't hurting anyone in neutral with his projectiles alone, which are all too slow to actually hit anyone in midrange or further if they don't commit. He has to take a risk of some sort, either a grab or some attack in between a Bomb in order to actually break defenses. And his damage output is not very good.

Even if D-throw N-air comboed (which it doesn't really), that's not a lot of damage. Also Ryu's fireballs are by far better zoning tools than TL's projectiles for the most part because they're actually fast enough to force people to guess in neutral.

And Little Mac is a floaty character. Worst recovery in the game. TL is a lightweight, his recovery moves lose to most attacks, and his attacks don't defend him well against edgeguards. His recovery is bad.

 

[Routa]

I heard someone mentioned Faptain. Why do people keep putting him into A tier? I mean he is good, but I think he has some big flaws (well I'm not a good explainer but I think which things I mean, so I wont name them) that yell "B tier!" instead of "A tier!". Could someone enlighten me?

 

[Luco]

He has an abusable recovery and lacklustre specials in general. Everything else about him is pretty great and more than compensates for it afaik.

 

[PUK]

I heard someone mentioned Faptain. Why do people keep putting him into A tier? I mean he is good, but I think he has some big flaws (well I'm not a good explainer but I think which things I mean, so I wont name them) that yell "B tier!" instead of "A tier!". Could someone enlighten me?

Because like some other character (ZSS, luigi) he can go over his flaws with sheer power

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

If you're assessing a set of throws you should obviously consider the set as a whole, weighting on each throw should be equal, why wouldn't it be? Why would you say like "a good Dthrow is better than a good Uthrow" when each character will appreciate different throws more?

Lucas' Dthrow is better IMO. He kills from it, gets more damage on average and it combos for longer. DI does not affect followups if properly read or reacted to. Ness gets Fair chains on specific characters at specific percents and that's the only thing his Dthrow does better outside raw damage. The Fair chains can be DI'd much of the time and DI-ing away from the throw itself causes it to stop true comboing pretty early, Ness cannot chase DI as well as Lucas because his throw has more ending lag.

Lucas' Bthrow is clearly worse.

Lucas' Uthrow and Fthrow are the same as Ness' but they trade base knockback for knockback scaling. Ness' versions are more useful at low percents and Lucas' are more useful at high percents. Both of Lucas' can kill. They are better than Ness'. Ness' Bthrow being better than both (which is true, except Lucas' throws might kill slightly earlier in specific locations where Ness is far from the blastzone) doesn't mean his throw set overall is better. Just means he has the best or second best kill throw in the game.

Yeah, I am not considering their grabs because we were discussing a set of throws. If you consider grabs, Lucas' are obviously worse (and worse than a large chunk of characters).

This doesn't make sense to me. No character throws each direction 25% of the time. As Ness you very rarely need uthrow because the other three fill almost every need; why is uthrow even relevant to evaluating Ness's throws? This is like saying Ganon has bad tilts because his utilt is so bad... when his ftilt and dtilt are so good and are clearly used collectively way more than 2/3 of the time. Ness's fthrow is better than Lucas's bthrow because it's functionally unique; it's way better to have two unique throws for different situations than two throws that often do the same job and compete for uses.

Let me highlight this. Suppose character A can kill at about 130% on average with all four throws. Character B kills at 130% on average with three throws and the fourth is mostly bad but at under 10% it gets a single hit combo follow-up. Obviously a throw that kills at 130% in general is a superior asset to a super low percent only combo throw. However, in context here, the second character is clearly way better off; you already have no trouble killing at 130% with a grab with both characters whereas with the second one you have more useful rewards when you grab someone at 0%. This is Ness vs Lucas throws in a nutshell. Throw by throw Lucas looks great, but then you realize he has one elite throw and three good ones while Ness has one elite throw that is elite in a more important category than Lucas's one elite throw, two good ones (people who don't realize Ness fthrow is very good are crazy, incidentally - it's way higher value than a traditional one especially in the context that Ness absolutely does not need it at high percents), and one you rarely use but that between Ness's three commonly used throws he covers more situations and functionality than Lucas does with four.

The exact metric is "starting from the moment in time you have already landed a grab, what is your average pay-off?". This discounts the grab itself (so Lucas's awful tether is not held against him), but it does weigh in the character's specific chase options and correctly adjusts for the fact that throw choice is an interesting dynamic with many factors to be weighted.

 

[Man Li Gi]

Can I do a plug-in? Hell, I'm just gonna do it:

These are off Anther's Ladder with me ranked as Silver III and him as Gold II (for those who don't know, that's a huge leap/gap in rankings).

I know it's kind of a rare MU to have, but it's good to know. For the first time in a damn while, I find myself actually AGREEING with A2ZOMG.

The 2nd vid truly highlights what A2ZOMG is saying in general and the ending of the first vid is what A2ZOMG was saying about being floaty.

I'd much rather face a TL than a Link due to TL'S much lower range, damage output, and overall easier to combo. Most of his kills off Ganon comes from Ganons becoming thirsty for green elf's blood. Link actually has kill setups and better damage per hit. Link can play footsies and can beat him straight up.

 

[BSP]

Chef Pac.

That's about it. The character is largely underrepresented.

That hurts. Zage and I aren't far behind those two.

 

[Scarlet Jile]

Can I do a plug-in? Hell, I'm just gonna do it:

These are off Anther's Ladder with me ranked as Silver III and him as Gold II (for those who don't know, that's a huge leap/gap in rankings).

I know it's kind of a rare MU to have, but it's good to know. For the first time in a damn while, I find myself actually AGREEING with A2ZOMG.

The 2nd vid truly highlights what A2ZOMG is saying in general and the ending of the first vid is what A2ZOMG was saying about being floaty.

I'd much rather face a TL than a Link due to TL'S much lower range, damage output, and overall easier to combo. Most of his kills off Ganon comes from Ganons becoming thirsty for green elf's blood. Link actually has kill setups and better damage per hit. Link can play footsies and can beat him straight up.

In fairness to the TL, a knowledgeable player probably wouldn't agree to Battlefield as the starter stage against Ganon, and definitely wouldn't Gentleman's back to it after he'd already lost there once.

But I'm in the same camp as A2 when it comes to TL's options. I feel like they are limited by shield and the reward for grab isn't strong enough to compensate for its risk.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

played TL against lvl 9 sheik to see anything.
glad i don't main him.

 

[Nu~]

That hurts. Zage and I aren't far behind those two.

Oh my bad. Sorry dude, I forgot lol.


I thought he was asking for well known players. With how chef pac is playing now, I would say that you have probably surpassed him.

 

[PK Gaming]

Robin has a great jab, useable projectiles, and disjoint never goes out of style. Robin is way above Zelda, or non-customs WFT/Palutena.

Way above either of those characters is a definite stretch, especially when you consider that unlike Robin, those characters don't have the misfortune of generally losing to both campers and zoners. At the very least, WFT/Palutena have decent mobility (which is crucial, crucial, cruchial) and Zelda's recovery is actually decent.

Honest opinion? Robin is definitely in the running for worst character (Nearly every matchup in the game barring a few of the heavywights is an uphill battle for Robin.) and if he is the worst, then that says a lot about this game's character balance.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Way above either of those characters is a definite stretch, especially when you consider that unlike Robin, those characters don't have the misfortune of generally losing to both campers and zoners. At the very least, WFT/Palutena have decent mobility (which is crucial, crucial, cruchial) and Zelda's recovery is actually decent.

Honest opinion? Robin is definitely in the running for worst character (Nearly every matchup in the game barring a few of the heavywights is an uphill battle for Robin.) and if he is the worst, then that says a lot about this game's character balance.

that it's pretty good? i'm no robin main, but i think robin just needs specials that are fast, control space, and are really damaging. like thoron damag on all his specials. these are tools zoning characters had in brawl (olimar and snake).

 

[NachoOfCheese]

played TL against lvl 9 sheik to see anything.
glad i don't main him.

The year is 20XX. Everyone now gets their matchup knowledge from fighting level 9 CPUs. Smh

 

[Minordeth]

To be fair to the TL player, Ganon is probably one of TL's losing MUs. The range disparity and damage output negates Ganon's poor negative state, and it doesn't help that TL's negative state isn't too hot either. For an easy comparison, Link is a much harder MU for Ganon at this point, due to the better footsies and ridiculous grab reward, not to mention superior aerials and damage to TL.

 

[Locke 06]

To be fair to the TL player, they are bad. Utilt>whiffed jab? Stahhhp.

Here's some better play. It's not vs dorf, but you can notice the amount of bomb play that is missing from the videos above in comparison to this video. Then apply them to dorf. Bombs bounce off shields. That leads to regrabs and more bomb throwing. Zan is probably right, shield beats bombs as long as the opponent doesn't panic and withstands the pressure, but I feel like toon link is being misrepresented by those videos.

And yes, toon link won this tournament.

 

[bc1910]

@ Luco See this post. I must say I'm shocked you disagree with me on something, didn't see that coming at all

This doesn't make sense to me. No character throws each direction 25% of the time. As Ness you very rarely need uthrow because the other three fill almost every need; why is uthrow even relevant to evaluating Ness's throws? This is like saying Ganon has bad tilts because his utilt is so bad... when his ftilt and dtilt are so good and are clearly used collectively way more than 2/3 of the time. Ness's fthrow is better than Lucas's bthrow because it's functionally unique; it's way better to have two unique throws for different situations than two throws that often do the same job and compete for uses.

Let me highlight this. Suppose character A can kill at about 130% on average with all four throws. Character B kills at 130% on average with three throws and the fourth is mostly bad but at under 10% it gets a single hit combo follow-up. Obviously a throw that kills at 130% in general is a superior asset to a super low percent only combo throw. However, in context here, the second character is clearly way better off; you already have no trouble killing at 130% with a grab with both characters whereas with the second one you have more useful rewards when you grab someone at 0%. This is Ness vs Lucas throws in a nutshell. Throw by throw Lucas looks great, but then you realize he has one elite throw and three good ones while Ness has one elite throw that is elite in a more important category than Lucas's one elite throw, two good ones (people who don't realize Ness fthrow is very good are crazy, incidentally - it's way higher value than a traditional one especially in the context that Ness absolutely does not need it at high percents), and one you rarely use but that between Ness's three commonly used throws he covers more situations and functionality than Lucas does with four.

The exact metric is "starting from the moment in time you have already landed a grab, what is your average pay-off?". This discounts the grab itself (so Lucas's awful tether is not held against him), but it does weigh in the character's specific chase options and correctly adjusts for the fact that throw choice is an interesting dynamic with many factors to be weighted.

None of this... Is what I was trying to say at all. Throwing in one direction 25% of the time? What? In fact I'm gonna drop this because you keep misunderstanding me entirely, but it's my fault because I'm probably not being clear and I don't have time to explain right now.

I'll end by saying, going by your method of weighting (which is more similar to what I was trying to say, not this 25% thing you invented) I still think Lucas has higher average reward. He gets very high reward whenever he grabs the opponent. There is a whole mid-percent section where Ness' reward off throws is substantially lower than Lucas'. His reward peaks quicker at high percents because Bthrow, the "elite" throw, kills earlier. That's his main advantage, but I don't think that makes his average reward better. Killing is the most important category but you cannot discount or downplay the others based on how good Ness is at killing with a throw. And even that is sketchy, because Lucas can kill midscreen at similar percents to Ness' Bthrow with PK hoo hah. He can also kill earlier facing a ledge with Fthrow or Uthrow. Ness' kill potential is still better, don't get me wrong, but Lucas' kill potential from his throws is not bad enough to give him the worse set overall.

I do think Ness' throws are great, probably too good for his grab, but there's a reason Lucas has THAT grab. Or rather, knowing he would have that grab because it takes from his canon/differentiates him to Ness/had it in Brawl, there's a reason the devs jacked his throws up so much. I think the confusion comes from Ness' back throw being just that good, which I can appreciate. You probably have a higher opinion of his Dthrow than I do too, I think Lucas' is better.