Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Rizen]

Hadn't even noticed that he didn't put in High Tier until today. I feel like being a big body holds him back too much to be top tier despite his great kit, particularly against the Pika clan. Does anybody here agree with M2K's view on our robot buddy? How well does R.O.B. do against the top tiers anyway?

I think ROB's good and his kit works well with ultimate's engine. The rotor arm buff gives him a great kill move, especially offstage, he has good ranged attacks and surprisingly good frame data. You're right about ROB getting juggled hard and probably out zoned by disjoints. I have ROB as a high tier. M2K's list is overrating him a bit but ROB's not bad at all.

 

[Lore]

As arrogant and as rude as he sounded in his original post, he's absolutely right. I've been posting in this series of threads exclusively (as in, I've never posted in any other thread in smashboards, maybe with one or two rare exceptions) since I joined. Why? Because it has been historically the only high-quality thread on smashboards. This thread was not just a thread; it was a community, and that too the last community where competitive play could be discussed to the exclusion of all else, and discussed seriously, using evidence, analysis, and debate. This isn't just smashboards, this is on any smash-related forum: twitter (lol), reddit, you name it. This thread was better than all of that. If you go back to certain iterations of this thread you will find dozens upon dozens of consecutively strong, analytical posts tearing smash 4 apart, core from fluff, player from character, controller from psyche. It was great.

To me it doesn't matter what people enjoy writing, because every post has only one writer, and potentially hundreds of readers. If hundreds of readers are not enjoying your post, then you posting it just because you enjoyed writing it is at best inconsiderate and at worst selfish. Not only that, but it also drives away other high-quality posts. The really sharp minds in this thread stop posting here when there is an uptick in random garbage like tier lists, low-level experience-based conclusions, and other similar things.

As for top players, we do sometimes get Dabuz and other top players lurking this thread series. But only when there are interesting and relevant insights.

Kinds of posts that imo shouldn't be here:

- tier lists that don't offer anything unique or insightful, with no backing commentary
- videos posted without any analysis. "Here's a good video of what X can do" isn't insightful; a simple YouTube search can accomplish the same thing. Why is the video important? What are some critical moments in the video?
- matchup impressions, e.g., "Bayo loses to Falco." Why does she lose to Falco? How do their tools interact? What does disadvantage state look like for both of them? "Character X is good/bad/low tier/top tier" also falls in this bucket.
- blanket expressions like "Wolf can't kill, so he struggles in the Pichu matchup." How, specifically, can he not kill? Does b-air not work in the matchup? What about 2-framing Agility at the ledge? What are the typical angles from which Pichu will be approaching?

If ever you wished that people would go one level deeper with their thoughts, this is the thread where you can get that. Or at least, it was sometimes. People used to get infracted for even using non-tournament experience to justify a claim. That's how seriously we used to take it.

Anyway, just my opinion. Y'all are free to do what you want. When the thread gets bad I just stop reading it. I'm probably just speaking into the void here, but I thought that we were unfairly criticizing Monete for making what is in essence an accurate assessment.

I think part of the issue is how discussion is centralized into this one thread. The forum has had a surge in popularity, and the thread has gotten a bit crowded.

I also think that you're a bit wrong here, but you have some good points too. This was good content.


I'm going to think on it a bit more then bring up a proposal in the Staff part of the boards. It'll probably be a few days to really settle my thoughts, plus I'm busy this weekend. Don't expect change to come quickly, but know that your concerns have been heard and are being considered.

 

[Ziodyne 21]

Hadn't even noticed that he didn't put in High Tier until today. I feel like being a big body holds him back too much to be top tier despite his great kit, particularly against the Pika clan. Does anybody here agree with M2K's view on our robot buddy? How well does R.O.B. do against the top tiers anyway?

One top-tier I think R.O.B does surprisingly well Fox. Yea I know Fox beats R.O.B onstage hands-down but R.O.B can utterly devestate Fox one he gets him offstage. Arm-Rotor deletes Fox-llusion as a recovery option, and R.O.B serveral options to gimp and edgeguard Fox offstage as well.

R.O.B does allright vs Wolf to for similar reasons.

 

[TumblrFamous]

Hadn't even noticed that he didn't put in High Tier until today. I feel like being a big body holds him back too much to be top tier despite his great kit, particularly against the Pika clan. Does anybody here agree with M2K's view on our robot buddy? How well does R.O.B. do against the top tiers anyway?

I'll pile on to what everyone is saying but I think ROB is his best yet. I don't see him as top tier, as he is really easily outclassed by Peach/Daisy, the rats, and some other unfavorable matchups in M2K's top tier. That being said, he's a top tier "gatekeeper" for sure.

I'm personally surprised by Lucas's placing. He is really lacking in high-level results. While I think he is underrated (his edgeguarding is improved and the air dodge mechanics can help him more as a mixup for recovery), I wouldn't call him the Top 20 character M2K is claiming. Lucas doesn't have the most spectacular gameplan in neutral, as it seems to just be a lot of poking with Fair, Zair, and PK Fire.

EDIT: He has Dtilt which can link into a lot but that doesn't have the range to be favorable in neutral.

 

[Allkings]

after playing a lot of lately, i really wish he was a little faster because there are many times when i am not fast enough to seal the stock

 

[Scarlet Spyder]

I still haven't seen a single Shulk main do literally anything at a major so far. Did I miss something? I like the character I guess, but this is getting kind of old.... Yeah he has good tools, but so does almost everyone in this game. Results aren't everything, but they do matter. Etc. Etc.

Nicko consistently does well at large local tournaments in SoCal but it seems that outside of him, not many players are picking up this character and/or doing well with him. I think it's a shame because the character has some solid tools (Monado switching during hitstun is kinda stupid) and watching a good Shulk is pretty entertaining. Results aren't everything but they do say a lot about a character. We'll see how Shulk does in the future...

 

[Ziodyne 21]

Just as we were taking about Gannondorf and online. Leffen posted his "online tier list"

Gannondorf is top-tier online of course as well has Bowser and DDD, Super-heavies generally are better online .

 

[Phoenix_is_OK]

View attachment 207180

Just as we were taking about Gannondorf and online. Leffen posted his "online tier list"

Gannondorf is top-tier online of course as well has Bowser and DDD, Super-heavies generally are better online .

>Link in S

I wholeheartedly approve

 

[NotLiquid]

Shulk is always going to be a character held alive by virtue of his theorycraft being a little too powerful on paper. No one's going to want to come out and say he's a mediocre character because - "in theory" - he's a character that can change his means of play at any situation. "In theory", he should have the greatest variance out of any character in the roster outside of Pokémon Trainer, being perhaps the only character who can arguably "counterpick" advantage/disadvantage states through his moveset. In theory, that seems a little ridiculous, and people will always assume his potential hasn't been mined because of it. It happened in Smash 4 and it's happening now.

Thing is, for as much as Smash players like theory, they usually don't care all that much for the thesis. Having the wherewithal to call Shulk of all characters mediocre is arguably a sort of a textbook example of "it's true but they shouldn't say it". The allure of Shulk is that he can be anything he wants to be, but the needs of Smash players are usually a lot more simpler than that. What you're left with is one of the most fascinating and coolest characters on the roster who's kind of lost on the masses.

 

[Y2Kay]

View attachment 207180

Just as we were taking about Gannondorf and online. Leffen posted his "online tier list"

Gannondorf is top-tier online of course as well has Bowser and DDD, Super-heavies generally are better online .

These are the kind of tier lists not worth discussing in our thread.

Most of these "online tier lists" are meant to be jokes anyway. In the grand scheme, artificial boosts in "viability" due to the harsher conditions of online are pointless anyway.

 

[Siledh]

Even as a joke, the prevalence of online tournaments might warrant a discussion of characters' online viability.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

Even as a joke, the prevalence of online tournaments might warrant a discussion of characters' online viability.

Not with the way online play is volatile. What worked one moment in the same match might not work the next time you try it due to the ever shifting of input delay. Characters get away with things they normally can't or can't do things they normally could because of it. Online tournaments aren't taken seriously for rankings (aside dedicated online ranking) for a reason. Both players are hardly ever on an even playing field and in a fighting game one frame can make all the difference. Compared to offline play where both players are always on the same playing field and everything is consistent.

Not to dog wifi, there are legitimate merits to it and it's a large contributing factor to the overall improvement of players in general, hell I play too much wifi myself and have gotten better because of it but it cannot compare to offline. I always make sure to compare my wifi experience to tournament and offline experiences before I formulate any opinions on the matters of this game.

 

[FruitLoop]

I think part of the issue is how discussion is centralized into this one thread. The forum has had a surge in popularity, and the thread has gotten a bit crowded.

I also think that you're a bit wrong here, but you have some good points too. This was good content.


I'm going to think on it a bit more then bring up a proposal in the Staff part of the boards. It'll probably be a few days to really settle my thoughts, plus I'm busy this weekend. Don't expect change to come quickly, but know that your concerns have been heard and are being considered.

Though to be fair I feel like there should be a seperate thread dedicated to simply tier list discussions. I think that might get less people to flood random tier lists here. Usually I don't mind people posting tier lists here but I'm not a fan of people responding with "I like the tier list but Char A is too high" and that's it without any real discussion. Maybe if there's a subtopic for it there would be less issues like these imo. That's just me though.

 

[L9999]

What I see in pretty much every response to tier lists is "X character isn't that high/low. Y is an idiot for having an opinion, tier list sucks." It would be much more productive to explore the logic of Y player's opinion and explain why X character in particular is deserving of so much praise. For example, Mr Game and Watch. "Game and Watch is too low! Have they seen Maister?" But what qualities does GnW have that he is undeserving of being called low tier? You could bring up that he has solid edgeguarding, he has a really good Up B, has good mobility, and that he has some nasty tools for juggling. Also his flaws, like low weight and low range that invites you to cheese him back, or how his frame data or hitboxes may blow in certain areas. Maybe M2K or whoever thinks this flaws outweight the positives, or any other reason. What about his MUs? You know, things that are //competitive character impressions//?

 

[TheBeastHimself]

After playing Lucas a lot in this game, I can't help but feel as though he has a ton of competitive potential that's being overlooked. While in other games he was always considered a worse version of Ness, Lucas has gotten a load of buffs that I believe could make him stand his ground against a large amount of the roster.

For starters, Lucas is arguably the best character to ledge guard with in Ultimate. Aside from the busted PK Freeze, Lucas has PK Thunder (which can throw off certain recoveries when used correctly), as well as two spikes in the form of bair and dair. In addition, Lucas' down smash can be used at the ledge to damage anyone trying to grab it; the range of the attack is large, and it has the potential to kill players at high percents, or chain them, having them repeatedly get hit and then going for the ledge again.

Lucas is as great getting back to the stage as he is guarding it. His floatiness can help him reach the ledge without his recovery, his tether grab has a ridiculously long range can allow him to maneuver to the ledge immediately, and he gets the opportunity to use his recovery twice if he uses it immediately after hitting a wall/the stage with it. Not to mention Lucas' recovery travels twice the length of Ness'. Thanks to his floatiness, Lucas can also easily evade players attempting to spike or hit him while off-stage.

Finally, Lucas just has great neutral options. In my opinion, he definitely has a lot more combo set ups than Ness. His short hop -> fair combo is quick and hardly ever risky. Same with his tilts, each are fast options when an opponent is near. I don't want to list every single one here, but Lucas has a ton of potential for creativity with how he plays in neutral.

Anyway, Lucas' only real weakness is falling down onto the stage from above. It can be very difficult for Lucas to land safely, and any errors could lead to getting repeatedly juggled.

I feel like a bit more attention should be given to Lucas because he's a lot different than Ness and has a lot of potential!

 

[DelugeFGC]

After playing Lucas a lot in this game, I can't help but feel as though he has a ton of competitive potential that's being overlooked. While in other games he was always considered a worse version of Ness, Lucas has gotten a load of buffs that I believe could make him stand his ground against a large amount of the roster.

For starters, Lucas is arguably the best character to ledge guard with in Ultimate. Aside from the busted PK Freeze, Lucas has PK Thunder (which can throw off certain recoveries when used correctly), as well as two spikes in the form of bair and dair. In addition, Lucas' down smash can be used at the ledge to damage anyone trying to grab it; the range of the attack is large, and it has the potential to kill players at high percents, or chain them, having them repeatedly get hit and then going for the ledge again.

Lucas is as great getting back to the stage as he is guarding it. His floatiness can help him reach the ledge without his recovery, his tether grab has a ridiculously long range can allow him to maneuver to the ledge immediately, and he gets the opportunity to use his recovery twice if he uses it immediately after hitting a wall/the stage with it. Not to mention Lucas' recovery travels twice the length of Ness'. Thanks to his floatiness, Lucas can also easily evade players attempting to spike or hit him while off-stage.

Finally, Lucas just has great neutral options. In my opinion, he definitely has a lot more combo set ups than Ness. His short hop -> fair combo is quick and hardly ever risky. Same with his tilts, each are fast options when an opponent is near. I don't want to list every single one here, but Lucas has a ton of potential for creativity with how he plays in neutral.

Anyway, Lucas' only real weakness is falling down onto the stage from above. It can be very difficult for Lucas to land safely, and any errors could lead to getting repeatedly juggled.

I feel like a bit more attention should be given to Lucas because he's a lot different than Ness and has a lot of potential!

Of the two wonder kids, Lucas is always the one I saw as having the most potential in Ult. People just try to play him like Ness and get less mileage out of him as a result, which is something that tends to happen with other characters as well it seems.

 

[FruitLoop]

After playing Lucas a lot in this game, I can't help but feel as though he has a ton of competitive potential that's being overlooked. While in other games he was always considered a worse version of Ness, Lucas has gotten a load of buffs that I believe could make him stand his ground against a large amount of the roster.

For starters, Lucas is arguably the best character to ledge guard with in Ultimate. Aside from the busted PK Freeze, Lucas has PK Thunder (which can throw off certain recoveries when used correctly), as well as two spikes in the form of bair and dair. In addition, Lucas' down smash can be used at the ledge to damage anyone trying to grab it; the range of the attack is large, and it has the potential to kill players at high percents, or chain them, having them repeatedly get hit and then going for the ledge again.

Lucas is as great getting back to the stage as he is guarding it. His floatiness can help him reach the ledge without his recovery, his tether grab has a ridiculously long range can allow him to maneuver to the ledge immediately, and he gets the opportunity to use his recovery twice if he uses it immediately after hitting a wall/the stage with it. Not to mention Lucas' recovery travels twice the length of Ness'. Thanks to his floatiness, Lucas can also easily evade players attempting to spike or hit him while off-stage.

Finally, Lucas just has great neutral options. In my opinion, he definitely has a lot more combo set ups than Ness. His short hop -> fair combo is quick and hardly ever risky. Same with his tilts, each are fast options when an opponent is near. I don't want to list every single one here, but Lucas has a ton of potential for creativity with how he plays in neutral.

Anyway, Lucas' only real weakness is falling down onto the stage from above. It can be very difficult for Lucas to land safely, and any errors could lead to getting repeatedly juggled.

I feel like a bit more attention should be given to Lucas because he's a lot different than Ness and has a lot of potential!

The thing with Lucas's neutral is that he can't really approach ironically. His ground mobility is actually quite poor and moves like Fair have pretty large and unsafe sourspots that usually requires Lucas to perfectly space some of his normals in a meta where everyone is moving all the time (Hence is sort of why Marth has been falling out of favor). Lucas only really has PK Fire and maybe Zair for zoning in neutral and they're a bit sluggish with Zair having pretty meh range after the range nerfs from 4. Lucas isn't really fast enough nor does he have to disjoints to really get things done in neutral. Ness may be a bit slower but he makes up for it through having a better magnet in neutral with access to a hitbox at the beginning meaning Ness can do a lot more safe pressure alongside Ness having generally better approach options with dash attack, forward-air, and even back-air with generally better overall normals.

Lucas's advantage state is simply kind of subpar without grab followups. like you do have drag down nair strings with some fast tilts to sort of give you decent low % strings, but his lack of real followups at mid % and higher is sort of where he falls flat and just having a bunch of quick tilts still won't give you super solid damage output as a whole (*cough cough* sheik *cough cough*).

Lucas in disadvantage as you sort of said is a bit lacking due to him being easy to juggle and having a hard time landing but i have to disagree with his recovery. I know Lucas has pretty floaty jumps and does have decent distance on his recovery. However it's still pretty easy to either use a reflector on the projectile or to just hit Lucas out of startup. Also being floaty means that you'll still be spending quite a bit of time offstage which is generally a bit problematic against most good edge guarders/ledge trappers and Lucas's recovery is slow enough to make it unsafe to use onstage usually even as a mixup. Also using Rope Snake against a good player offstage is a bit risky as the game takes priority on having the opponent get hit by rope snake rather than recovering and using it offstage whilst the opponent intercepts it could either force you to jump and get edge guarded or simply die or be forced to up-b. Still not a great recovery.

My main gripe with Lucas is that outside of his pretty great edge guarding/ledge guarding game + amazing PK Freeze, he's just not that amazing at doing anything in particular. He's got kill throws, but he doesnt really have the consistent neutral and mid/late game damage output to really compliment it whilst being weaker than ness back-throw usually. Lucas has access to disjoints on a few moves, but they have a lot of weird sourspots sometimes and they're pretty limited disjoints in terms of range. Lucas has a few fast moves, but his mobility isn't great and his approach game makes it so he can't always utilize it. Lucas just doesn't really have a particularly special identity and outside of doing super well vs Snake and maybe Inkling, Lucas doesn't fare too amazing vs most of the cast. Due to most of the cast being buffed anyways, I sort of see Lucas as just a typical mid tier and nothing else.

 

[DelugeFGC]

The thing with Lucas's neutral is that he can't really approach ironically. His ground mobility is actually quite poor and moves like Fair have pretty large and unsafe sourspots that usually requires Lucas to perfectly space some of his normals in a meta where everyone is moving all the time (Hence is sort of why Marth has been falling out of favor). Lucas only really has PK Fire and maybe Zair for zoning in neutral and they're a bit sluggish with Zair having pretty meh range after the range nerfs from 4. Lucas isn't really fast enough nor does he have to disjoints to really get things done in neutral. Ness may be a bit slower but he makes up for it through having a better magnet in neutral with access to a hitbox at the beginning meaning Ness can do a lot more safe pressure alongside Ness having generally better approach options with dash attack, forward-air, and even back-air with generally better overall normals.

Lucas's advantage state is simply kind of subpar without grab followups. like you do have drag down nair strings with some fast tilts to sort of give you decent low % strings, but his lack of real followups at mid % and higher is sort of where he falls flat and just having a bunch of quick tilts still won't give you super solid damage output as a whole (*cough cough* sheik *cough cough*).

Lucas in disadvantage as you sort of said is a bit lacking due to him being easy to juggle and having a hard time landing but i have to disagree with his recovery. I know Lucas has pretty floaty jumps and does have decent distance on his recovery. However it's still pretty easy to either use a reflector on the projectile or to just hit Lucas out of startup. Also being floaty means that you'll still be spending quite a bit of time offstage which is generally a bit problematic against most good edge guarders/ledge trappers and Lucas's recovery is slow enough to make it unsafe to use onstage usually even as a mixup. Also using Rope Snake against a good player offstage is a bit risky as the game takes priority on having the opponent get hit by rope snake rather than recovering and using it offstage whilst the opponent intercepts it could either force you to jump and get edge guarded or simply die or be forced to up-b. Still not a great recovery.

My main gripe with Lucas is that outside of his pretty great edge guarding/ledge guarding game + amazing PK Freeze, he's just not that amazing at doing anything in particular. He's got kill throws, but he doesnt really have the consistent neutral and mid/late game damage output to really compliment it whilst being weaker than ness back-throw usually. Lucas has access to disjoints on a few moves, but they have a lot of weird sourspots sometimes and they're pretty limited disjoints in terms of range. Lucas has a few fast moves, but his mobility isn't great and his approach game makes it so he can't always utilize it. Lucas just doesn't really have a particularly special identity and outside of doing super well vs Snake and maybe Inkling, Lucas doesn't fare too amazing vs most of the cast. Due to most of the cast being buffed anyways, I sort of see Lucas as just a typical mid tier and nothing else.

I'd definitely agree that Lucas is a mid-tier, but I also see him potentially (but not definitely) overtaking Ness in the meta one day when he's optimized further. A lot of what you said definitely holds true, but there -is- more to playing Lucas than that if you're familiar with the character. A guy in one of my practice groups is a Lucas main and I've had him do **** with the character I would've told you wasn't even possible prior to learning the MU more.

Ness, on the other hand, I've fought MANY times and isn't a character I find pulling tricks out of his sleeve on me. It may just be that Ness is more popular and has been around longer and thus the MU is more developed, but I just have an easier time fighting him than I do a properly good Lucas player.

(I counterpick Captain Falcon or Ganon for this MU, 100% of the time usually, it's just my preferred 'response' from my experience I suppose as I'm very familiar with those two characters and generally have a pretty okay time against the Wonder Kids using them, either that or Ike / Cloud if the player is REALLY zone-y with how they use them.)

 

[Wunderwaft]

Hadn't even noticed that he didn't put in High Tier until today. I feel like being a big body holds him back too much to be top tier despite his great kit, particularly against the Pika clan. Does anybody here agree with M2K's view on our robot buddy? How well does R.O.B. do against the top tiers anyway?

R.O.B can hold his own against top tiers just fine imo. Yes he's easy to juggle because of his big size, but his stage control with his gyro and side special can shut down a rushdown character like Fox. It doesn't help that most top tiers are light, who R.O.B can kill early with his down grab to up smash combo.

 

[MG_3989]

I'd definitely agree that Lucas is a mid-tier, but I also see him potentially (but not definitely) overtaking Ness in the meta one day when he's optimized further. A lot of what you said definitely holds true, but there -is- more to playing Lucas than that if you're familiar with the character. A guy in one of my practice groups is a Lucas main and I've had him do **** with the character I would've told you wasn't even possible prior to learning the MU more.

Ness, on the other hand, I've fought MANY times and isn't a character I find pulling tricks out of his sleeve on me. It may just be that Ness is more popular and has been around longer and thus the MU is more developed, but I just have an easier time fighting him than I do a properly good Lucas player.

(I counterpick Captain Falcon or Ganon for this MU, 100% of the time usually, it's just my preferred 'response' from my experience I suppose as I'm very familiar with those two characters and generally have a pretty okay time against the Wonder Kids using them, either that or Ike / Cloud if the player is REALLY zone-y with how they use them.)

Ok what specific reasons do you have that Lucas is better than Ness? So you've fought Ness more times so he's not going to have "tricks" anymore because you've seen him more than Lucas. Ness has results, a kit I highlighted just a few pages ago so I'm not gonna write the same things over again? I think Ness is clearly better than Lucas with surperipor approach, combos, combo starters, an easier time killing, edge guarding that I actually think is at least equal if not better than Lucas's with PKT, Nair, fair, PK Fire, dair, and yoyo. Ness juggles better with uair. Need has a better magnet for landing and an insane air dodge for recovering. While his recovery isn't as good as Lucas's he's got at least an average recovery that plays fine in Ultimate with an air dodge that's like a third jump. Lucas is better at zoning and has a better recovery but he has a lot more trouble getting in and Ness kills the easier. Double Jump cancel Zair is also worse and less versatile than Double Jump Magnet. Ness just has a much more consistent game plan than Lucas as well as Ultimate's engine favoring him more, imo Ness is clearly a better character and I don't see Lucas overtaking him. For Ness's meta also advancing you can check my earlier we post. What's your reasoning for thinking Lucas has more potential?

Lucas and Ness shouldn't be compared anyway because they're not that simila and they don't play the same way

 

[DJ3DS]

Hadn't even noticed that he didn't put in High Tier until today. I feel like being a big body holds him back too much to be top tier despite his great kit, particularly against the Pika clan. Does anybody here agree with M2K's view on our robot buddy? How well does R.O.B. do against the top tiers anyway?

As a ROB main, there are two sides to this coin. On one hand, he has issues that make him difficult to call top, namely his atrocious disadvantage. ROB has no good "get off me" options in the air, bad out of shield options, and his base makes him disproportionately big relative to his effective range. On the other hand, Pikachu is particularly effective at shutting him down due to a combination of his size, advantage and ability to edgeguard ROB whilst avoiding the edgeguards in return.

In terms of his matchups versus top tiers, his best notable matchup is Inkling - who Cosmos believes loses to ROB per his matchup chart, likely because ROB messes with Inklings zoning and roller games well whilst being difficult to edgeguard and deleting up b with his side b. He also has decent matchups against Fox and Wolf - a good parallel is a less extreme version of Melee fox puff, as ROB loses the neutral and can struggle in disadvantage but utterly dominates fox in particular in advantage. His matchups against swordies are difficult but doable. His worst matchups you'll see regularly are Pikachu, Pichu, ZSS (this has not improved since 4) with a sprinkling of Palutena on the side.

It doesn't help that most top tiers are light, who R.O.B can kill early with his down grab to up smash combo.

People can mash out of down throw upsmash at percentages over 160. ROB does not get early kills from this. Please don't spread misinformation.

 

[Wunderwaft]

People can mash out of down throw upsmash at percentages over 160. ROB does not get early kills from this. Please don't spread misinformation.

Fair enough, I was under the impression that it connects even if they mash out of the bury. I suppose a better option is short hop up air or up tilt.

 

[TumblrFamous]

Ok what specific reasons do you have that Lucas is better than Ness? So you've fought Ness more times so he's not going to have "tricks" anymore because you've seen him more than Lucas. Ness has results, a kit I highlighted just a few pages ago so I'm not gonna write the same things over again? I think Ness is clearly better than Lucas with surperipor approach, combos, combo starters, an easier time killing, edge guarding that I actually think is at least equal if not better than Lucas's with PKT, Nair, fair, PK Fire, dair, and yoyo. Ness juggles better with uair. Need has a better magnet for landing and an insane air dodge for recovering. While his recovery isn't as good as Lucas's he's got at least an average recovery that plays fine in Ultimate with an air dodge that's like a third jump. Lucas is better at zoning and has a better recovery but he has a lot more trouble getting in and Ness kills the easier. Double Jump cancel Zair is also worse and less versatile than Double Jump Magnet. Ness just has a much more consistent game plan than Lucas as well as Ultimate's engine favoring him more, imo Ness is clearly a better character and I don't see Lucas overtaking him. For Ness's meta also advancing you can check my earlier we post. What's your reasoning for thinking Lucas has more potential?

Lucas and Ness shouldn't be compared anyway because they're not that simila and they don't play the same way

People are always gonna compare the two because of their similar game origin and body proportion, and the fact that their specials are *somewhat* similar. But the idea that Lucas is like Ness is asinine; they're incredibly different.

And I gotta agree that Ness is better. Ness's neutral is overall a lot better, and while one could argue that Lucas has a lot of combos, Ness has an overall easier time getting in and starting his combos. Lucas's setups are far more risky. Not to mention that while PK Freeze is much better, I can't see it being very effective as an edgeguarding tool at high level play.

Again, we shouldn't compare the two. But apart from the worse recovery, Lucas is not better than Ness.

Also kudos to FruitLoop for putting everything I thought about Lucas into words. His landing and approach options ain't great. I know that everyone says losing his combo throw is the worst Nerf to him, but personally his range nerf on his Zair has been the most getting used to. In 4 I was always throwing that out as a reliable way to zone and poke the opponent and now I can barely use it. I don't know why developers made the range of the snake so laughably short.

 

[DelugeFGC]

I never once compared the two directly. It's pretty clear half the **** I say here is gonna get met with salt and angry opinions, so I think I'm just gonna keep my discussions limited to tournaments and go off my own experience. The elementary school climate is a bit old, it's only a 'discussion' here until you say something someone disagrees with, then everybody is salty and its an argument or a **** measuring contest.

I base damned near everything I saw off of personal experience, not living vicariously through sets on YT.

 

[TumblrFamous]

No one is coming at you with salt. But saying you think Lucas has more potential than Ness because "I know the Ness matchup" and "someone you know has crazy tools and skills when playing Lucas" should he supported with substance. What crazy tools does the guy in your group have with Lucas? How is Ness predictable when you fight against him? And what does that mean for their meta?

I for one welcome the idea of sharing stories of crazy **** you see personally with a character, I think that can drive discussion. But it should be structured in a way that promotes discussion about the viability of those tools at high level play, not just "'X Character' is gonna be good in the future".

 

[Lore]

I never once compared the two directly. It's pretty clear half the **** I say here is gonna get met with salt and angry opinions, so I think I'm just gonna keep my discussions limited to tournaments and go off my own experience. The elementary school climate is a bit old, it's only a 'discussion' here until you say something someone disagrees with, then everybody is salty and its an argument or a **** measuring contest.

I base damned near everything I saw off of personal experience, not living vicariously through sets on YT.

Relax, my dude.

When you bring up that one character is better than another, you should expect people who are fans of the other character to bring up counterpoints. It's kinda how it is.

But if you feel like they are too harsh on stating their counterpoints, there is a Report feature that pings me or another mod to come check it out. We will evaluate the situation and work it out.


I'd also recommend not discounting YT sets. Local metas can differ from place to place, and some characters can see success in surprising places. It's good to take in as much data as possible and supplement your own experience with it.

 

[Heracr055]

I'm eagerly waiting to see the outcome of Werekill's potential proposal. I'll leave it at that.
Anyways...it'll be interesting to see how the Ridleys do this weekend. His disadvantage, big body, less than expected weight and exploitable recovery will be his undoing in my opinion. However...I look forward to the prospect of being proven wrong. Ridley advantage is pretty good, and in the hands of a player like Trela we might be seeing a major shift of opinion on him this weekend. I fear that if the Ridleys don't do that well that the character will fall by the wayside unless patched.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

In addition to what has been said two more issues with Lucas is his weakness in the ground to air game, particularly playing vertically and shield, both offensively and defensively.

One of Lucas' biggest weaknesses in 4 was his inability to do much of anything about platform camping and threatening vertical space. It's improved a bit in Ultimate with a better Up air but aside his Up air he doesn't really have a way to pressure opponents directly above him making him susceptible to vertical approaches and camping. His Up air exists but is rather meh, his Up smash is too slow, his Fair is good but is for suited to more horizontal space, his Nair isn't threatening from below and none of his specials help with this either. This also hurts his advantage state since his ability to juggle is rather meh. (One could argue that aspect isn't too much of a disadvantage when his edge guarding is supber so he'd rather launch opponents horizontally off stage over above him to set up for this).

Building off the last point his inability to threaten space directly above him makes him susceptible to vertical jump ins and means he's going to shield often to deal with the pressure or retreat. Problem two is his OOS options are pretty bad. Grab is slow and getting grabbed by Lucas isn't a problem unless your at kill percentages for his throws. His Nair doesn't have good range and doesn't lead to much after low percentages. His bair or dair don't work as OOS options nor does his specials. He can use Fair it just doesn't help with cross ups and requires really good timing since it's not the best to use when rising. This means it's often better for him to retreat from incoming pressure and being a zoner that's counter productive since he's losing space to efficiently zone.

I don't think Lucas is a bad character by no means but he's just too middling and lacks a real since of purpose with his kit as it currently is.

 

[Wunderwaft]

I'm eagerly waiting to see the outcome of Werekill's potential proposal. I'll leave it at that.
Anyways...it'll be interesting to see how the Ridleys do this weekend. His disadvantage, big body, less than expected weight and exploitable recovery will be his undoing in my opinion. However...I look forward to the prospect of being proven wrong. Ridley advantage is pretty good, and in the hands of a player like Trela we might be seeing a major shift of opinion on him this weekend. I fear that if the Ridleys don't do that well that the character will fall by the wayside unless patched.

I've already talked about this before, but Ridley's big body and weight doesn't make him absolutely awful as how some pros like ZeRo made it out to be. Yes, he is combo food with an awful disadvantage state, but the rest of his kit makes him a formidable foe at the hands of a good player.

For his recovery, I haven't found it nearly as bad as how some people make it out to be. Ridley has two jumps, the first one I use to get closer under the ledge so I can recover low with Wing Blitz. As for the second jump I personally use it as an emergency jump if I got gimped or hit by my opponent while recovering, it gives me a second chance to recover back to the stage. Ridley's recovery isn't bad, it's more so that it requires understanding of when to use his jumps and Wing Blitz.

The kill power of his Smash attacks is absurdly good. His F-Smash comes out at a decent speed and kills super early, it doesn't have that much range, but it makes up for it with firepower. His U-Smash is a good anti-air that covers the platform above Ridley, his legs are intangible while doing the move. And his D-Smash is arguably his best Smash attack, it covers 3 out of 4 get up options, and it has really good range. The nice thing about this move is that Ridley does a small hop while doing it, the opponent won't hit Ridley if he's get up attacking while doing this. It also has decent ledge trapping potential thanks to the small hop.

All of his aerials (except for his down aerial) are good, especially his neutral air which deals decent damage and covers good distance. His tilts also covers good range which makes them great spacing tools. His Plasma Breath is a nice tool for edgueguarding and to deal with campers who spam projectiles, if the opponent shields fully charged fireballs then this leaves him open for Ridley to dash and grab him. His Space Pirate Rush is a great punishing tool that punishes opponents that shield a lot, it puts them at a disadvantageous position that they don't want to be in.

Honestly it seem to me that people have been underselling Ridley. I don't think he's super great, but at the same time I don't think he's garbage like what people have been saying lately. He has good things and bad things, and I don't feel like the bad things completely ruin him.

 

[blackghost]

I believe the exact opposite has happened to.

When you look at Bayonetta's results, you get an average character. Nothing special, nothing great but nothing terrible either. But apparently Bayonetta is one of the worst characters ever. I think the idea here is just how people have inflated Ganon's improvements, people have inflated Bayonetta's nerfs. You have a character who was the absolute best character in Smash4 who then dropped 20-30 spots on a general list. That's a big dip, but that doesn't make Bayonetta top 5 worst characters.

First off i don't think anyone has ever called ultimate bayo one of the worst characters in smash history. Maybe one of the most frustrating character to play in smash history.

Not really the same tho. Ganon has always had a clear gameplay design and focus. Read based, hard hitting slow (or now semi slow) movement.In previous smash games the movement being as poor as it was lead to him being a bad character. an immobile smash character has never been good, heck in most fighting games if you list the characters movement from best to worst often that mirrors the tier list. Ganon's tools were constent and when the moves landed resulted in kills and strong reward. Ganon felt like the character he was: the king of evil.

WHat smash has thrived on and why people love it so much is because how accurate characters feel to their source games and personalities. Characters from third party games almost always incorporate pieces of their gameplay to smash. This is the core of the issue to many bayonetta mains especially those that have played her games.

smash ultimate bayonetta is a combo character with inconsistent combos. its similar to zelda's flaws when people call her a zoner or spacer. she's incomplete as a zoner because she cannot control enough space. Bayonetta is similar except on the combo side. Bayonetta will never have a neutral even in her own games she taunts to get enemies to approach her.

you can read this about bayonetta is a full analysis of her in ultimate and why her playerbase is really unhappy. https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/bc1r2x/how_good_or_bad_is_bayonetta_an_in_depth_look_at/
people love calling out her playerbase thinking they want her broken again that simple isnt true. What the bayonetta playerbase is asking for is really not different from what the marth playerbase in the beginning of smash 4 was asking: buff our character back to a playable state.

 

[Phoenix_is_OK]

Could someone explain MK to me in this game? I have the least matchup experience with him, and when I do I have seemingly no problem with him. What is his gameplan, and what makes him good?

you can read this about bayonetta is a full analysis of her in ultimate and why her playerbase is really unhappy. https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/bc1r2x/how_good_or_bad_is_bayonetta_an_in_depth_look_at/
people love calling out her playerbase thinking they want her broken again that simple isnt true. What the bayonetta playerbase is asking for is really not different from what the marth playerbase in the beginning of smash 4 was asking: buff our character back to a playable state.

Look Mom I'm on the Telly!

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

Could someone explain MK to me in this game? I have the least matchup experience with him, and when I do I have seemingly no problem with him. What is his gameplan, and what makes him good?



Look Mom I'm on the Telly!

MK doesn't work all that well in Ultimate. IMO Air Speed is king in this game, no matter how many jumps you have. If you're slow in the air, you better have ways to mix up landings or have oppressive hitboxes that make juggling you difficult.

 

[FruitLoop]

Could someone explain MK to me in this game? I have the least matchup experience with him, and when I do I have seemingly no problem with him. What is his gameplan, and what makes him good?



Look Mom I'm on the Telly!

Meta Knight has the best disadvantage in the game by far thanks to his short hurtbox, disjointed range, multiple jumps, and his fantastic recovery with multiple options means that he can often always just go back to ledge without any issues. Meta Knight being a short character with great mobility and a sword means that he can often nickel and dime most of the cast quite safely (Especially with Down-Smash which literally has Brawl Meta Knight's Down-Smash Frame Data no joke). He's less of trying to deal 60 off of one hit, but his special ability of taking twice as less damage when compared to almost every other character means that he actually has some pretty decent mus against even the Pikas. MK is mostly about utilizing his frame data and mobility/sword to play kind of bait and punishey and for getting rewarded if he sees the opponent do anything that isn't perfect gameplay. MK is very good at correcting mistakes and good Meta Knight players can apply pressure very well. Having an unedge-guardable recovery, wall of pain with a killing back-air, and even a ladder despite nerfs does mean that MK really is favored by how the Meta currently works. His neutral may not be great and he is a bit on the light side with his sword not having the BEST range possible despite buffs. But his attributes and just how well he forces bad options just means that MK as a whole is super consistent. Imo i think MK is bottom of high tier. A lot of people overlook him and pass him off due to the fact that he can't do crazy stuff in advantage but having the best disadvantage more than makes up for it. Low Risk Medium Reward Char def.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

Meta Knight has the best disadvantage in the game by far thanks to his short hurtbox, disjointed range, multiple jumps, and his fantastic recovery with multiple options means that he can often always just go back to ledge without any issues.

I so disagree here. I think it is fairly easy to keep control of MK, however slowly you have to do it.

 

[TheBeastHimself]

I also didn't mean to imply that Lucas was better than Ness, if I came off that way. I personally believe both characters have their strengths and weaknesses, and the two are so different that comparing them wouldn't really make that much sense.

I guess the reason I made that post was because if you play Lucas creatively, there's a lot you can do with him which is why I personally prefer playing as him over Ness. When I play as Ness, I'm typically going for the usual PK Fire -> d-throw, fair, fair. 90% of the damage I'm doing to my opponent is probably from fairs alone, and I got kind of bored with his playstyle. But when I picked up Lucas, I felt like there was just a lot more room for creativity with his moves. I find Lucas lacking a solid kit and sense of purpose is what allows him to be so creative. Let me get into my experience and what I mean by this.

One of Lucas' biggest weaknesses in 4 was his inability to do much of anything about platform camping and threatening vertical space. It's improved a bit in Ultimate with a better Up air but aside his Up air he doesn't really have a way to pressure opponents directly above him making him susceptible to vertical approaches and camping. His Up air exists but is rather meh, his Up smash is too slow, his Fair is good but is for suited to more horizontal space, his Nair isn't threatening from below and none of his specials help with this either. This also hurts his advantage state since his ability to juggle is rather meh. (One could argue that aspect isn't too much of a disadvantage when his edge guarding is supber so he'd rather launch opponents horizontally off stage over above him to set up for this).

Whenever an opponent continuously attacks from above, I found an easy solution with Lucas. On the surface, it doesn't seem that he has any way to really defend himself from these types of attacks, as you've mention, but I found his PK Thunder can actually work wonders on-stage if you learn how to properly control it and time it correctly. Players who tend to attack from above can get in the PK Thunder (which goes through enemies unlike Ness'), and that not only racks up damage but also throws off your opponent's strategy. Nobody is expecting a Lucas to pull out PK Thunder on-stage, so it can also be used as a surprise tactic. But yeah, I find Lucas' PK Thunder can get a lot of usage. However, I'm not gonna pretend this is always a useful strategy because this is definitely an area Lucas is weak in.

I've found some interesting combos with Lucas. For starters, bair -> fair/bair -> fsmash. Lucas' bair is a quick attack that spikes opponents when you sweetspot it. At low percents, spiking opponents onto the stage with this attack will cause them to bounce upwards and remain vulnerable for a few seconds, giving you time to follow up with a bair or fsmash.

At the end of the day, I agree with you guys that Lucas is mid-tier, but I don't think he is as average of a character as most people suspect. I don't think the character is utilized to his full potential in the slightest, and I truly believe there's a lot more to uncover with him if only more people gave him a chance. Lucas is one of the most interesting characters on the roster in my opinion, I feel like the meta surrounding him just needs to develop more.

 

[FruitLoop]

I also didn't mean to imply that Lucas was better than Ness, if I came off that way. I personally believe both characters have their strengths and weaknesses, and the two are so different that comparing them wouldn't really make that much sense.

I guess the reason I made that post was because if you play Lucas creatively, there's a lot you can do with him which is why I personally prefer playing as him over Ness. When I play as Ness, I'm typically going for the usual PK Fire -> d-throw, fair, fair. 90% of the damage I'm doing to my opponent is probably from fairs alone, and I got kind of bored with his playstyle. But when I picked up Lucas, I felt like there was just a lot more room for creativity with his moves. I find Lucas lacking a solid kit and sense of purpose is what allows him to be so creative. Let me get into my experience and what I mean by this.



Whenever an opponent continuously attacks from above, I found an easy solution with Lucas. On the surface, it doesn't seem that he has any way to really defend himself from these types of attacks, as you've mention, but I found his PK Thunder can actually work wonders on-stage if you learn how to properly control it and time it correctly. Players who tend to attack from above can get in the PK Thunder (which goes through enemies unlike Ness'), and that not only racks up damage but also throws off your opponent's strategy. Nobody is expecting a Lucas to pull out PK Thunder on-stage, so it can also be used as a surprise tactic. But yeah, I find Lucas' PK Thunder can get a lot of usage. However, I'm not gonna pretend this is always a useful strategy because this is definitely an area Lucas is weak in.

I've found some interesting combos with Lucas. For starters, bair -> fair/bair -> fsmash. Lucas' bair is a quick attack that spikes opponents when you sweetspot it. At low percents, spiking opponents onto the stage with this attack will cause them to bounce upwards and remain vulnerable for a few seconds, giving you time to follow up with a bair or fsmash.

At the end of the day, I agree with you guys that Lucas is mid-tier, but I don't think he is as average of a character as most people suspect. I don't think the character is utilized to his full potential in the slightest, and I truly believe there's a lot more to uncover with him if only more people gave him a chance. Lucas is one of the most interesting characters on the roster in my opinion, I feel like the meta surrounding him just needs to develop more.

The issue with the combo you stated is the fact that it's actually quite hard to get the bair, especially in neutral. Lucas himself has to be in advantage and to get an airdodge read if he wants to get it on any good player. Bair is quick for a meteor, sure. However it's still too slow to be used for anything that isn't advantage when against someone who knows how to shield. I believe I addressed "Using Up-B on-stage" on my former post. The issue with using it on-stage as a mixup is that unlike certain recoveries in the game, it's quite unsafe on shield and it's mostly relied on the opponent not realizing that you're going to challenge them onstage with a hitbox. However due to the fact that you can visibly see the angle Lucas goes and the fact that the move itself has quite a bit of landing lag, it's still not a particularly good mixup.

I know comparing isn't 100% fair, but Ness actually isn't too linear of a char, in fact i'd say he has just as much if not more gimmicks than Lucas. Ness's access to a hitbox on his Down-B and the fact that you can cancel it with an aerial means that you can shorthop Down-B and retreat as a method of pressuring defensive options whilst retreating away from OoS while you can mixup with aerials if you want to condition the opponent for doing a repetitive OoS for example. Ness's access to Yo-Yo ledge traps forces chars to recover high and the low endlag on those two moves means that ness can still anti-air with up-air or even setup a drag down up-air confirm whilst having access to a disjointed up-tilt, etc. Actually Ness's Drag-Down up-air is more effecient than Lucas Nair for drag down properties for multiple reasons. Technically you cant approach with shorthop up-air to challenge chars horizontally of Ness, but Ness has the approach tools to make up for it. However, Drag-Down Up-air has 4 frames less landing lag when compared to Lucas Nair (even with the landing lag buffs from 2.0.0) and its disjointed properties from the air allows it to be an effective anti-air to punish air dodges and the fact that it KILLS means that you can use it for multiple things. Ness has the tools to condition the opponent super well and he actually has a lot more mixup tools than Lucas and more EFFECTIVE mixup tools at that. If you ever fought BestNess or seen how him and other Ness mains like Awestin and FOW play, Ness is clearly not as linear as Smash 4 and his gameplay is actually quite diverse in anything that's not mid level play and lower.

Saying a char is mid tier has a lot of connotations. I would say a mid tier is a character that does have "potential" or does have a few tools to do well in tournaments and does have a gimmick or mechanic or two that could make for an efficient char. However at the end of the day, the character either isn't explored enough to prove that they are a threat or they just don't have enough ingredients to really fit in the meta in a beneficial way imo. Lucas sort of fits in that category and he just has a bit too many contradictory holes in his gameplan to be truly efficient. It's like if Sakurai threw darts on random things on Lucas's design. He threw a dart on "Give good kill throw" and "Give him great edge guarding" but threw another dart at "but make his Damage Output not great" and "Make him just as easy to edge guard and make it hard for him to always get the opponent offstage" for example. Lucas just doesn't have an efficient gameplan or identity and that results in just creating a very typical mid tier. I can argue that any char is unexplored, but Lucas in theorycraft still doesn't add up. Characters like Pac-Man turned high tier not just because of results to show off what he has, but in theorycraft he was high tier all along unlike a char like Lucas unless something broken gets discovered. Results are an easy way to show a char's potential sure, but a char has to work in theorycraft to really be considered high tier for example. Pink Fresh winning majors with lucas would prolly still not make him high tier UNLESS he finds genuinely busted things or if there's more ways to cover up Lucas's patches. I do agree that Lucas is underdeveloped, but that doesn't equate to "If people learn to use him, then he might be high tier in the future". And almost everyone that's not top 5-10 is basically "underdeveloped" anyways.

 

[TheBeastHimself]

The issue with the combo you stated is the fact that it's actually quite hard to get the bair, especially in neutral. Lucas himself has to be in advantage and to get an airdodge read if he wants to get it on any good player. Bair is quick for a meteor, sure. However it's still too slow to be used for anything that isn't advantage when against someone who knows how to shield. I believe I addressed "Using Up-B on-stage" on my former post. The issue with using it on-stage as a mixup is that unlike certain recoveries in the game, it's quite unsafe on shield and it's mostly relied on the opponent not realizing that you're going to challenge them onstage with a hitbox. However due to the fact that you can visibly see the angle Lucas goes and the fact that the move itself has quite a bit of landing lag, it's still not a particularly good mixup.

I know comparing isn't 100% fair, but Ness actually isn't too linear of a char, in fact i'd say he has just as much if not more gimmicks than Lucas. Ness's access to a hitbox on his Down-B and the fact that you can cancel it with an aerial means that you can shorthop Down-B and retreat as a method of pressuring defensive options whilst retreating away from OoS while you can mixup with aerials if you want to condition the opponent for doing a repetitive OoS for example. Ness's access to Yo-Yo ledge traps forces chars to recover high and the low endlag on those two moves means that ness can still anti-air with up-air or even setup a drag down up-air confirm whilst having access to a disjointed up-tilt, etc. Actually Ness's Drag-Down up-air is more effecient than Lucas Nair for drag down properties for multiple reasons. Technically you cant approach with shorthop up-air to challenge chars horizontally of Ness, but Ness has the approach tools to make up for it. However, Drag-Down Up-air has 4 frames less landing lag when compared to Lucas Nair (even with the landing lag buffs from 2.0.0) and its disjointed properties from the air allows it to be an effective anti-air to punish air dodges and the fact that it KILLS means that you can use it for multiple things. Ness has the tools to condition the opponent super well and he actually has a lot more mixup tools than Lucas and more EFFECTIVE mixup tools at that. If you ever fought BestNess or seen how him and other Ness mains like Awestin and FOW play, Ness is clearly not as linear as Smash 4 and his gameplay is actually quite diverse in anything that's not mid level play and lower.

Saying a char is mid tier has a lot of connotations. I would say a mid tier is a character that does have "potential" or does have a few tools to do well in tournaments and does have a gimmick or mechanic or two that could make for an efficient char. However at the end of the day, the character either isn't explored enough to prove that they are a threat or they just don't have enough ingredients to really fit in the meta in a beneficial way imo. Lucas sort of fits in that category and he just has a bit too many contradictory holes in his gameplan to be truly efficient. It's like if Sakurai threw darts on random things on Lucas's design. He threw a dart on "Give good kill throw" and "Give him great edge guarding" but threw another dart at "but make his Damage Output not great" and "Make him just as easy to edge guard and make it hard for him to always get the opponent offstage" for example. Lucas just doesn't have an efficient gameplan or identity and that results in just creating a very typical mid tier. I can argue that any char is unexplored, but Lucas in theorycraft still doesn't add up. Characters like Pac-Man turned high tier not just because of results to show off what he has, but in theorycraft he was high tier all along unlike a char like Lucas unless something broken gets discovered. Results are an easy way to show a char's potential sure, but a char has to work in theorycraft to really be considered high tier for example. Pink Fresh winning majors with lucas would prolly still not make him high tier UNLESS he finds genuinely busted things or if there's more ways to cover up Lucas's patches. I do agree that Lucas is underdeveloped, but that doesn't equate to "If people learn to use him, then he might be high tier in the future". And almost everyone that's not top 5-10 is basically "underdeveloped" anyways.

You know, as someone who doesn't delve to deeply into the technical side of Smash, I'm glad you were able to offer me such a detailed response, thank you very much. This provided a lot of insight into Lucas for me, and I'm definitely going to take a lot of this information into account when I play Smash in the future. Especially that last paragraph, it actually cleared a lot of things up for me. I used to be like "why does nobody pay attention to Lucas" but now I get it. He's just "meh" among the roster, and I'm honestly fine with that. I love the character, and I love Mother 3 so I'm always gonna be supporting Lucas. And just to clarify, when I said Lucas should be explored more, I didn't mean to imply that more people using him would lead to him becoming high tier. I meant that if more people used to him to the extant that they use other characters, there would be a higher possibility of something new being discovered about Lucas.

 

[FruitLoop]

I so disagree here. I think it is fairly easy to keep control of MK, however slowly you have to do it.

Meta Knight even without retreating to ledge can still mixup with tornado, dimensional cape, and even try for more tranditional disadvantage options such as air dodge or using his disjointed down-air if the opponent tries to juggle him with a move without a ton of disjoints. Compared to every other char, MK simply has the most amount of options in disadvantage whilst not being combo food and having the best ability to get back offstage and not get ledge trapped thanks to up-b hitting above ledges preventing two frames and things like Gordos, Holy Water, etc. Disadvantage is composed of three things: Getting onto Ground/Not getting juggled or comboed, Offstage, and Ledge. Meta Knight excels at all three. Also Dimensional Cape can allow MK to travel wherever and he's partially invincible so you can't just consistently condition him on ground for using it too much and the fact that you can mix it up with a hitbox means that it punishes opponents for getting too greedy with the reads.

 

[FruitLoop]

You know, as someone who doesn't delve to deeply into the technical side of Smash, I'm glad you were able to offer me such a detailed response, thank you very much. This provided a lot of insight into Lucas for me, and I'm definitely going to take a lot of this information into account when I play Smash in the future. Especially that last paragraph, it actually cleared a lot of things up for me. I used to be like "why does nobody pay attention to Lucas" but now I get it. He's just "meh" among the roster, and I'm honestly fine with that. I love the character, and I love Mother 3 so I'm always gonna be supporting Lucas. And just to clarify, when I said Lucas should be explored more, I didn't mean to imply that more people using him would lead to him becoming high tier. I meant that if more people used to him to the extant that they use other characters, there would be a higher possibility of something new being discovered about Lucas.

yea thanks for your response. Usually I would say that results allows for more things to be discovered is more universal so usually that's why I don't always go by the "potential" claim and rather like to go into theorycraft and apply the theorycraft to what I see in tournaments.

 

[NINTENDO Galaxy]

At lot of the characters he put in low tier because "lack of results or top players using x character" even though they shouldn't be there. Then he puts in top tier? Who other than Nicko plays him? Has anyone played Shulk at a major? I think Shulk is a high tier character, he's scary good when used correctly, but this is just another flaw with M2K's tier list.

That's because you are probably only looking at SoCal tournies or results that only cover top 128 to top 4. There are a ton of Shulks out there, just like there are for other characters. They even have a "shulk on stream" role for their discord which alerts you everytime a Shulk is on stream. It gets used very frequently.

Just because you don't see them on stream at big name tournies does not mean they do not exist. A Shulk could be a player's name in a pool that you pay no attention to, it could be that the person who picks which matches will go on stream could be biased so no Shulk on stream, or the Shulk did not make it out of pools, and so on.

Another way you can find vods for characters that you do not see often, is to follow a lot of smash youtube channels and scroll through the vods. You can also visit a character's match analysis channel on discord and see lots of vods posted there from various tournies (results vary per discord); Ice Climbers discord rarely gets vods posted.

-

I was writing a long response about why the CCI threads suck (started it yesterday), but I just deleted it (11:49 AM EST) since I have brought it up multiple times and just have to accept that this will never change. Instead I'll just make a list of why I still visit this thread.

1. To read misinformation/salt and share what I find in the character discords.
2. To correct misinformation.
3. To try and improve players knowledge and the quality of the CCI threads.
4. To read about tournament results and upcoming tournies since I generally do not see those talked about in the character servers I'm active in.
5. To hear your guys opinions on Shulk, Ice Climbers, and Lucas.
6. Reading CCI threads are a great way to pass time on a boring day.
7. To find new tech or information that I would miss since I am not active in every server nor do I keep up with top players content.
8. To watch new players enter the CCI thread and fall into the trap of typing an essay along with their match-up chart as if that will help them become a better player. I've helped a few to find better resources, but I'm tired of doing that now.

This thread is a joke.

All the tier list/match-up chart conversations do for me is make victory sweeter when a player truly believes that X character should win X match-up by default since X player said so.

I think that a lot of topics that you guys cover here do not help a player improve unless it is detailed advice from a player who has invested a lot of time into said character and has done their research well.