Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Nate1080]

Words and phrases Supermodel From Paris wants to retire in 2020 due to permanent semantic satiation:

- Tactic(s)
- Placebo
- Glass Cannon
- Viable

Thanks. :^)

I remember a few months ago saying “let’s not make placebo the new buzzword”. Here we are now, almost every other post beats the word to death, either ironically or seriously.

 

[Omnos]

Joker = Sheik
Arsene = Wolf

This will be a good character since Arsene isn't hard to build up and is very dangerous.

 

[Rizen]

Take your time with this character before making a rash judgement about how underwhelming he is. Joker seems pretty unique, so it makes sense that you might have to play Joker in a unique way to play him optimally.

This is a two way street; I see a lot of rash judgements about how good Joker is too. People get so caught up in his flashiness that they don't see how he gets out sword zoned by longer swords with better angles and out projectile zoned by anyone with a decent projectile.
In the match vs Lucina:

Not even 24 hours and someone is whipping him out in a GFs.

You can see a bit of his edgeguarding potential here.

Mr.E clearly did not know how to space or punish Joker and still won by virtue of Lucina's option coverage. To be fair Lucina's a top tier who can do that to anyone but it shows Joker has a lot of blind spots in his game.

 

[Idon]

This is a two way street; I see a lot of rash judgements about how good Joker is too. People get so caught up in his flashiness that they don't see how he gets out sword zoned by longer swords with better angles and out projectile zoned by anyone with a decent projectile.
In the match vs Lucina:

Mr.E clearly did not know how to space or punish Joker and still won by virtue of Lucina's option coverage. To be fair Lucina's a top tier who can do that to anyone but it shows Joker has a lot of blind spots in his game.

Ah dammit, Mr. E and the switch from Marth. That hurts my soul.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

This is a two way street; I see a lot of rash judgements about how good Joker is too. People get so caught up in his flashiness that they don't see how he gets out sword zoned by longer swords with better angles and out projectile zoned by anyone with a decent projectile.
In the match vs Lucina:

Mr.E clearly did not know how to space or punish Joker and still won by virtue of Lucina's option coverage. To be fair Lucina's a top tier who can do that to anyone but it shows Joker has a lot of blind spots in his game.

I mean it's true that if you look at things in a mathematical sort of way, Joker can't come out on top. My curiosity is about how Joker can leverage his unique movement options in lieu of traditional pokes and zoning to access angles that other characters can't reach in the same way.

 

[Nate1080]

Mr.E clearly did not know how to space or punish Joker and still won by virtue of Lucina's option coverage. To be fair Lucina's a top tier who can do that to anyone but it shows Joker has a lot of blind spots in his game.

No, it just shows that Joker is less than a day old and no one knows how to play with or against him yet.

Not saying he’s top tier, trash or anything, just that let’s take day 1 Joker gameplay with a grain of salt before passing ultimate judgement on him.

 

[blackghost]

to me jokers greatest strength is the dot damage and his rebel guard red focus.

i dont know the frame data on the guard but it looks lit its under 5 frame startup. being able to eat almost any hit is a great tool.
joker can run and throw out his side b almost like a Olimar gameplan to get a lot of damage.
joker has utility, speed, and safe normals. he will be solid. additionally, he has anti-platform camping in hit kit. think the character is good. i tihnk people are expecting too much from characters on the surface. joker isnt plant there is a lot more to explore here.

 

[KirbySquad101]

On the subject, much like PP, he feels like a character that's too hard to evaluate on whether or not he's good atm. For me, he does feel like a character that looks underwhelming at first, but the more you play him, the more he does sort of start to gel together. We'll see, but I am going to hold any judgments of what tier he might be at.

On a side note, I know people are speaking a lot of praise about 's buffs, but I'm surprised no one's brought up 's single buff. Deep Breathing is already one of the best moves in the game, and now they made it last almost as long as 's Limit Break? That feels like a surplus of "uh-oh's" right there lol

This is a two way street; I see a lot of rash judgements about how good Joker is too. People get so caught up in his flashiness that they don't see how he gets out sword zoned by longer swords with better angles and out projectile zoned by anyone with a decent projectile.

This is true, but I am seeing a lot more people here in this thread writing off Joker than people that are hyping him up. Then again, I'm not keeping up very well with all this Joker talk.

 

[Glerma]

On a side note, I know people are speaking a lot of praise about 's buffs, but I'm surprised no one brought up 's single buff. Deep Breathing is already one of the best moves in the game, and now they made it last almost as long as 's Limit Break? That feels like a surplus of "uh-oh's" right there lol.

I noticed that buff and I am excited ^_^ My Wii Fit is far from tournament level (Then again nobody I play is tournament level but that has not stopped me from trying...), but definitely one of the characters I enjoy in a competitive environment and 1v1s.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

lol, IMO Wii Fit is a SSBU dark horse. So many of her problems from Smash 4 went away between games and these buffs are pretty strong.

 

[Phoenix_is_OK]

The more I hear of the Sheik buff the more massive it seems, but at the same time I don't think it is enough for the character to be considered usable:

• The Fair buff is one of the two bigger ones here, and it is *hot*. Falling Fair is a thing once again thanks to the hitbox not being horrible finally. I'm expecting to see some new combos for her, hopefully even a new kill confirm perhaps? We'll have to see.
• Dtilt buff is a nice QoL improvement to the move, nothing big but definitely good.
• Rapid jab has a bit less endlag which, at least from my knowledge, was never a problem so... sweet.
• Needles! Full charge went down from 98 to 82 frames (16 frames shaved off these bad boys)! Considering how integral they are to several kill confirms, and the fact that they net her a solid 15% when most of her moves do 4%, it's pretty massive that these got buffed. In addition, they didn't get hit by the shield damage nerf, and the removal of autoparry makes needles better: parrying the first one means you now get hit by the next 5 unless you manually parry each one.

With that said, she still has massive flaws, but given that Sheik received two buffs in a row from the patches, I expect to see her as a quality character eventually in the future.

 

[AxelVDP]

The more I hear of the Sheik buff the more massive it seems, but at the same time I don't think it is enough for the character to be considered usable:

• The Fair buff is one of the two bigger ones here, and it is *hot*. Falling Fair is a thing once again thanks to the hitbox not being horrible finally. I'm expecting to see some new combos for her, hopefully even a new kill confirm perhaps? We'll have to see.
• Dtilt buff is a nice QoL improvement to the move, nothing big but definitely good.
• Rapid jab has a bit less endlag which, at least from my knowledge, was never a problem so... sweet.
• Needles! Full charge went down from 98 to 82 frames (16 frames shaved off these bad boys)! Considering how integral they are to several kill confirms, and the fact that they net her a solid 15% when most of her moves do 4%, it's pretty massive that these got buffed. In addition, they didn't get hit by the shield damage nerf, and the removal of autoparry makes needles better: parrying the first one means you now get hit by the next 5 unless you manually parry each one.

With that said, she still has massive flaws, but given that Sheik received two buffs in a row from the patches, I expect to see her as a quality character eventually.

in what world do sheik's needles do 15% lol, they do like 10% up close and 5% at max distance -fully charged-
also, again, I think you're over reacting (sorry if I sound like I'm picking on you)
first of all, I don't think we can fully apreciate the range buffs yet whitout having a good visualization tool
for example, the swordies dash grab was listed as having improved range, but this just meant removing some blindspots in the z-axis, not being able to grab characters for farther away
also, the first point of "new" kill confirms from fair is pretty moot, if she has kill confirms from max range fair she had kill confirms with close up fair to begin with (less distance to travel for other attacks to connect, since knockback values did not change)

if anything, the biggest buff she received is probably (and I stress the -probably-) on her down tilt, seeing as tipper dtilt could kill confirm and set up comboes before

this was meant as an example
just because there's a little "buff" (or nerf, for the matter) tag in the patchnotes, it does not mean anything if we don't now the full magnitude of said change, and for that we would need exact numbers AND experimenting with the changes

 

[G. Stache]

This is a two way street; I see a lot of rash judgements about how good Joker is too. People get so caught up in his flashiness that they don't see how he gets out sword zoned by longer swords with better angles and out projectile zoned by anyone with a decent projectile.

This is very true and if I had seen others praise joker to the moon and back on the first day I’d make the same point that it is only day one and we should calm down with any claims of how good this character actually is. It just seemed as if a lot of people here were over blowing how bad joker was when he obviously has tools to compete in a lot of situations. Overall I just think we should do our best to understand the character the best we can before making any judgment on any character and I think a few hours online or in training mode with a friend. (which, let’s be honest, that’s the way most of us are probably practicing and labbing with Joker rn) hardly passes for fully understanding the character. Again, as a Persona 5 loading screen once told me: Take Your Time. No need to rush to any sort of conclusion on a character.

 

[Phoenix_is_OK]

in what world do sheik's needles do 15% lol, they do like 10% up close and 5% at max distance -fully charged-
also, again, I think you're over reacting (sorry if I sound like I'm picking on you)
first of all, I don't think we can fully apreciate the range buffs yet whitout having a good visualization tool
for example, the swordies dash grab was listed as having improved range, but this just meant removing some blindspots in the z-axis, not being able to grab characters for farther away
also, the first point of "new" kill confirms from fair is pretty moot, if she has kill confirms from max range fair she had kill confirms with close up fair to begin with (less distance to travel for other attacks to connect, since knockback values did not change)

if anything, the biggest buff she received is probably (and I stress the -probably-) on her down tilt, seeing as tipper dtilt could kill confirm and set up comboes before

I was overexaggerating on the needle thing.

Second, the swordies got a range buff that, while it was mostly Z-Axis stuff, is actually visible in this video:
https://youtu.be/JNGsiIJ_Zto?t=252 (timestamped)

Third, as someone who bloody tries to play Sheik, the Fair buff is very obvious. If you want your before and after:

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Wow it even includes a new 60% combo that appears to be true before DI, like I said may potentially happen! Thank god I didn't overestimate by saying she would get zero to deaths!

Also to quote myself
"but at the same time I don't think it is enough for the character to be considered usable:"
and
"With that said, she still has massive flaws"

Her biggest buff is without a doubt needles, considering how Sheik can smack em out without autoparry messing her up. This makes them both faster and safer, and given that they are a big kill creator it's good for her that they got buffed.

Edit: I'm new to this ok I'm sorry I broke the tweet

 

[Untouch]

On the subject, much like PP, he feels like a character that's too hard to evaluate on whether or not he's good atm. For me, he does feel like a character that looks underwhelming at first, but the more you play him, the more he does sort of start to gel together. We'll see, but I am going to hold any judgments of what tier he might be at.

On a side note, I know people are speaking a lot of praise about 's buffs, but I'm surprised no one's brought up 's single buff. Deep Breathing is already one of the best moves in the game, and now they made it last almost as long as 's Limit Break? That feels like a surplus of "uh-oh's" right there lol



This is true, but I am seeing a lot more people here in this thread writing off Joker than people that are hyping him up. Then again, I'm not keeping up very well with all this Joker talk.

Deep Breathing's buff wasn't even the best buff WFT recieved.
The jab change gives her a consistent frame 4 kill confirm around 130%. It went from one of the worst jabs in the game to one of the best.

Outside of dash and ftilt (which were both risky), she really never had a great kill confirm and now she has an amazing one.

 

[The_Bookworm]

A really weird glitch recently discovered.

Captain L in the comment section of this video said that he got this a few months ago without any idea what this is. Very odd....

 

[AxelVDP]

I was overexaggerating on the needle thing.

This is simply called being wrong where I'm from, but alas

Second, the swordies got a range buff that, while it was mostly Z-Axis stuff, is actually visible in this video:
https://youtu.be/JNGsiIJ_Zto?t=252 (timestamped)

If you look real close, he clearly is performing the grabs from like a third of a square closer in the 3.0 side: pic
in general I don't really like Izaw's content, he often shows combos that are not true or are escapable claiming they are true regardless of DI (most recent example I can think is the mario vid he made), he is a youtuber first and has to make content quick if he wants the views so I think this should be taken with a grain of salt, since I doubt he thoroughly checked this stuff

Third, as someone who bloody tries to play Sheik, the Fair buff is very obvious. If you want your before and after:

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Wow it even includes a new 60% combo that appears to be true before DI, like I said may potentially happen! Thank god I didn't overestimate by saying she would get zero to deaths!

except you're overestimating right now too O_O, but yeah at least it looks promising

Her biggest buff is without a doubt needles, considering how Sheik can smack em out without autoparry messing her up. This makes them both faster and safer, and given that they are a big kill creator it's good for her that they got buffed.

that is yet to be seen, for the moment I think that her biggest buff is still up to debate

 

[Phoenix_is_OK]

This is simply called being wrong where I'm from, but alas


If you look real close, he clearly is performing the grabs from like a third of a square closer in the 3.0 side: pic
in general I don't really like Izaw's content, he often shows combos that are not true or are escapable claiming they are true regardless of DI (most recent example I can think is the mario vid he made), he is a youtuber first and has to make content quick if he wants the views so I think this should be taken with a grain of salt, since I doubt he thoroughly checked this stuff


except you're overestimating right now too O_O, but yeah at least it looks promising


that is yet to be seen, for the moment I think that her biggest buff is still up to debate

God forbid I make a joke about Sheik's damage output or Axel is gonna hunt me down again.

Grab does indeed look off in the video.

That Fair buff is far from overestimating, it's a massive buff to the move and Sheik mains from 4 seem to be digging it after less than 24 hours with it:

I've been playing mostly Sheik so far lmao, but I'll play more Joker eventually

charging needles this fast feels insanely satisfying and the new fair makes her feel like Smash 4 Sheik again. High tier FREE

— BKROG | Ramin (@Mr_RSmash) April 18, 2019

There was a problem fetching the tweet

 

[KirbySquad101]

Deep Breathing's buff wasn't even the best buff WFT recieved.
The jab change gives her a consistent frame 4 kill confirm around 130%. It went from one of the worst jabs in the game to one of the best.

Outside of dash and ftilt (which were both risky), she really never had a great kill confirm and now she has an amazing one.

Oh geez, that it is actually really good news for her; if varun is able to keep up the good work with her, I can see her going places.

 

[KakuCP9]

I think before we call Wii Fit a contender, I wanna know a few things.

Firstly, does rising bair hit anyone (including short characters) because that seems to be the primary button in neutral and as a OOS option (her up-b could count since its frame 6, but she gets nothing from it and characters might chase her down afterwards making it moot).

Also, what does she do in neutral in general outside of annoy you? She might have decent frame data, but her hitboxes are still super wack (i.e fair, ftilt, nair etc). While she has good projectiles, she can't choke the life a out you with them like Megaman and she can't use her buttons to supplement her projectile game like Samus and a lesser extent Wolf and Snake (same goes for deep breathing since Cloud uses his mobility and buttons to run you over and create opportunities to charge limit whereas Wii fit would have trouble in that regard). Until she has a coherent plan for neutral, she's probably still going to be average at best.

 

[Diabolique]

I think before we call Wii Fit a contender, I wanna know a few things.

Firstly, does rising bair hit anyone (including short characters) because that seems to be the primary button in neutral and as a OOS option (her up-b could count since its frame 6, but she gets nothing from it and characters might chase her down afterwards making it moot).

Also, what does she do in neutral in general outside of annoy you? She might have decent frame data, but her hitboxes are still super wack (i.e fair, ftilt, nair etc). While she has good projectiles, she can't choke the life a out you with them like Megaman and she can't use her buttons to supplement her projectile game like Samus and a lesser extent Wolf and Snake (same goes for deep breathing since Cloud uses his mobility and buttons to run you over and create opportunities to charge limit whereas Wii fit would have trouble in that regard). Until she has a coherent plan for neutral, she's probably still going to be average at best.

Yes, Bair OoS hits all characters pretty much, even pichu ( I haven't used it against olimar yet, but I imagine if it hits pichu it hits olimar). I would not call Bair a neutral move per se, because it doesn't auto-cancel well. It is a good, killing OoS option with decent range, but Wii Fit has no good OoS options from the front except for grab, ftilt, or jab, which are not that fast at all.

The buffs are nice, but let's be real: Wii Fit has no neutral game. B and Side B are annoying, sure, but when people realize that Side B is basically a smaller gordo and hit can be hit right back at her, the neutral options are limited. Her approach is basically cancelling Side B and then hitting the soccer ball with a move, hoping you shield / jump to avoid it and not hit it back. running utilt can catch short hoppers well, but other than that and dash attack, she has no other approach options because Nair, while it has great reward, is really easy to punish on block.

Also, jab buffs are overblown. The lag on Jab 3 is so long and the bury is so weak that you can't follow up against a competent masher ( and since you are caught in jab 1 and 2, you have plenty of time to react and mash) until at least 100%. Also if you space the jab 3 at the very edge Ftilt won't even reach the buried opponent depending on their height lol.

Also her recovery was nerfed. Pretty sure everyone knows that it does not go as far as Smash 4, but it has multiple weak hits that are *supposed* to connect, but when they don't the opponent can actually pop out on the side, smack her with a fair/bair and stage spike her lol.

 

[Sean²]

I sat and played Joker for about 6 hours straight today, and have some new impressions...

Maybe he’s just not for me, but I’m considering the possibilities.

• He feels like he will be a very technical character. Still very Sheik-esque in movement and some attacks, but the gunplay and gun-dashing (does it have a name yet? If not I’ll coin it as this) is probably gonna make or break someone trying to pick him up.
• The tether as a command grab seems pretty unintuitive. I can’t see it being used in most common situations. It’s like Wolf’s side B but with way less reward.
• The tether recovery isn’t as good as I thought that it was. It goes deep but is frustratingly vulnerable.
• His projectiles outside of his powered up form are really underwhelming
• His down B can be exploited, I think. Maybe my timing was off but I was getting hit while armored, then they would dash back for the counterattack, then punish hard during the cooldown. Or just grab sometimes. That’s always a way around it.
• Arcen can be distracting, especially if you’re using a lighter colored costume. Maybe another subjective thing but when Arcen was out, I had trouble telling what the hell I was doing half the time.
• Edgeguarding with him isn’t as easy as I thought it’d be.
• His tilts are actually pretty useful, powered up or not. I was unimpressed at first.

All in all, he still seems like an overall good character. People who like Sheik-types will like him. If he had Arcen out all the time, I’d definitely play him seriously. Maybe that would be ridiculous, but I love the way his range changes when Arcen is out. His normal form is where I begin to notice stuff that could really drag him down as people learn the matchup more. I’m just not a very technical player, so I don’t think I would be able to use him to his full potential anyway. Soft pass for me.

Also, there’s our favorite buzzword. Get ready for a few months down the line just before 4.0 comes out, where every top player ranks him in high tier based on ‘crazy potential, just needs the right player to unlock it’. Right next to Shulk. If any top 10 player actually picks him up seriously and sticks with him several months down the line, you can color me impressed.

Editrap I misspelled Arsene. Oh well, I don’t feel like changing all of them. Pretend I spelled it right

 

[DelugeFGC]

I respect the hell out that opinion, and based on my time with Joker I'd have to say my opinion changed too. Low tier, not mid tier, far too gimmicky with way too many problems and people are wayyyy too eager to look past the tons of better options and kits on other characters to play pretend with his.

He still feels like another PP to me, and until I see hard results, I don't think I can change my mind. He just FEELS underwhelming, looks it.. the whole shebang. On top of being literally full of holes, it's not a good place to be. People keep theorycrafting and REALLY stretching to fit him into these boxes to make him look good, there is literally jack **** people can say clear and concisely, laying it down on the table with confidence, to show he's got proper high chops. It's a lot of paragraphs, essays, theorycrafting, stretching and lab videos.. that's like the low tier denial starter kit.

All the technical potential in the world means nada, look at IC's. He also gets completely blistered in a lot of REALLY important MU's so far. I don't think he has viability at all, honestly, I think people are going honeymoon over him.



I am EAGER to be proved wrong, I want him to be good, I paid for the damned character like everyone else. I'm not eager to call him trash.. but I'm not gonna be anything less than honest about my experiences with him thus far. Not only is he underwhelming, I'd call him a handicap to his player. I hope someone makes me look like an idiot, I REALLY do. Right now all I see are a bunch of people in denial / the honeymoon phase / character loyalty phase trying to literally force him into boxes he doesn't fit in. I keep seeing tons of videos.. in the lab. He feels like another IC's, and they've STILL yet to pull any of this hidden magic out that people swear up and down they have. The reality is, MAYBE Sean is right.. but maybe that player never picks up Joker. I think comparing him to Shulk is short-sighted, and even naive, a little overly-optimistic. Shulk can actually hold his own without a ton of technical skill.. Joker can't. That's not the trait of a top/high tier.

Shulk is a good character with amazing potential. Joker is a.. bad character who feels incomplete, with really gimmicky and meh potential that I can just start freehand naming better instances of on the roster. Why would you want to pour heart and soul to a character.. just to develop him to the peaks of mid tier tops? I don't get it, I really don't. I dropped my main for greener pastures, I don't see why other competitive (that's the keyword) players can't wise up and do the same when we're all a bunch of crusty idiots trying to win and make money.

Sometimes... characters just suck. It's an unfortunate reality, but it is a reality.

 

[NairWizard]

Joker's combo-heavy, and by combo-heavy I mean really combo-heavy. He has actual throw combos--a rarity--and strings involving up-b and up-air dragdowns that can net over 50% against taller characters. He's potent in advantage and can keep you in the air; up-air + up-b + up-tilt is all the vertical coverage that you need, and then he's got a far-ranged dash attack to catch directional airdodge away, so he frame-traps you for days. Finally, f-air1 has huge hitstun such that it combos long into kill percents.

Speaking of that, he's above average at killing. f-air1 -> fair-1 -> jab jab -> f-smash is true and kills as early as 75%. Aerials can net kills and he can go deep for edgeguards; Arsene-smashes can net kills, and d-smash at the ledge is a moderate-risk kill option.

In neutral, swords zone him, but he's fast enough to keep pace. It turns out that being average in all your mobility params actually makes you pretty mobile; Joker doesn't excel in any one stat besides fall speed adjustment, but the combination of different good-enough mobility tools and his gun hops makes him option-rich. You never quite know what he's going for, especially once he throws in the gun movement. He can get out of situations that others can't by feinting something and then gun-canceling away, and he whiff punishes you and hits you at unexpected/hard-to-anticipate angles.

Strong whiff punishing plus potent neutral mixups that keep swordies guessing should keep those matchups within fair win-percent windows.

With Arsene, his neutral is hilarious. Side-b makes playing midrange risky, but at close range one f-smash read and you've eaten over 30% and possibly lost your stock, so you face a rock-and-hard-place situation, where you have to kind of camp him out. But camping him out makes Arsene last for 30 seconds, which is playing with fire since with Arsene on deck he has the range to tango with swords. It's hard to beat this kind of neutral.

I don't like tiers, but my impression is that Joker is good, and competitively viable.

 

[blackghost]

I respect the hell out that opinion, and based on my time with Joker I'd have to say my opinion changed too. Low tier, not mid tier, far too gimmicky with way too many problems and people are wayyyy too eager to look past the tons of better options and kits on other characters to play pretend with his.

He still feels like another PP to me, and until I see hard results, I don't think I can change my mind. He just FEELS underwhelming, looks it.. the whole shebang. On top of being literally full of holes, it's not a good place to be. People keep theorycrafting and REALLY stretching to fit him into these boxes to make him look good, there is literally jack **** people can say clear and concisely, laying it down on the table with confidence, to show he's got proper high chops. It's a lot of paragraphs, essays, theorycrafting, stretching and lab videos.. that's like the low tier denial starter kit.

All the technical potential in the world means nada, look at IC's. He also gets completely blistered in a lot of REALLY important MU's so far. I don't think he has viability at all, honestly, I think people are going honeymoon over him.



I am EAGER to be proved wrong, I want him to be good, I paid for the damned character like everyone else. I'm not eager to call him trash.. but I'm not gonna be anything less than honest about my experiences with him thus far. Not only is he underwhelming, I'd call him a handicap to his player. I hope someone makes me look like an idiot, I REALLY do. Right now all I see are a bunch of people in denial / the honeymoon phase / character loyalty phase trying to literally force him into boxes he doesn't fit in. I keep seeing tons of videos.. in the lab. He feels like another IC's, and they've STILL yet to pull any of this hidden magic out that people swear up and down they have. The reality is, MAYBE Sean is right.. but maybe that player never picks up Joker. I think comparing him to Shulk is short-sighted, and even naive, a little overly-optimistic. Shulk can actually hold his own without a ton of technical skill.. Joker can't. That's not the trait of a top/high tier.

Shulk is a good character with amazing potential. Joker is a.. bad character who feels incomplete, with really gimmicky and meh potential that I can just start freehand naming better instances of on the roster. Why would you want to pour heart and soul to a character.. just to develop him to the peaks of mid tier tops? I don't get it, I really don't. I dropped my main for greener pastures, I don't see why other competitive (that's the keyword) players can't wise up and do the same when we're all a bunch of crusty idiots trying to win and make money.


Sometimes... characters just suck. It's an unfortunate reality, but it is a reality.

you need to clarify some of this. What holes are you talking about.


if you were going to buy the character soley based on how strong he was you should have waited to find out.

im not picking on you but i am going to use you as an example. you main olimar a character whose gameplan and philiosphy can be placed out in simple terms and one the surface is very easy to see why is good: high damage. keepaway, ridiculous smashes, and reocvery and is small. joker isnt that simple. but i will try and use the most basic breakdown of who joker appears: he's shiek but hits harders. its the most crass and Basic ***** definition i can give on joker. that is not everything but it is good enough imo

im not basing my opinions off twitter and lab combos that doesnt work with combo characters in ultimate otherwise bayo, ICs, shiek, luigi, and ken would be good characters. im basing my thoughts on joker based on elegant and sweetT

play in WNF tournament play. having a deep bag of tricks is very important for a viable character.. Can joker runaway? yes. can he rushdown? yes. can he zone with projectiles? yes. can he kill with air attacks? yes. can he edgegaurd? yes.

this character is not underwhelming. Plant was. Plant was a walking group of gimmicks and tricks of unsustainability. this character is good he has the fundementalsof a good smash characterand he fits into ultimates playstyle and engine. how good is debatable but if his only weakness is range and weight then going by ultimate so far that is not sufficient to say he cannot reach the upper ends of high tier. we are talking about a character with string smash attacks, can combo into kil moves, has ultility, and can drown character in frame data. i think he will have issues with Olimar and some swords (not all).



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASRHuImYT5g&t=48s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWdF2VBWUNw

 

[Emblem Lord]

I want to understand what is so gimmicky about playing solid footsies with a knife and great movement?

What is gimmicky about drop zone edgeguards?

What is gimmicky about safe buttons on block?

The hell?

 

[Nekoo]

I want to understand what is so gimmicky about playing solid footsies with a knife and great movement?

What is gimmicky about drop zone edgeguards?

What is gimmicky about safe buttons on block?

The hell?

People who never played other fighting games or doesn't grasp what a neutral is and paying for the commitments or footsies probably find Joker too gimmicky because he doesn't have a "Panic" button that most top tiers or Characters have in smash to get away from the player's mistake

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

I don't like the Shiek comparison for Joker. The are both fast, light characters with great SHFFLs but that's about it. Joker doesn't command neutral like Sheik can atleast not without Aresen, Gun and Side B are no needles. Joker's frame data is also not as good as Sheik's where he can just throw hitboxes out steadily like she can. His OOS can be lacking against ambiguous crossups in which he's not sure if he should Fair or bair OOS (Both frame 7 moves 10 frames OOS which isn't bad but not stellar). Though with his great mobility he may not need them and opt to move around hitboxes like Greninja would do alleviate this issue.

Can I also say without Aresen I am not impressed with Gun like a lot of people are. Normal gun is great off stage for recovery and for screwing over recoveries, he can go quite deep with it and it allows him to followup with an aerial once he's stopped firing and can still make it back to stage but that's where my positive impression stops.

From the distance it's safe to use gun it doesn't flinch your opponent can close the gap between you due to this quickly. He can roll away but he's staling his rolls when he does this, giving up stage and and the distance he added between y'all likely just put him out of range again to flinch his opponent. He can roll in but to my knowledge can't reverse his shot so now he's likely shooting with his back to you vulnerable. He can jump but again to my knowledge it's a set height he jumps each time and if your under a platform the bullets can't hit you giving you a free punish once he lands. Since it's a set height this also means you can preemptively place a hitbox at the spot he'd be at if he jumps with it and stop it completely.

Sure he has those neat movement techs with it but those require you to be airborne nor are instant so it's only a matter of time till people start recognizing it sooner and taking the needed precautions to deal with it. Now with Aresen active this all changes and gun becomes a lot more formidable, but just standard Gun I'm not yet seeing how the move is all that useful. Definitely a tool that will need a lot more exploring indepth for its usefulness.

 

[NotLiquid]

I don't like the Shiek comparison for Joker. The are both fast, light characters with great SHFFLs but that's about it. Joker doesn't command neutral like Sheik can atleast not without Aresen, Gun and Side B are no needles. Joker's frame data is also not as good as Sheik's where he can just throw hitboxes out steadily like she can. His OOS can be lacking against ambiguous crossups in which he's not sure if he should Fair or bair OOS (Both frame 7 moves 10 frames OOS which isn't bad but not stellar). Though with his great mobility he may not need them and opt to move around hitboxes like Greninja would do alleviate this issue.

Can I also say without Aresen I am not impressed with Gun like a lot of people are. Normal gun is great off stage for recovery and for screwing over recoveries, he can go quite deep with it and it allows him to followup with an aerial once he's stopped firing and can still make it back to stage but that's where my positive impression stops.

From the distance it's safe to use gun it doesn't flinch your opponent can close the gap between you due to this quickly. He can roll away but he's staling his rolls when he does this, giving up stage and and the distance he added between y'all likely just put him out of range again to flinch his opponent. He can roll in but to my knowledge can't reverse his shot so now he's likely shooting with his back to you vulnerable. He can jump but again to my knowledge it's a set height he jumps each time and if your under a platform the bullets can't hit you giving you a free punish once he lands. Since it's a set height this also means you can preemptively place a hitbox at the spot he'd be at if he jumps with it and stop it completely.

Sure he has those neat movement techs with it but those require you to be airborne nor are instant so it's only a matter of time till people start recognizing it sooner and taking the needed precautions to deal with it. Now with Aresen active this all changes and gun becomes a lot more formidable, but just standard Gun I'm not yet seeing how the move is all that useful. Definitely a tool that will need a lot more exploring indepth for its usefulness.

Gun actually gives Joker a semi-useful OoS option select with the aerial down version (or have we all agreed to call it the Rainstorm since he basically shamelessly took it from Dante from the Devil May Cry™ series?) It's obviously not a perfect option but given that he's somewhat lacking in those, having options will be better than having none. The move in general is not ideal as an offensive tool but it's not really supposed to be - Eiha is Joker's go-to move for mid-range which has pretty much the same range when it comes to its flinching hitbox. Gun is more of a mix-up tool, and is going to be part of the reason why Joker mains will likely ban Omega stages at every turn they can get. The most use it'll likely see as an offensive tool is when it comes to gimping low recoveries.

I do agree that the Sheik = Joker comparison isn't an entirely honest one, however I feel that's mostly a case of, as I speculated on the last page, his OoS game and a decent chunk of his neutral more closely resembling Greninja, whereas it's his advantage state that leans the other. That said it's a bit of a semantics point to debate the cumulative percentage of "this character is like this one" etc. I imagine it's going to be easy to compare Joker with Sheik in part because a couple of former Sheik mains like VoiD have taken to him pretty easily, and VoiD even joking on stream how the new update added Sheik into the game and gave her a limit break.

 

[Sean²]

I respect the hell out that opinion, and based on my time with Joker I'd have to say my opinion changed too. Low tier, not mid tier, far too gimmicky with way too many problems and people are wayyyy too eager to look past the tons of better options and kits on other characters to play pretend with his.

He still feels like another PP to me, and until I see hard results, I don't think I can change my mind. He just FEELS underwhelming, looks it.. the whole shebang. On top of being literally full of holes, it's not a good place to be. People keep theorycrafting and REALLY stretching to fit him into these boxes to make him look good, there is literally jack **** people can say clear and concisely, laying it down on the table with confidence, to show he's got proper high chops. It's a lot of paragraphs, essays, theorycrafting, stretching and lab videos.. that's like the low tier denial starter kit.

All the technical potential in the world means nada, look at IC's. He also gets completely blistered in a lot of REALLY important MU's so far. I don't think he has viability at all, honestly, I think people are going honeymoon over him.



I am EAGER to be proved wrong, I want him to be good, I paid for the damned character like everyone else. I'm not eager to call him trash.. but I'm not gonna be anything less than honest about my experiences with him thus far. Not only is he underwhelming, I'd call him a handicap to his player. I hope someone makes me look like an idiot, I REALLY do. Right now all I see are a bunch of people in denial / the honeymoon phase / character loyalty phase trying to literally force him into boxes he doesn't fit in. I keep seeing tons of videos.. in the lab. He feels like another IC's, and they've STILL yet to pull any of this hidden magic out that people swear up and down they have. The reality is, MAYBE Sean is right.. but maybe that player never picks up Joker. I think comparing him to Shulk is short-sighted, and even naive, a little overly-optimistic. Shulk can actually hold his own without a ton of technical skill.. Joker can't. That's not the trait of a top/high tier.

Shulk is a good character with amazing potential. Joker is a.. bad character who feels incomplete, with really gimmicky and meh potential that I can just start freehand naming better instances of on the roster. Why would you want to pour heart and soul to a character.. just to develop him to the peaks of mid tier tops? I don't get it, I really don't. I dropped my main for greener pastures, I don't see why other competitive (that's the keyword) players can't wise up and do the same when we're all a bunch of crusty idiots trying to win and make money.

Sometimes... characters just suck. It's an unfortunate reality, but it is a reality.

When PP came out I, and a lot of others, had immediate thoughts that he was not that great. You could just tell, within 2 or 3 games of playing him that he wasn't very good. He's got some wonky kill options and is deceptively heavy, but that's it. Otherwise slow and lacks range. The fact that you can walk right through the poison cloud made what could have been an amazing kill confirm move into something fairly useless. Not getting the same vibes with Joker at all. I'm skeptical of the overall usefulness of his gun, but other than that, he's already a lot more playable than PP.

So what's the gimmick? He plays out like a classic singles fighter with a comeback mechanic. He's fast, he can combo, he has a good recovery, and can edgeguard. And that's without Arsene. With Arsene, he can kill at fairly low percents...fsmash can kill at like 70 at the ledge. He has a good anti-zoner tool and combo breaker with both down Bs. Good get off me tools with his tilts. He can already do a lot of things PP and several other perceived low tiers can't. He's kind of a lightweight, and can't zone well himself without Arsene, but that's beside the point.

The comparison to Shulk was only in how I'm guessing top players are going to rank him. They always tout potential and say that the right person needs to pick him up and he'll be top tier easy if someone does, but no one ever tries. I actually think speculating he's low tier at this point is the naive way of thinking. And I would say the same if you said he's top tier. Most people have only had the character for a day or so. We need to give it a little bit more time before dropping crazy hot takes. Maybe he has some issues against swordfighters, okay. Something to work around. Maybe he won't be an easy top tier or whatever, but I don't think he's an overall bad character.

I don't really know how to respond to this...

Why would you want to pour heart and soul to a character.. just to develop him to the peaks of mid tier tops? I don't get it, I really don't. I dropped my main for greener pastures, I don't see why other competitive (that's the keyword) players can't wise up and do the same when we're all a bunch of crusty idiots trying to win and make money.

...except for that this is what I think a large issue is with the mindset of a lot of Smash players. Are you sponsored by a high-profile organization and getting performance reviews on your tourney placements and in-game performance? Is your goal with this game to win internationals and be #1 in the world? If not, this really doesn't matter nearly as much. If you're just playing at locals, or online, or whatever, it matters much less. Play who you want and develop the character to the point where you feel satisfied. If it's not satisfying, don't play the character. I dropped Cloud, though he's perceived better than some of the other characters I play, because I didn't like the way you had to play him to be successful at a higher level. The game didn't let me play him the way I wanted to play him. But I still stick with Richter sometimes because he's still enjoyable to play and improve with, even with getting gimped and all. The money is a minuscule factor at these levels, and tiers matter much less than at the absolute top. Your skill at the game will be the end-all at lower levels.

I feel like suggesting players drop who they like playing and who they have success with for a perceived better character is what robs the game of its identity. There are a lot of dark horse characters, so I'm hoping the status quo will not always be in place. I posted about this some time ago in this same thread, and I think it still carries some weight. I still believe a lot of characters will go drastically underdeveloped in this game, and it saddens me a little bit. Maybe it makes me a bit of a scrub for saying so, but I'll wear that crown if need be.

 

[Nate1080]

I respect the hell out that opinion, and based on my time with Joker I'd have to say my opinion changed too. Low tier, not mid tier, far too gimmicky with way too many problems and people are wayyyy too eager to look past the tons of better options and kits on other characters to play pretend with his.

He still feels like another PP to me, and until I see hard results, I don't think I can change my mind. He just FEELS underwhelming, looks it.. the whole shebang. On top of being literally full of holes, it's not a good place to be. People keep theorycrafting and REALLY stretching to fit him into these boxes to make him look good, there is literally jack **** people can say clear and concisely, laying it down on the table with confidence, to show he's got proper high chops. It's a lot of paragraphs, essays, theorycrafting, stretching and lab videos.. that's like the low tier denial starter kit.

All the technical potential in the world means nada, look at IC's. He also gets completely blistered in a lot of REALLY important MU's so far. I don't think he has viability at all, honestly, I think people are going honeymoon over him.



I am EAGER to be proved wrong, I want him to be good, I paid for the damned character like everyone else. I'm not eager to call him trash.. but I'm not gonna be anything less than honest about my experiences with him thus far. Not only is he underwhelming, I'd call him a handicap to his player. I hope someone makes me look like an idiot, I REALLY do. Right now all I see are a bunch of people in denial / the honeymoon phase / character loyalty phase trying to literally force him into boxes he doesn't fit in. I keep seeing tons of videos.. in the lab. He feels like another IC's, and they've STILL yet to pull any of this hidden magic out that people swear up and down they have. The reality is, MAYBE Sean is right.. but maybe that player never picks up Joker. I think comparing him to Shulk is short-sighted, and even naive, a little overly-optimistic. Shulk can actually hold his own without a ton of technical skill.. Joker can't. That's not the trait of a top/high tier.

Shulk is a good character with amazing potential. Joker is a.. bad character who feels incomplete, with really gimmicky and meh potential that I can just start freehand naming better instances of on the roster. Why would you want to pour heart and soul to a character.. just to develop him to the peaks of mid tier tops? I don't get it, I really don't. I dropped my main for greener pastures, I don't see why other competitive (that's the keyword) players can't wise up and do the same when we're all a bunch of crusty idiots trying to win and make money.

Sometimes... characters just suck. It's an unfortunate reality, but it is a reality.

Comparing PP to Joker is the biggest reach of all time. Outside of both being DLC (btw, Plant is also technically paid DLC), they aren’t comparable.


Joker actually has a neutral that works and makes sense, regardless of if you think/he is a good or bad character.

PP doesn’t have a working or logical neutral. Something that can and was figured out in the training room on day 1.

 

[Emblem Lord]

People need to get out of the mindset that a character is only worth paying for, is if they are top tier.

By that logic any fighting game ever purchased is a financial loss right out the gate.

 

[ARISTOS]

People need to get out of the mindset that a character is only worth paying for, is if they are top tier.

By that logic any fighting game ever purchased is a financial loss right out the gate.

Moreover people do this then complain when they get characters like Cloud or Bayonetta.

Gotta make up your minds

 

[Phoenix_is_OK]

If Joker is a low tier, he's the best low tier in Smash Bros history.

It's day 2, and we already have sick combos and kill confirms, along with a 2nd place in a GF.

 

[Kiligar]

Everyone is focused on Joker and Mewtwo, but the real menace everyone forgot is none other than Mii Brawler. Criminally underrated character. I’d say he’s top 25, and I’m not joking. First, please take time to watch this video.

If you watched most of the vid, you’d see plenty of excellent strategies Mii Brawler’s moveset contains. Why do I say he’s so good now? The projectile nerf. One of the things Mii Brawler struggled with was projectiles, but with the universal nerf he’s much better off, and his only projectile, shotput which is amazing for edgegaurding as shown in the vid, did not get nerfed. What DKbill forgot to mention we’re two things: explosive side kick can be used to edgegaurd, and flying axe kick is prepatch chromicide, the last of its kind remaining in the game. Not to mention Mii Brawler’s combo potential. I also believe there is a Chromicide kill combo, which can be useful when you’re ahead a stock or behind in percent. Here’s a link to a combo video, not so good video quality but it gets the job done. https://youtu.be/F73HnS4_RHQ
Furthermore, don’t forget he has the 4th fastest fast fall Speed in the game, 3rd if you don’t include Little Mac, a great run speed of 1.92 placing him just below Inkling and Lucina, and a good air speed of 1.15, making him very mobile and adding extreme pressure on the opponent. Please don’t continue to misinform the community that Mii Brawler is “low tier”. Just because he’s underused doesn’t mean he’s bad.

 

[Gleam]

Joker needs Persona/Arsene to be relevant and while I don't think Persona turns Joker into any kind of monster, it significantly helps him, giving him a great deal of extra killing power, knockback, improved projectile, etc. I do think his Persona Recovery is very limited and even risky. It has more lag on it's landing than most and because of its severely limited direction, you really need to make sure you time and space it right.

One wrong space and you'll find yourself falling off the stage or landing on it and getting a Smash Attack in the face for your trouble. I'd argue tether is better just because of its versatility and arguably being just as good a range.

If Base Joker's stats were the same as his Persona Stats, you'd have a good character. I don't know about Top, but you'd have a character with at least decent combo capabilities, nice killing power and projectile. But you can see where our problem here is, Joker doesn't start off with those stats.

What Joker starts off with is a character who...

1.) Has a severe lack of killing power.
2.) Weak damage racking.
3.) Pitiful projectile.
4.) Poor edgeguarding and offstage tools.
5.) Weak combos that don't amount to the high level of percentages Joker needs to get people up.
6.) Because of the lack of killing power, is more easily killed in his base form before he can rightfully get opponents up to kill percentage himself.
7.) His need for Persona essentially requires him to take risky moves such as counters and damage.

I do think Persona Joker does get overhyped but I think one can argue that Persona Joker is a decent character. I don't think the same can be said for Base Joker and when you're forced to play as a relatively vulnerable character for at least half a stock or half a match, that severely handicaps the character imo.

 

[Sean²]

I can maybe see the rest of your points as plausible, but I disagree with the edgeguarding point. When I was playing him, 2/3 of my kills were from edgeguards. Nair stays out for a while so you can gimp a lot of characters just with runoff nair. Pretty sure his dtilt can 2 frame, or at least catch characters who don't easily snap to the ledge. Its not quite as easy as people have been hyping it up to be, but he can go deceptively deep, even in base form.

 

[NotLiquid]

It's a miserable state of affairs when we get people coming into this thread after doing zero substantial labbing and having a hot take just because they feel they need to have their opinion validated on a character they can't actually get around.

That's pretty much the only way you can explain outrageously baseless claims like "poor edgeguarding".

 

[Rizen]

I messed around with and fought 2 at the weekly tournament. He feels like a mid tier character. Normal Joker is undertuned slightly and Arsene is overtuned but not an absurd amount. Joker will get Arsene, like Cloud will get Limit; it's a fact of the MU. I like the Joker to Sheik comparison because they're both quick characters who require presision in their attacks. Joker trades a little of that speed for power. This leads me to my negative points; Joker does not have good option coverage with his hitboxes. His dagger is shorter than swords and he doesn't have wide swings on many of his attacks. He needs precision to connect. Joker can't really out-camp with his projectiles and they're mainly good for dealing chip damage but not killing or zoning. This makes him an odd jack of all trades/rushdown but he's worse at them than specialist characters. At 93 units he's fairly light too. For posatives, his Fsmash is strong but slow at f16. He has good combos and chains. Arsene makes him overtuned. Being well rounded he has the tools for various situations even if they're not the strongest of their kind.

As a side note, I think YL has a slight advantage against him.

 

[The_Bookworm]

It's a miserable state of affairs when we get people coming into this thread after doing zero substantial labbing and having a hot take just because they feel they need to have their opinion validated on a character they can't actually get around.

That's pretty much the only way you can explain outrageously baseless claims like "poor edgeguarding".

Reminds me when ZeRo put "poor damage racking" and "poor edgeguarding" as a reason why he think G&W is bottom 5.

Wait... why did I force myself to remember that? I need to do better things my in life. lol



I think the reason why some of us in this thread "feel" underwhelmed when they play Joker, is because Joker as a character really only fits certain playstyles. You at players like VoiD, Armada, and Leffen, and you would see that they are a natural with the character.

Sometimes when you consider playing a character, you should not focus on whether they are good or not, but whether does the character "fit you" or not.