Choosing A Character To Play As Until Smash 4

[_Kun_]

Hello everyone! Sorry if you read the previous topic on this thread and try to come up with answer. I finally know how to express what I really want to talk about. Sorry about posting this in the competitive brawl discussion as this was a topic about mains before.

I am burnt on using Sonic and occasionally Snake & Marth. I am just looking for a character for me to play in brawl to hold me over until smash 4.

What I am looking for in a character (whether good or bad) is the following in order of priority:

KO Power
Speed
Helps me improve as a smasher / characters that teach lessons on the fundamentals of smash.

Bonus ( As in cool to have but not necessary ) :

Combos/Strings?
A Decent Projectile

Playstyle/ Where I want to Improve :

My play style at the moment is rush but I used to play defensively so I'm open to any character that is effective with a certain play style. If not, I will try to play a character the way they are not suppose to and see happens but what ever, always looking for innovation. I have a hard time with playing on "autopilot" so I am looking to improve instead of just pressing buttons with out thinking or not making reads, etc.

Character Suggestions I would not like but if they will help me improve or hold me over till smash 4 for or if you can convince me to play as them are:

Mario
Luigi
Donkey Kong
Toon Link
Samus/ ZSS
Pit
Ice Climbers
Kirby
MetaKnight
Fox
Falco
Captain Falcon
Ike
Ness

I realize this is a long list but if you can work around this list, thank you.

Tell me who you are using until smash 4? Are you gonna stick with that character or play with others once it out? I am curious of what you all think.

Update: Not feeling so burnt out anymore but just in case I ever do until smash 4 comes out, keep the suggestions rolling!

 

[Thor]

If you're not playing MK you're choosing the wrong character.

Joking aside, MK gives you the best chance to win. If you want KO power and speed, he's one of the best for the job. Your next best bet (and someone who sounds most fitted to your requests) is Diddy Kong - two projectiles (the peanut popgun for camping) and bananas (SOOOOO good for everything from throwing to traps to combos to locks), and he's fast, while dsmash and fsmash are strong enough to serve as reliable KO moves (they can SDI fsmash, but details details), and his fair can also start acting as a KO move at high percents as well. He's also got a decent momentum cancel, and he's pretty fast.

Zero Suit Samus may also work for you - great strings with uair and dsmash and her side+b is a solid KO move (as is uair at certain points, and her down+b kick, meteoring or later), and she's very fast. She can't generate projectiles throughout the match like Diddy Kong can.

If you're okay being slower, Snake is still a powerful choice - a strong projectile (Grenades), a situational one, some explosives, a few interesting strings (mainly tying ftilt and jab in various ways to get more damage out before one uses ftilt2 or jab3) and KO power off the charts in his utilt and bair/uair (though those are not KO tools of choice, of course). But if he bores you (can you use his grenande tricks well? Make your opponent drop a grenade they pick up? He can do that...) then you might not want to use him.

Sonic is a fine choice if you have local mid-tier tournaments (or just mid-tier tournaments anywhere) but he's not the best choice to win a tournament (unless people just don't know the MU, then you can run circles around them, sometimes almost literally - and that won't happen at the highest of tournaments, if that's where your sights are set). Sonic does lack reliable KO power though (fsmash is rather slow, bair isn't fast, and his other moves for KOing lack oomph or are slow/laggy after use).

Not sure about training advice - have read tons but different people can give different ideas. Perhaps another person will weigh in.

 

[_Kun_]

If you're not playing MK you're choosing the wrong character.

Joking aside, MK gives you the best chance to win. If you want KO power and speed, he's one of the best for the job. Your next best bet (and someone who sounds most fitted to your requests) is Diddy Kong - two projectiles (the peanut popgun for camping) and bananas (SOOOOO good for everything from throwing to traps to combos to locks), and he's fast, while dsmash and fsmash are strong enough to serve as reliable KO moves (they can SDI fsmash, but details details), and his fair can also start acting as a KO move at high percents as well. He's also got a decent momentum cancel, and he's pretty fast.

Zero Suit Samus may also work for you - great strings with uair and dsmash and her side+b is a solid KO move (as is uair at certain points, and her down+b kick, meteoring or later), and she's very fast. She can't generate projectiles throughout the match like Diddy Kong can.

If you're okay being slower, Snake is still a powerful choice - a strong projectile (Grenades), a situational one, some explosives, a few interesting strings (mainly tying ftilt and jab in various ways to get more damage out before one uses ftilt2 or jab3) and KO power off the charts in his utilt and bair/uair (though those are not KO tools of choice, of course). But if he bores you (can you use his grenande tricks well? Make your opponent drop a grenade they pick up? He can do that...) then you might not want to use him.

Sonic is a fine choice if you have local mid-tier tournaments (or just mid-tier tournaments anywhere) but he's not the best choice to win a tournament (unless people just don't know the MU, then you can run circles around them, sometimes almost literally - and that won't happen at the highest of tournaments, if that's where your sights are set). Sonic does lack reliable KO power though (fsmash is rather slow, bair isn't fast, and his other moves for KOing lack oomph or are slow/laggy after use).

Not sure about training advice - have read tons but different people can give different ideas. Perhaps another person will weigh in.

Thank you for your input! Definitely agree about the Metaknight. However I decided I am looking for someone else besides him.

 

[_Kun_]

If you're not playing MK you're choosing the wrong character.

Joking aside, MK gives you the best chance to win. If you want KO power and speed, he's one of the best for the job. Your next best bet (and someone who sounds most fitted to your requests) is Diddy Kong - two projectiles (the peanut popgun for camping) and bananas (SOOOOO good for everything from throwing to traps to combos to locks), and he's fast, while dsmash and fsmash are strong enough to serve as reliable KO moves (they can SDI fsmash, but details details), and his fair can also start acting as a KO move at high percents as well. He's also got a decent momentum cancel, and he's pretty fast.

Zero Suit Samus may also work for you - great strings with uair and dsmash and her side+b is a solid KO move (as is uair at certain points, and her down+b kick, meteoring or later), and she's very fast. She can't generate projectiles throughout the match like Diddy Kong can.

If you're okay being slower, Snake is still a powerful choice - a strong projectile (Grenades), a situational one, some explosives, a few interesting strings (mainly tying ftilt and jab in various ways to get more damage out before one uses ftilt2 or jab3) and KO power off the charts in his utilt and bair/uair (though those are not KO tools of choice, of course). But if he bores you (can you use his grenande tricks well? Make your opponent drop a grenade they pick up? He can do that...) then you might not want to use him.

Sonic is a fine choice if you have local mid-tier tournaments (or just mid-tier tournaments anywhere) but he's not the best choice to win a tournament (unless people just don't know the MU, then you can run circles around them, sometimes almost literally - and that won't happen at the highest of tournaments, if that's where your sights are set). Sonic does lack reliable KO power though (fsmash is rather slow, bair isn't fast, and his other moves for KOing lack oomph or are slow/laggy after use).

Not sure about training advice - have read tons but different people can give different ideas. Perhaps another person will weigh in.

Thank you Thor for help before I changed the Topic of the thread.

 

[shapular]

If not Fox, I'd say Pikachu. He's got good KO power with his up smash, forward smash, and Thunder. He's fast, especially if you add in Quick Attack Cancel. I can't speak to how good he is for learning fundamentals, but he should be fine. He's got some strings (chaingrab, uair strings, stuff -> Thunder) and Thunder Jolt is a decent, pretty spammable projectile. As a bonus, he's high tier and has a decent MK matchup. Try him out and see if he's what you're looking for.

 

[_Kun_]

If not Fox, I'd say Pikachu. He's got good KO power with his up smash, forward smash, and Thunder. He's fast, especially if you add in Quick Attack Cancel. I can't speak to how good he is for learning fundamentals, but he should be fine. He's got some strings (chaingrab, uair strings, stuff -> Thunder) and Thunder Jolt is a decent, pretty spammable projectile. As a bonus, he's high tier and has a decent MK matchup. Try him out and see if he's what you're looking for.

Ok, thank you!

Are you still playing as game and watch until smash 4?

 

[shapular]

Ok, thank you!

Are you still playing as game and watch until smash 4?

Yep.

 

[_Kun_]

Yep.

What keeps you going to play as game & watch?

 

[shapular]

What keeps you going to play as game & watch?

He's been my favorite character to play since Melee. I like his powerful smashes, his lingering, disjointed hitboxes, his good aerials, and his great recovery. None of my other characters except Peach are close to on par with him, so switching wouldn't be the greatest idea even if I wanted to. I tried picking up Olimar as a secondary a while ago but that didn't turn out so well.

 

[_Kun_]

He's been my favorite character to play since Melee. I like his powerful smashes, his lingering, disjointed hitboxes, his good aerials, and his great recovery. None of my other characters except Peach are close to on par with him, so switching wouldn't be the greatest idea even if I wanted to. I tried picking up Olimar as a secondary a while ago but that didn't turn out so well.

Cool. I like his juggles and down into hammer/jab.

 

[shapular]

Cool. I like his juggles and down into hammer/jab.

Ah, that reminds me of the great wifi combo (or just against people who don't know the tech timing) down throw -> jab -> grab -> down throw -> jab -> grab etc. And yes, being able to cover a whole platform with fishbowl and then keeping your opponent up there forever is wonderful.

 

[_Kun_]

Ah, that reminds me of the great wifi combo (or just against people who don't know the tech timing) down throw -> jab -> grab -> down throw -> jab -> grab etc. And yes, being able to cover a whole platform with fishbowl and then keeping your opponent up there forever is wonderful.

Sounds quite trolly.

 

[KeketheBasedCat]

Based on your criteria, I'd go with DK. KO Power is obviously there, speed is up to par with most middleweights, and his long-ranged -but-not-projectile moveset teaches you a lot about footsies. You could even argue that his lack of a good recovery hammers out some smash fundamentals since you can't just easily make your way back to the stage.
I'd say Olimar could be good too, but by the time you got over the hard part of his learning curve, the game would already be out.

 

[_Kun_]

Based on your criteria, I'd go with DK. KO Power is obviously there, speed is up to par with most middleweights, and his long-ranged -but-not-projectile moveset teaches you a lot about footsies. You could even argue that his lack of a good recovery hammers out some smash fundamentals since you can't just easily make your way back to the stage.
I'd say Olimar could be good too, but by the time you got over the hard part of his learning curve, the game would already be out.

I don't care too much about learning curves. I main Sonic, so I think I can handle other characters with other learning curves. Could you please go into detail about Olimar? Thanks for the suggestion. By the way, I love the avatar!

 

[KeketheBasedCat]

I don't care too much about learning curves. I main Sonic, so I think I can handle other characters with other learning curves. Could you please go into detail about Olimar? Thanks for the suggestion. By the way, I love the avatar!

Basically, Olimar is a fantastic spacing character with a lot of tools to deal with a lot of situations. In that sense, you'd get a good idea of what sort of options are good in different situations. For example, getting good at pivot grabbing with Olimar gives you a good sense of how to use a 'offensive defense' where you're both retreating and attacking. That would correspond well with the new pivot-tilt mechanic in Smash 4. Olimar also has a lot psuedo-combos that aren't really combos but are instead moves that put your opponent in a position where you can cleanly follow up at some percents and have to make a read at other percents. His dthrow, for instance, can combo into another dthrow at low percents on fast-fallers like Fox or Falco. It can also, in rare circumstances, be followed up with a fair. But on a lot of characters, dthrow can't be followed up on without a read. Like if the opponent airdodges after your dthrow (they're expecting the fair), then you can dash forward and regrab, or dash forward once and charge a dsmash for when they land after the airdodge. Stuff like that. Additionally, around 40-50%, Olimar should instead choose to uthrow for a guaranteed UpB (guaranteed on the right characters at the right percent, obviously, but 40-50% is generally the mark). And since Smash 4 has, at least for now, a loose combo system where a lot of combos work before 60% but not afterwards, Olimar's similar loose-combo system might transition well into whatever character you choose in Smash 4. Basically, the hitstun in Smash 4 might be large enough to have combos at the early percents (like the dthrow combos Olimar has in Brawl), and perhaps even large enough to have very specific guaranteed followups at the mid-high percents (like how you can combo uthrow to UpB or nair to upB at the middle percents in Brawl). But, the hitstun in Smash4 won't be so high that you can do long and (move-selection wise) lenient combos at like 70-100% like in Melee. So not only does Olimar teach you how to deal with a variety of options well, he has a lot of almost-combos in Brawl that might end up transitioning you well for Smash 4's slightly increased hitstun. Hopefully that makes sense.
However, Olimar's learning curve is really rough. Before you can start worrying about that stuff that I mentioned, you have to have a good grasp on pikmin management. Pikmin are really finicky in Brawl, and learning the ins-and-outs of how they move and rotate in different positions can be frustrating, but also has to become second nature if you want to be good with Olimar. Obviously, that doesn't even start to get into how each pikmin is good at different things, and watching your line while also watching the other player can get tough. But it's required unless you want to fair or dsmash them with a white pikmin at 160% and see them only move halfway across the stage. His recovery is also terrible, making recovering a hard thing to master. It's not as simple as UpB'ing once you're in range of the edge and hoping for the best. You have to learn when to use and when not to use your jump while recovering, and when to anticipate the opponent attacking you offstage, and whistling accordingly. It's rough. His garbage off-stage game also makes edgeguarding harder than it is for most characters, since he can't really afford to go off the stage and challenge their recovery too much. So you learn to cope by fsmashing off the stage, timing edgehogs really well, or short-hop dair'ing and then DIing back onto the stage before you really even leave it. That last one isn't too reliable, just showy.
But yeah, Olimar's learning curve is, in my opinion, maaaaybe the hardest in the game. If not, then Snake or ICs might take the cake. But bottom line is, if you at least get a simple grasp on him and learn how his moves work and complement each other, you can hopefully identify similar strengths and combo opportunities in non-Olimar Smash 4 characters.

 

[_Kun_]

Basically, Olimar is a fantastic spacing character with a lot of tools to deal with a lot of situations. In that sense, you'd get a good idea of what sort of options are good in different situations. For example, getting good at pivot grabbing with Olimar gives you a good sense of how to use a 'offensive defense' where you're both retreating and attacking. That would correspond well with the new pivot-tilt mechanic in Smash 4. Olimar also has a lot psuedo-combos that aren't really combos but are instead moves that put your opponent in a position where you can cleanly follow up at some percents and have to make a read at other percents. His dthrow, for instance, can combo into another dthrow at low percents on fast-fallers like Fox or Falco. It can also, in rare circumstances, be followed up with a fair. But on a lot of characters, dthrow can't be followed up on without a read. Like if the opponent airdodges after your dthrow (they're expecting the fair), then you can dash forward and regrab, or dash forward once and charge a dsmash for when they land after the airdodge. Stuff like that. Additionally, around 40-50%, Olimar should instead choose to uthrow for a guaranteed UpB (guaranteed on the right characters at the right percent, obviously, but 40-50% is generally the mark). And since Smash 4 has, at least for now, a loose combo system where a lot of combos work before 60% but not afterwards, Olimar's similar loose-combo system might transition well into whatever character you choose in Smash 4. Basically, the hitstun in Smash 4 might be large enough to have combos at the early percents (like the dthrow combos Olimar has in Brawl), and perhaps even large enough to have very specific guaranteed followups at the mid-high percents (like how you can combo uthrow to UpB or nair to upB at the middle percents in Brawl). But, the hitstun in Smash4 won't be so high that you can do long and (move-selection wise) lenient combos at like 70-100% like in Melee. So not only does Olimar teach you how to deal with a variety of options well, he has a lot of almost-combos in Brawl that might end up transitioning you well for Smash 4's slightly increased hitstun. Hopefully that makes sense.
However, Olimar's learning curve is really rough. Before you can start worrying about that stuff that I mentioned, you have to have a good grasp on pikmin management. Pikmin are really finicky in Brawl, and learning the ins-and-outs of how they move and rotate in different positions can be frustrating, but also has to become second nature if you want to be good with Olimar. Obviously, that doesn't even start to get into how each pikmin is good at different things, and watching your line while also watching the other player can get tough. But it's required unless you want to fair or dsmash them with a white pikmin at 160% and see them only move halfway across the stage. His recovery is also terrible, making recovering a hard thing to master. It's not as simple as UpB'ing once you're in range of the edge and hoping for the best. You have to learn when to use and when not to use your jump while recovering, and when to anticipate the opponent attacking you offstage, and whistling accordingly. It's rough. His garbage off-stage game also makes edgeguarding harder than it is for most characters, since he can't really afford to go off the stage and challenge their recovery too much. So you learn to cope by fsmashing off the stage, timing edgehogs really well, or short-hop dair'ing and then DIing back onto the stage before you really even leave it. That last one isn't too reliable, just showy.
But yeah, Olimar's learning curve is, in my opinion, maaaaybe the hardest in the game. If not, then Snake or ICs might take the cake. But bottom line is, if you at least get a simple grasp on him and learn how his moves work and complement each other, you can hopefully identify similar strengths and combo opportunities in non-Olimar Smash 4 characters.

WOW! Thank you for giving so much detail. Olimar looks like a good character to use to prepare for smash 4. Any other characters that come to mind? (Particularly if there not in the list above but if they are tell me anyways!) An example is that Olimar would teach spacing and potential combos that are possible in smash 4 along with that offensive defense tactics. I know that you mentioned DK with footsies. But thanks with what you have offered so far. I definitely have Olimar on my list of characters to try out and use before smash 4.