Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Ziodyne 21]

Results for Suplex City

1st: Nairo
2nd: Shoyo James
3rd: Wishes
4th: Dark Wizzy
5th: LeoN
5th: Light
7th: Marss
7th: Dabuz
9th: Laid
9th: Mr E
9th: JaKaL
9th: Juice
13th: Jul
13th: Gen
13th: Raffi-X
13th: Bankai


Another strong placing for Palu, Chrom, PkMn Trainer, and Mario.
Bowser finally gets a result that brings in high level attention, which is amazing to see (thought I do think he is underrated).

Well like Palu, Chrom and PT placings should not be that surpsing due to being considered very high tier. Arguabally top 10-15 characters.. But yeah good showing from Bowser and Mario. Both of them showing promise. I do think Bowser will arguabslly be the best super-heavy but not by that great a length

 

[The_Bookworm]

Well like Palu, Chrom and PT placings should not be that surpsing due to being considered very high tier. Arguabally top 10-15 characters..

I know. It is more like "add another one one the list" kind of thing, than of a "they finally got a result" kind of thing.

 

[KirbySquad101]

After a few rocky placings, Dark Wizzy's definitely stepping up his game; at this point, I really can't see being anything less than high tier. The dude's pretty much almost as scary as he was in Smash 4.

's 5th placement was definitely a big win for him; like with , I think we'll need more time and results before making quick assumptions, but his buffs really are doing him wonders right now.

 

[Dream Cancel]

Kind of a self-update, but I found Juul in the Robin discord and his controls are what I expected; A+B smash (for levin aerials), tilt stick, and a shoulder button set to specials. I'm glad to see a Robin pull off a change of controls like that and do well. Winning a 60+entrant NY local and then a 13th placement at Suplex is good for sure.

 

[DelugeFGC]

Kind of a self-update, but I found Juul in the Robin discord and his controls are what I expected; A+B smash (for levin aerials), tilt stick, and a shoulder button set to specials. I'm glad to see a Robin pull off a change of controls like that and do well. Winning a 60+entrant NY local and then a 13th placement at Suplex is good for sure.

As someone who just switched to hard-maining Olimar in Ult, the prospect of doing anything BUT tilt stick was always laughable to me. It really just does benefit some characters FAR more than other's, though.. and with aerial momentum fixed, I don't see a reason why a Robin player simply wouldn't rock an extra set of controls using Smash Stick. Since seriously picking up Olimar, I've changed the stance I once had on the matter, I thought smash stick was NEVER worth it unless you went Megaman or something.. and even then I was iffy. But it really is a game changer sometimes, and none of Robin's tilts are so important that I would say tilt stick is what you want. The only reason I could see tilt stick being the go-to is the conserve Levin for certain aerials you DON'T want knockback on, but there's easy ways to do that as-is.

 

[Nobie]

I think some of the woes people have been expressing are a confluence of two factors: 1) the game is trying really hard to properly balance risk:reward ratio, but at the same time 2) has purposely made projectiles better overall.

The rewards overall for parrying might indeed be undertuned, but I notice that most parries happen against safer attacks (likely because the desire to spam safe moves is only natural), which means the punish window is smaller. If you parry a jab, you get fewer advantage frames than if you parry a smash attack.

But at the same time, just as players are criticizing the game for not rewarding parries enough, other players are criticizing the game for not rewarding jabs and safe pokes enough. In Ultimate, jabs generally do not combo or lead into any guaranteed follow-ups. They're, at best, for quick damage/a mix-up/getting the opponent off stage/pushing the opponent away. Players want minimal risk with minimal reward, and the game is actively saying "no." So depending on your perspective, it can seem like both the attacker and the defender are not being fairly rewarded. Yet, the game is saying the same thing on both sides: if you want the goods, you gotta gamble a bit.

Layered on top of this is the fact that the game clearly wants projectiles to matter. That's WHY parrying them is worse than shielding. They don't want you to just be able to parry your way through projectiles from a distance, which is an old criticism of Third Strike—that it minimized the importance of fireballs. It's a risk that's always present in any game with parrying, and Ultimate chose the route that projectiles must be overcome by movement and prediction. See also how dash into shield is much worse. You can't just thoughtlessly barge your way through projectiles.

The end result is that you somehow have people complaining that Ultimate is both too defensive AND too aggressive. It's an interesting place to be.

 

[Rizen]

Controls are always a matter of preference but some setups work better for certain characters than others.

I'm glad jabs don't combo into anything because they're meant to be a fast, low risk/reward option. If something's going to combo it should be a little slower.

Parries need to be adjusted but projectiles are balanced by character stats. YL for example has great projectiles but a f6 jab as his fastest ground attack and F8 Dtilt as a combo starter (compared to Greninja's f5 Dtilt and f3 jab). The system works and YL has a healthy amount of bad MUs vs characters like Ike, Chrom and Fox, who for one reason or another beat him in CQC.

 

[Gearkeeper-8a]

I think some of the woes people have been expressing are a confluence of two factors: 1) the game is trying really hard to properly balance risk:reward ratio, but at the same time 2) has purposely made projectiles better overall.

The rewards overall for parrying might indeed be undertuned, but I notice that most parries happen against safer attacks (likely because the desire to spam safe moves is only natural), which means the punish window is smaller. If you parry a jab, you get fewer advantage frames than if you parry a smash attack.

But at the same time, just as players are criticizing the game for not rewarding parries enough, other players are criticizing the game for not rewarding jabs and safe pokes enough. In Ultimate, jabs generally do not combo or lead into any guaranteed follow-ups. They're, at best, for quick damage/a mix-up/getting the opponent off stage/pushing the opponent away. Players want minimal risk with minimal reward, and the game is actively saying "no." So depending on your perspective, it can seem like both the attacker and the defender are not being fairly rewarded. Yet, the game is saying the same thing on both sides: if you want the goods, you gotta gamble a bit.

Layered on top of this is the fact that the game clearly wants projectiles to matter. That's WHY parrying them is worse than shielding. They don't want you to just be able to parry your way through projectiles from a distance, which is an old criticism of Third Strike—that it minimized the importance of fireballs. It's a risk that's always present in any game with parrying, and Ultimate chose the route that projectiles must be overcome by movement and prediction. See also how dash into shield is much worse. You can't just thoughtlessly barge your way through projectiles.

The end result is that you somehow have people complaining that Ultimate is both too defensive AND too aggressive. It's an interesting place to be.

I agree and I think that some players have bias because they used top tiers in smash 4, in that game mechanics were more stronger that character kits, and the only way of overpowered them was with specific strategies like grab beats shield and shielded beats attacks, very few characters could overcome these mechanics without playing the rules and in the end these characters were the top tiers, they could be more varied with their gameplay because the mechanics weren't holding them back, this is why mid tiers and even some high tiers would end with linear gameplay because that was the only way to compete with top tiers, similar how some top players that played brawl liked the game because of metaknight but did know that the game had glaring issues.

 

[Emblem Lord]

The risk for throwing a bad projectile in Ultimate is just not there compared to the risks it takes to get in generally.

 

[Rizen]

The risk for throwing a bad projectile in Ultimate is just not there compared to the risks it takes to get in generally.

That's the whole point of projectiles; they're safe and make approaching hard. You don't see projectile characters dominating the meta. There's actually a healthy mix of rush and combo characters like Wario and Pichu, sword zoners- Lucina and Ike, all arounders like Palutena and Wolf, trap characters- Snake and others in high and top tier. With frequent mid tiers showing up in top 8s. I wouldn't say any type of character is too powerful but some top tiers could be toned down.

 

[$.A.F.]

Plant. Over or underrated?

 

[Idon]

Plant. Over or underrated?

Rated just as it deserves. Very lowly.

terrible aerials, highly situational specials, stubby range, outside of maybe fooling someone who's never seen it, it's not going to get much mileage at even mid level play.

 

[$.A.F.]

Specials are only really somewhat situational. Long stem strike is great against zoners, Ptooie is a great move in general, Side B is actually really situational though. Aerials aren’t really terrible IMO. Nair is pretty good. Up air juggles, Dair is one of the fastest spikes in the game and combos into up smash at certain percentages. Bair is very slow, but it kills under 80 at the ledge which makes up for it at least somewhat. Range is pretty mediocre though. As for top level play, Brood is doing great things with the character.

 

[TimG57867]

Kawaii Con ended a few hours ago and here are the results as noted in the results thread:

https://smash.gg/tournament/kawaii-...gles-kkon19-main-event/brackets/550042/928754
Kawaii Kon 2019 (208 entrants) (Honolulu, Hawaii)
1. Samsora
2. VoiD
3. Larry Lurr
4. Captain L
5. Magister
5. Eon
7. Scizor
7. Xzax
9. Tempest
9. Dren
9. Virtue
9. Snappy
13. K0rean
13. The Chancellor
13. AnD
13. Yung Goos (needs further confirmation)

Samsora managed to come out on top over Void in an endeavor which included needed to make a hard fought for bracket reset and managed to take whole tourney with a good amount relevant competition present. And it does indeed seem that Captain L is set on invested in Pikachu again which it already doing work against a lot of strong players.

However, among these results, the real star of night appeared to be Magister and his who got 5th at the event. Incineroar's place in the meta has definitely been one of the most polarizing amongst the cast with him often turning up in people's low mid tier or even low tier. But despite such perceptions, Magister continues to put on a great show with the Heel Pokemon and demonstrates just how potent Incineroar's normals and Alolan Whip are. Especially when he's amped up by Revenge. He managed to do impressive work tonight but alas, his run was terminated by both Void in Winners and Captain L in Losers who used and respectively. The Chus definitely seem to be unfun matchups for the cat atm as they're tricky for him to get a clean shot on and do a spectacular job of exploiting the achilees heel that is Incineroar's recovery. Despite the disadvantage though, Magister managed to keep it close with both of them, taking it to Game 5 in both sets. Notably he managed to mixup Incineroar's recovery in the most outlandish of ways and skirt death over and over while mitigating Thunder Jolt spam with Revenge. And while he frequently found himself in disadvantage, Incineroar being the big heavy hitter he his allowed him to keep it close with fewer hits and he did an incredible job of pushing advantage of his own.

Magister has been consistently performing well from the start of Ultimate from 7th at Don't Park on the Grass to 25th at GENESIS 6 to 65th at Frostbite 2019. And while Incineroar's buffs haven't made him massively better, Magister has definitely been putting them to good use. Particularly the Up B and Up Throw buffs. Despite opinions of his character being all over the place, he definitely seems to be performing consistently well and I hope he continues to shatter expectations with the fire cat.

 

[Ziodyne 21]

Kawaii Con ended a few hours ago and here are the results as noted in the results thread:

https://smash.gg/tournament/kawaii-...gles-kkon19-main-event/brackets/550042/928754
Kawaii Kon 2019 (208 entrants) (Honolulu, Hawaii)
1. Samsora
2. VoiD
3. Larry Lurr
4. Captain L
5. Magister
5. Eon
7. Scizor
7. Xzax
9. Tempest
9. Dren
9. Virtue
9. Snappy
13. K0rean
13. The Chancellor
13. AnD
13. Yung Goos (needs further confirmation)

Samsora managed to come out on top over Void in an endeavor which included needed to make a hard fought for bracket reset and managed to take whole tourney with a good amount relevant competition present. And it does indeed seem that Captain L is set on invested in Pikachu again which it already doing work against a lot of strong players.

However, among these results, the real star of night appeared to be Magister and his who got 5th at the event. Incineroar's place in the meta has definitely been one of the most polarizing amongst the cast with him often turning up in people's low mid tier or even low tier. But despite such perceptions, Magister continues to put on a great show with the Heel Pokemon and demonstrates just how potent Incineroar's normals and Alolan Whip are. Especially when he's amped up by Revenge. He managed to do impressive work tonight but alas, his run was terminated by both Void in Winners and Captain L in Losers who used and respectively. The Chus definitely seem to be unfun matchups for the cat atm as they're tricky for him to get a clean shot on and do a spectacular job of exploiting the achilees heel that is Incineroar's recovery. Despite the disadvantage though, Magister managed to keep it close with both of them, taking it to Game 5 in both sets. Notably he managed to mixup Incineroar's recovery in the most outlandish of ways and skirt death over and over while mitigating Thunder Jolt spam with Revenge. And while he frequently found himself in disadvantage, Incineroar being the big heavy hitter he his allowed him to keep it close with fewer hits and he did an incredible job of pushing advantage of his own.

Magister has been consistently performing well from the start of Ultimate from 7th at Don't Park on the Grass to 25th at GENESIS 6 to 65th at Frostbite 2019. And while Incineroar's buffs haven't made him massively better, Magister has definitely been putting them to good use. Particularly the Up B and Up Throw buffs. Despite opinions of his character being all over the place, he definitely seems to be performing consistently well and I hope he continues to shatter expectations with the fire cat.

Well I think worst MU's are actullay most FE Swordies due to the fact they dont camp him out with projectiles that he can potentially Revenge on, they do with superior range and hitboxes that can keep him out day with his terribad mobility. I think are theroetically bad being fellow superheavies but with overall better range and mobility , where he simply gets outclassed

 

[Siledh]

Whoa, two , that's nice to see.

 

[Spinosaurus]

Well I think worst MU's are actullay most FE Swordies due to the fact they dont camp him out with projectiles that he can potentially Revenge on, they do with superior range and hitboxes that can keep him out day with his terribad mobility. I think are theroetically bad being fellow superheavies but with overall better range and mobility , where he simply gets outclassed

Granted this was like a month ago, but I know both Shoyo James and Magister had the Chrom matchup as one that Incineroar does well in. I dunno about Ike but the reason Lucina wins this one is for how much she exploits his recovery.

Range isn't Roar's issue, honestly. He can play footsies perfectly fine, especially when he has a big dtilt that low profiles and is intangible, and a fair that chunky and fast for air to airs.

 

[NairWizard]

Incineroar does just fine vs. swords. His attacks are fast and the hitboxes are good; he can also get guaranteed Revenge activations from swordie up-bs at many different angles. Only Lucina seems hard, and that's probably because it's Lucina.

Incineroar's real problem area is midrange burst; he has Lariat, which is great, but he doesn't have good run-in options, like a dash attack or falling aerial. Falling f-air is just...alright, falling n-air doesn't have quite enough horizontal range, and b-air hits just a bit too high for his mobility specs to support. If you camp Incineroar at midrange he has a hard time conditioning you to open up.

Pichu and Pikachu can't capitalize on that weakness too hard, so despite how good at gimps they are Incineroar does just fine in those matchups.

Meanwhile, some characters who can are Olimar, Inkling, and ZSS. Incineroar can't approach Olimar from Oli's diagonal blindspot and the weak midrange options gives Olimar plenty of room to set up shop. Inkling and ZSS can play a strong midrange camp game with their mobility and Incineroar can't react to their burst (he's tall enough for ZSS to hit several variations of f-air in neutral, and Inkling has dash attack).

Those matchups seem painful in neutral. It's kinda like Incineroar goes knocking on their door trying to tell knock knock jokes, but they just sit inside and never say who's there.

To counterplay, the Incineroar has to take risks with Revenge, but once he has it activated he gets camped even harder until it goes away, so it seems like a bad look. Somewhere between -1 and -2.

Ness is also probably pretty hard, since you can't Revenge PK Fire.

For reference here's Magister's MU chart:

There was a problem fetching the tweet

 

[ZephyrZ]

Speaking of Superheavies and their viability, I seriously recommend that anyone who who doubts Charizard's usefulness to PT's team, or just wants to watch a good set in general, watches Wishes's set against Light. Charizard put in some serious work.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/407043022?t=07h49m01s

Anyway here's the stuff I got out of this match up.

can wrack up damage extremely well, and getting those combos started isn't too tricky either. Squirtle's neutral is probably the strongest of the team's in this match up, as he's too good at zonebreaking to reliably keep out with Ivy. It is worth noting that Squirtle's even with Squirtle's small hurtbox and good aerial acceleration he still struggled in disadvantage, especially since Fox has the speed to punish Withdraw as long as Light was prepared.

can't zone or land that well in the Fox match up, but Wishes did show that Ivysaur still has her uses. Fox is at his most vulnerable when he's offstage or at the corner, which is where you could see Wishes switch to Ivysaur the most. Even if she was least important Pokemon in this set Ivysaur definitely still carried her weight on the team. But now let's talk the character I'm most excited to bring up.

showed exactly how powerful he can be at the ledge or in advantage. Even a fast faller like Fox struggled to land against Charizard's amazing ground pressure and OoS. Zard's fantastic out of shield game came into play here, not just because of his lightning-fast Up Smash but because of how rewarding his throws are. Wishes also showed constantly just how dangerous Charizard's Bair is in every game state but especially in advantage, killing Fox at an impressively low 65% by calling out a high recovery and later at 72%. It's also worth noting that Wishes would sometimes switch to Charizard while he was cornered as Ivysaur in this match up.

And yet despite all Charizard did in this set there was not a single Flare Blitz kill. This match really affirmed to me that Charizard who is amazing at carrying momentum or making comebacks, and isn't just some silly Flare Blitz bot like so many people think he is.

Anyway, I still think Fox is a losing match up for PT overall but if this set shows anything it's far from undoable as long as you know understand the value of corner pressure.

 

[Augi]

Samsora weighs in on the recent Ultimate bashing.

There was a problem fetching the tweet

This doesn’t apply to Tweek but in many other cases I think he’s absolutely right and I’m glad someone wasn’t afraid to say this.

It’s no coincidence that the players doing best (Dabuz, Nairo, Samsora himself) have amazing smash fundamentals including pressing the advantage stage extremely well which is an underrated skill right now.

Ultimate is also significantly more balanced than any other game in the series along with having a massive roster and I think a lot of players are having trouble with this. ZeRo in particular is struggling without a Brawl MK/S4 Diddy/S4 Sheik to blast through the competition with. There is plenty of silliness and some easy characters, but no truly busted top tiers who can churn out consistent results with no effort. High tiers and even mid tiers can put in serious work in this game.

This is clearly a thing. And not just for top players, but you see this effect on above average enthusiasts (such as people on these forums) as well; myself included. It happens with every smash game. I've played Smash since the 64 version came out, then got really good at Melee, and bit it hard when Brawl came out. No surprise, my best character was Marth, followed closely by Peach in Melee. Two of the games better/best characters. When Brawl felt terrible in comparison I decried it like many as "The Worst Thing Ever" and abandoned it. (I still maintain that Brawl took things in a bad direction)

BUT playing more casually through Sm4sh and now more seriously in Ultimate, trying to get my groove back like I had in melee, the hard pavement of reality became unavoidable. I had to sit down one day and realize that "I was never as good as I thought I was."

While my fingers don't move as fast as they used to, and executing moves inside tight frame windows has gotten more difficult, the cold truth is my battle sense, my knowledge of the Fundamentals, is lacking. I took advantage of the power of a top tier character like many others and when I tried in a newer smash to "Play like Marth in Melee" and it didn't work, I got frustrated. It took me a long time to stop trying to play the game the way I wanted to play it, and play it the way I'm supposed to play it. And even now those habits still come through.

Ultimate is incredibly balanced compared to previous titles. A strong focus on fundamentals is very prevalent even among the the top tiers where fundamentals can historically be ignored.

 

[blackghost]

Bayo is being played by Samsora online and against other top players, and being fairly successful at cranking out wins.
Luigi and Icees have very intricate combos that have yet to realize their full potential.

one player messing around with bayo does not equate to meta relevance. Also as we are ALL aware online doesnt mean much at all. Deedee is an online threat.not a tournament meta character in the slightest.

combos doesnt equal potential. icies are capable of absurd things but they really dont stand out. separate they are easy to deal with.
im not familiar with luigi but there must be a reason that he hasnt seen play.

 

[NotLiquid]

Mewtwo's Confusion can kill confirm into FAir at 140%. On certain characters with worse air dodges or double jumps, that percentage can be a bit lower. You need to buffer Confusion from a short hop or full hop (on taller characters it needs to be a full hop), then buffer FAir.

The only characters so far that have Frame 1 tools able to circumvent this are Luigi and Bayonetta. Every other character with a Frame 1 will either whiff or set themselves up for a hard punish.

 

[KirbySquad101]

Whoa, two , that's nice to see.

That makes me wonder: Does + make for a good combination of mains to have under your belt? I know T co-mains the two as well, and he seems to be doing pretty solid at his region overall.

 

[SwagGuy99]

im not familiar with luigi but there must be a reason that he hasnt seen play.

I really think the only reason he hasn't seen a lot of tournament play is because people can't seem to adjust to his worse recovery. Some of his combos also feel slightly less guaranteed and harder to land as well although his combos are still very good. seems like a high mid tier character to me ATM but I think he has room for improvement and that improvement will probably come when someone can optimize him significantly.

Mewtwo's Confusion can kill confirm into FAir at 140%. On certain characters with worse air dodges or double jumps, that percentage can be a bit lower. You need to buffer Confusion from a short hop or full hop (on taller characters it needs to be a full hop), then buffer FAir.

The only characters so far that have Frame 1 tools able to circumvent this are Luigi and Bayonetta. Every other character with a Frame 1 will either whiff or set themselves up for a hard punish.

Speaking of I guess this is kind of an interesting (but situational) piece of news regarding him.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

one player messing around with bayo does not equate to meta relevance. Also as we are ALL aware online doesnt mean much at all. Deedee is an online threat.not a tournament meta character in the slightest.

combos doesnt equal potential. icies are capable of absurd things but they really dont stand out. separate they are easy to deal with.
im not familiar with luigi but there must be a reason that he hasnt seen play.

From what I understand about Luigi and from our former top Luigi in my state, Luigi's weaknesses got blown up.

He had trouble with disjoints in 4 but had a burst option in his grab along with fireballs that helped him mitigate the damage he would take trying to get a hold of you. And if anyone remembers Smash 4 Luigi often he would only need one grab to nearly obliterate your stock. In Ultimate he lost this grab which hurt a lot. While he can still obliterate a stock with one grab getting that grab is a lot harder when it's a slower tether grab. People can shield more safely around Luigi which makes it harder for him to actually play around it and get damage in especially once you factor in the issue with ranged attacks.

Recovery- Luigi didn't have a great recovery in Smash 4 but it was hidden under the fact that tornado made him have a solid recovery that you'd be scared of challenging unless you could do so from directly above him. With the loss of tornado his recovery is very bad to the point even with a jump if he doesn't get a misfire and is sent to the bottom corner of the stage he won't make it back. Green missile if very slow and given misfire odds not always a bad idea to challenge and his Up b has zero use if hes not directly below the stage. He has o travel in a very linear fashion to get back to stage and it's easy for a lot of characters to get simple gimps on him because of it.

Basically things that hurt him in other smash games got amplified in this game while things that made him good weren't pushed up enough to compatste. He's definitely not a bad character but he also just isn't as threatening anymore if he doesn't grab you at zero and your opponent doesn't mess up the zero to deaths. A Luigi expert can fill in the gaps and misinformation for me however.

 

[Lacrimosa]

Mewtwo's Confusion can kill confirm into FAir at 140%. On certain characters with worse air dodges or double jumps, that percentage can be a bit lower. You need to buffer Confusion from a short hop or full hop (on taller characters it needs to be a full hop), then buffer FAir.

The only characters so far that have Frame 1 tools able to circumvent this are Luigi and Bayonetta. Every other character with a Frame 1 will either whiff or set themselves up for a hard punish.

I wonder how useful that actually will be. This seems to work well at high percent and if Mewtwo can get close to a Shield at that range, wouldn't upthrow be the better option? I don't think that's that helpful (unlike the tech with Snake GimR mentioned), but I can be wrong...

 

[blackghost]

From what I understand about Luigi and from our former top Luigi in my state, Luigi's weaknesses got blown up.

He had trouble with disjoints in 4 but had a burst option in his grab along with fireballs that helped him mitigate the damage he would take trying to get a hold of you. And if anyone remembers Smash 4 Luigi often he would only need one grab to nearly obliterate your stock. In Ultimate he lost this grab which hurt a lot. While he can still obliterate a stock with one grab getting that grab is a lot harder when it's a slower tether grab. People can shield more safely around Luigi which makes it harder for him to actually play around it and get damage in especially once you factor in the issue with ranged attacks.

Recovery- Luigi didn't have a great recovery in Smash 4 but it was hidden under the fact that tornado made him have a solid recovery that you'd be scared of challenging unless you could do so from directly above him. With the loss of tornado his recovery is very bad to the point even with a jump if he doesn't get a misfire and is sent to the bottom corner of the stage he won't make it back. Green missile if very slow and given misfire odds not always a bad idea to challenge and his Up b has zero use if hes not directly below the stage. He has o travel in a very linear fashion to get back to stage and it's easy for a lot of characters to get simple gimps on him because of it.

Basically things that hurt him in other smash games got amplified in this game while things that made him good weren't pushed up enough to compatste. He's definitely not a bad character but he also just isn't as threatening anymore if he doesn't grab you at zero and your opponent doesn't mess up the zero to deaths. A Luigi expert can fill in the gaps and misinformation for me however.

if he struggled with disjoints it doesnt help him that almost every sword character (RIP Corrin and Robyn) are somewhere between good and elite characters. other commonly used characters heavily impact who can rise in the meta.

 

[Phoenix_is_OK]

Mewtwo's Confusion can kill confirm into FAir at 140%. On certain characters with worse air dodges or double jumps, that percentage can be a bit lower. You need to buffer Confusion from a short hop or full hop (on taller characters it needs to be a full hop), then buffer FAir.

The only characters so far that have Frame 1 tools able to circumvent this are Luigi and Bayonetta. Every other character with a Frame 1 will either whiff or set themselves up for a hard punish.

Jesus Christ. I'm expecting GimR to make a video on Corrin's 0% kill confirm next. That's techy and cool as ****.

I didn't think Mewtwo was all that low going into Ultimate, this looks super good, and hopefully they alter his hurtbox a bit in 3.0.0.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

Hey everyone!

 

[ARISTOS]

From what I understand about Luigi and from our former top Luigi in my state, Luigi's weaknesses got blown up.

He had trouble with disjoints in 4 but had a burst option in his grab along with fireballs that helped him mitigate the damage he would take trying to get a hold of you. And if anyone remembers Smash 4 Luigi often he would only need one grab to nearly obliterate your stock. In Ultimate he lost this grab which hurt a lot. While he can still obliterate a stock with one grab getting that grab is a lot harder when it's a slower tether grab. People can shield more safely around Luigi which makes it harder for him to actually play around it and get damage in especially once you factor in the issue with ranged attacks.

Recovery- Luigi didn't have a great recovery in Smash 4 but it was hidden under the fact that tornado made him have a solid recovery that you'd be scared of challenging unless you could do so from directly above him. With the loss of tornado his recovery is very bad to the point even with a jump if he doesn't get a misfire and is sent to the bottom corner of the stage he won't make it back. Green missile if very slow and given misfire odds not always a bad idea to challenge and his Up b has zero use if hes not directly below the stage. He has o travel in a very linear fashion to get back to stage and it's easy for a lot of characters to get simple gimps on him because of it.

Basically things that hurt him in other smash games got amplified in this game while things that made him good weren't pushed up enough to compatste. He's definitely not a bad character but he also just isn't as threatening anymore if he doesn't grab you at zero and your opponent doesn't mess up the zero to deaths. A Luigi expert can fill in the gaps and misinformation for me however.

The change to tether grab helps a bit because now he can anticipate whiffed sword aerials and punish whereas he could only really get those on PS in Smash 4.

Almost every other change in Ultimate seems to have hurt the character, from losing tornado recovery (which makes his recovery legit bottom tier, he has no mixup and basically has to hope the opponent can't go out to challenge Missile) to everyone having a better dash dance meaning manuevering around Luigi's hitboxes are way easier and you can play around fireballs better, to the air dodge change meaning Luigi has one of the ****tiest ADs in the whole cast, meaning he pretty much has to always button out of stuff.

Elegant is still PR'd, but he seems to have fallen a lot from his Smash 4 ranking (down to 10th). Luigi's still super cheesy but he gets very few opportunities to do that now, mechanics of the game just don't suit him

 

[Rizen]

Tether grabs have uses but imo normal grabs are better. Tethers are f12+ which makes them bad for tomahawking, chaining into and generally require a hard read. In a game as mobile as Ultimate the extra distance isn't as valuable.

That makes me wonder: Does + make for a good combination of mains to have under your belt? I know T co-mains the two as well, and he seems to be doing pretty solid at his region overall.

IDK Link's MUs. They both suffer vs Fox but YL seems to do better with only a slight disadvantage. At first I didn't think YL wouldn't be a good counterpick character but that's changed. He could be a good co-main/secondary but that depends on what Link struggles with. YL does well vs (IMO) (according to top Peach MU charts), heavyweights and several lower characters but struggles with (in theory). They're not particularly good at covering each other's weaknesses but YL mostly loses to top tiers who generally have very few bad MUs anyway.

In terms of player CPing I can see it working out. Link can be excellent if he outplays the opponent a little and the pair play very differently. YL's a strong lightweight zoner to comboer and Link's a weird mix of zoner, heavy swordsman and trapping. They could be great at mixing up play styles.

It ends up the same conundrum as always: why pick Link/YL as a secondary when you could use a top tier like Lucina/Olimar and get better all around MU coverage? Link+YL are not a bad pair but not without weak points, mostly to top tiers.

 

[$.A.F.]

one player messing around with bayo does not equate to meta relevance. Also as we are ALL aware online doesnt mean much at all. Deedee is an online threat.not a tournament meta character in the slightest.

combos doesnt equal potential. icies are capable of absurd things but they really dont stand out. separate they are easy to deal with.
im not familiar with luigi but there must be a reason that he hasnt seen play.

Yeah it’s not like a D3 players have hit top 4 at a major. Or beat Lea. Or made top 4 again at DPOTG. Or made top 8 at two Japanese Majors.

 

[NotLiquid]

I wonder how useful that actually will be. This seems to work well at high percent and if Mewtwo can get close to a Shield at that range, wouldn't upthrow be the better option? I don't think that's that helpful (unlike the tech with Snake GimR mentioned), but I can be wrong...

This would generally be a preferable option select over up throw since it covers spot dodges and a few other OoS options. The Confusion hitbox lasts quite a while and is deceptively large, and Mewtwo can always go for a raw FAir if the player suspects the opponent will go for a shorthop NAir.

 

[Game7a1]

Mewtwo's Confusion can kill confirm into FAir at 140%. On certain characters with worse air dodges or double jumps, that percentage can be a bit lower. You need to buffer Confusion from a short hop or full hop (on taller characters it needs to be a full hop), then buffer FAir.

The only characters so far that have Frame 1 tools able to circumvent this are Luigi and Bayonetta. Every other character with a Frame 1 will either whiff or set themselves up for a hard punish.

Puff's Rest also works (as shown towards the end of the video), but it becomes a 50/50 for both Mewtwo and Puff. If the Puff Rests, then Mewtwo shouldn't F-air (and vice versa). I imagine this 50/50 also exists with Luigi and Bayonetta but to a lesser degree (given Rest's endlag and punish capabilities).

I wonder how useful that actually will be. This seems to work well at high percent and if Mewtwo can get close to a Shield at that range, wouldn't upthrow be the better option? I don't think that's that helpful (unlike the tech with Snake GimR mentioned), but I can be wrong...

I think this works best in a stage with a high ceiling where Up-Throw may not KO. It's also an option that can work when Mewtwo is already in the air.

 

[DelugeFGC]

Tether grabs have uses but imo normal grabs are better. Tethers are f12+ which makes them bad for tomahawking, chaining into and generally require a hard read. In a game as mobile as Ultimate the extra distance isn't as valuable.

IDK Link's MUs. They both suffer vs Fox but YL seems to do better with only a slight disadvantage. At first I didn't think YL wouldn't be a good counterpick character but that's changed. He could be a good co-main/secondary but that depends on what Link struggles with. YL does well vs (IMO) (according to top Peach MU charts), heavyweights and several lower characters but struggles with (in theory). They're not particularly good at covering each other's weaknesses but YL mostly loses to top tiers who generally have very few bad MUs anyway.

In terms of player CPing I can see it working out. Link can be excellent if he outplays the opponent a little and the pair play very differently. YL's a strong lightweight zoner to comboer and Link's a weird mix of zoner, heavy swordsman and trapping. They could be great at mixing up play styles.

It ends up the same conundrum as always: why pick Link/YL as a secondary when you could use a top tier like Lucina/Olimar and get better all around MU coverage? Link+YL are not a bad pair but not without weak points, mostly to top tiers.

Because, somebody has to develop those metas and some playstyles just mesh better with certain people I'd say. That or just loyalty. Lord knows I know the struggle of having to give up your main because they're not cutting it (just did that) but at the same time, that doesn't matter to some.

 

[The_Bookworm]

From what I understand about Luigi and from our former top Luigi in my state, Luigi's weaknesses got blown up.

He had trouble with disjoints in 4 but had a burst option in his grab along with fireballs that helped him mitigate the damage he would take trying to get a hold of you. And if anyone remembers Smash 4 Luigi often he would only need one grab to nearly obliterate your stock. In Ultimate he lost this grab which hurt a lot. While he can still obliterate a stock with one grab getting that grab is a lot harder when it's a slower tether grab. People can shield more safely around Luigi which makes it harder for him to actually play around it and get damage in especially once you factor in the issue with ranged attacks.

Recovery- Luigi didn't have a great recovery in Smash 4 but it was hidden under the fact that tornado made him have a solid recovery that you'd be scared of challenging unless you could do so from directly above him. With the loss of tornado his recovery is very bad to the point even with a jump if he doesn't get a misfire and is sent to the bottom corner of the stage he won't make it back. Green missile if very slow and given misfire odds not always a bad idea to challenge and his Up b has zero use if hes not directly below the stage. He has o travel in a very linear fashion to get back to stage and it's easy for a lot of characters to get simple gimps on him because of it.

Basically things that hurt him in other smash games got amplified in this game while things that made him good weren't pushed up enough to compatste. He's definitely not a bad character but he also just isn't as threatening anymore if he doesn't grab you at zero and your opponent doesn't mess up the zero to deaths. A Luigi expert can fill in the gaps and misinformation for me however.

Luigi's grounded approach actually got a lot better in this game. It is stemming from his faster dash, but also a decrease to his traction. The traction decrease, in particular, is a huge buff that allows him to not whiff punish as badly when his shield gets hit. His tether grab I would argue is a buff, as it is surprisingly fast for a tether grab (frame 12 is kinda eh in startup, but the ending lag is so low for a tether grab), and it covers somewhat decent reach. When combined with a faster grounded mobility and lower traction, it is easier than it sounds to land the tether grab.

The one true huge nerf to Luigi that you already mentioned, is that his cyclone doesn't do a lot in terms of recovery anymore. Basically what Luigi got in this game, is that his strengths are boosted even further, but also his weaknesses. Aka, he is higher risk, higher reward than in SSB4.

Elegant is still PR'd, but he seems to have fallen a lot from his Smash 4 ranking (down to 10th). Luigi's still super cheesy but he gets very few opportunities to do that now, mechanics of the game just don't suit him

It is not easy to get used to a practically new character. Elegant hasn't really participated in a lot of tournaments, but he and some of the other Luigi players have recently shown rapid improvement and character progress (similar to Falcon right now). They are particularly beginning to abuse Cyclone's frame 1-7 I-frames on the air.

I personally think it is too early to jump the gun on Luigi.

 

[blackghost]

Yeah it’s not like a D3 players have hit top 4 at a major. Or beat Lea. Or made top 4 again at DPOTG. Or made top 8 at two Japanese Majors.

DDD is not considered a top tier tournament threat yet or top tier in the tier list. that can change but as of now no he isnt. i dont think that is controversial. high end of the tier list is full of characters that have the tools to deal with DDD projectile and approach options and character that have frame data that make it hard for him to get started. we will keep an eye on things moving forward but as of now DDD hasnt earned that yet.

 

[$.A.F.]

That’s not what you said. You said and I quote
“Dedede is not a tournament threat in the slightest” end quote. Don’t lie about your own quotes man.

 

[Siledh]

That makes me wonder: Does + make for a good combination of mains to have under your belt? I know T co-mains the two as well, and he seems to be doing pretty solid at his region overall.

I mean, they are essentially two separate character types and don't really cover either's weaknesses. For me, it always feels weird to play or because they're not where I want them to be.

Admittedly, felt that way at the start too, but even with the new bombs, his general kit and movement were overall very similar, so it didn't take long for me to work it out again. Now his bombs are becoming a key part of my gameplan.

I wouldn't feel comfortable CPing another Link: too different, but too similar.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

I wonder how useful that actually will be. This seems to work well at high percent and if Mewtwo can get close to a Shield at that range, wouldn't upthrow be the better option? I don't think that's that helpful (unlike the tech with Snake GimR mentioned), but I can be wrong...

M2 grab is 8 frames dash grab is 10 frames confusion is 12 frames and with a jump it's 15 frames. Not really why you'd go for this when you can just throw for the kill. Most definitely useless tech.