Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[KakuCP9]

I don't think its going to magically change his MU with reflectors since all he has to do is throw away the reflected Pikmin or even just whistle it and the glitch is undone. Still, Olimar players should not have to put up with something that counter-intuitive (and defiantly unintended) no matter how much the Smash community hates him.

Edit: Here's a thread with more info

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[Rizen]

I don't think its going to magically change his MU with reflectors since all he has to do is throw away the reflected Pikmin or even just whistle it and the glitch is undone. Still, Olimar players should not have to put up with something that counter-intuitive (and defiantly unintended) no matter how much the Smash community hates him.

If anything it's good for the captain because he can shield reflected smashes then throw the pikmin away.

 

[DelugeFGC]

I don't think its going to magically change his MU with reflectors since all he has to do is throw away the reflected Pikmin or even just whistle it and the glitch is undone. Still, Olimar players should not have to put up with something that counter-intuitive (and defiantly unintended) no matter how much the Smash community hates him.

Edit: Here's a thread with more info

There was a problem fetching the tweet

I've had this happen multiple times now and I had no idea why. Thank you so much for posting this, it was really screwing with my head.

Playing who is potentially the most hated character in the game is already hard, having your own aerial attacks nuke you into the blast zone suddenly on top of that is a big wooboi. I genuinely had no idea what the hell was doing this, it's been happening to me a lot since Joker is everywhere atm and I've had my Smash attacks reflected more times than I'd care to admit.

Is it bad I actually think Olimar is fun? Like for real, this is a serious question. I actually find his playstyle to be the funnest one on the roster, but I also don't play an extremely campy Olimar. I play a very, hover-just-out-range in neutral Olimar who can BECOME very campy if he's losing, but otherwise tries to alternate between passively-aggro / defensive to outright very aggro. I know that's not 100% optimal, but it's just how I like to play. Like I focus my Olimar game on a lot of grab setups and juggle combos, and a lot of aerial footsie spacing. I don't just run away and spam Side B and FSmash constantly.

If I use FSmash too many times in a match I genuinely start to hate myself. I know it's busted as hell and I should spam it.. I mean it (and USmash) can literally COMBO INTO THEMSELVES, AS SMASH ATTACKS.. but I just can't. I use USmash as a juggle starter and a kill tool, and FSmash mostly to tech chase or setup grabs. Otherwise I never touch the moves, they literally feel dirty to me now. I use DSmash a lot, though, comboing into it and getting some hitbox magic going (having both Pikmin hit) can lead to MASSIVE damage output from one attack.. and I love the launch angle. It's his only Smash attack I commonly use, though. I know not using a lot of smash attacks as an Olimar player is dumb, but I really do try to play him.. not like.. you know.

 

[Repli.Cant]

Is it bad I actually think Olimar is fun?

No, of course not. Everyone has different ways to play the game. For example, I'm a Bowser Jr. main (and proud of it too, baby). The character is constantly getting trashed on by people, but a question I get a lot is "why Jr. over any better characters?". Simple: the character is fun to me. It's not just a thing with Olimar, despite the fact that Olimar gets memed on the same amount if not more than Jr.

It's kind of sad that it's gotten to a point where we ask "is it ok to main this character because I enjoy their playstyle, even though they're viewed negatively?". I know this hasn't started with Ultimate, hell even before . The same issue exists in other games.

Basically: play who you want. (Duh)

 

[Kiligar]

Pit vs Olimar Grand Finals. The matchup isn’t too bad for Pit, who from my experience likes fighting light characters due to his speedy smash attacks. The tournament could have gone either way, the weaknesses of Pit’s side Special become very apparent in the final game. The comeback on game 4 from Lucky was amazing though.

 

[blackghost]

Myran did it in February/March,

There was a problem fetching the tweet

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yeah that tier list is awful from mid tier down.

 

[DelugeFGC]

This Shulk is top tier nonsense really needs to calm down. As much potential as the guy does have, he has abysmal frame data and fairly meh kill power without Smash Monado, and around medium-range overall hitboxes.. he's also pretty slow with a fairly crap / linear recovery when you can't pull out Jump Monado. His recovery isn't one you can do crazy edge guards with and walk away alive, it's more the.. last ditch escape plan at 130% at the blast zone type of deal, like a Link bomb recovery. His BAir, UAir and DAir and F/USmash also all have a ton of startup and basically REQUIRE reads in most situations without Speed.

No amount of galaxy brained BS with the Monado Arts is going to change his latent issues, and Monado Arts can hurt you just as much as they can help. He's high risk, high reward.. for sure. Definitely high tier.. at least. But top tier? Naaah.

Also that mid tier and low tier.. tragic. Why is Richter like 10+ tier spots ahead of Simon? They have ONE difference, and I really don't think Aura Holy Water is that big of a MU game changer for Olimar and such to the point where it jacks him WAY ahead of Simon on the tier list. Olimar is great, maybe even a little busted, but with his disadvantage state I really can't concede to him being #1 on top tier. Top 3 or top 5, for sure.. but #1? Naaah. I think most of the glass cannons will drop some overtime, Olimar might be an exception because of how safe / consistent his options are though, unlike say Pichu.

 

[Frihetsanka]

yeah that tier list is awful from mid tier down.

The point was that he placed Olimar as #1 before VoiD did.

Definitely high tier.. at least. But top tier? Naaah.

High tier or better but not top tier? Do you have a tier between high tier and top tier?

As for killing, he has pretty strong kill options even without Smash Art, and while they might not be fast they have huge range.

 

[DelugeFGC]

The point was that he placed Olimar as #1 before VoiD did.

High tier or better but not top tier? Do you have a tier between high tier and top tier?

As for killing, he has pretty strong kill options even without Smash Art, and while they might not be fast they have huge range.

Did I word that bad? My apologies if I did.

And yeah actually now that you mention it, I don't really look at it like just, high, top, etc. I go by letters. So when people say high tier, I think of A and B personally, I'd put Shulk in B, but not A. High Tier -, if you will.

Outside of his smash attacks and air slash, what does he have without Smash Monado? His Smash Attacks basically require a read, I couldn't find much that confirmed into them outside of crazy popoff combos out of Buster Monado, so basically nothing super consistent. When I say a character has meh kill power, I don't just mean literal '% other characters die at against them' I more-so mean the whole song and dance. Getting a kill WITHOUT Smash Monado or a hard read with Shulk, in my limited experience with him, can sometimes be a chore.

 

[Frihetsanka]

Outside of his smash attacks and air slash, what does he have without Smash Monado?

Up-tilt is pretty solid, up-air is very strong (might be the strongest in the game even without Smash Arts), f-tilt near the ledge kills reasonably early, bair is one of the strongest in the game, his counter is probably one of the best counters for killing too. Side-B also kills (so all specials kill).

Max rage Shulk f-tilt killed Ally's Snake at 118% from the middle of the stage, without any Smash Arts. I don't know about Ally's DI but that's pretty solid. Shulk sacrifices frame data for range and Monado Arts, and in this game it seems like he's one of the best characters when played at a top level.

 

[DelugeFGC]

Up-tilt is pretty solid, up-air is very strong (might be the strongest in the game even without Smash Arts), f-tilt near the ledge kills reasonably early, bair is one of the strongest in the game, his counter is probably one of the best counters for killing too. Side-B also kills (so all specials kill).

Max rage Shulk f-tilt killed Ally's Snake at 118% from the middle of the stage, without any Smash Arts. I don't know about Ally's DI but that's pretty solid. Shulk sacrifices frame data for range and Monado Arts, and in this game it seems like he's one of the best characters when played at a top level.

For as much range as he has, is it not a considerable factor that the hitboxes on such attacks aren't big disjoints? Like BAir, UAir, DAir and his Smash Attacks require a degree of precision to them most don't, and with the amount of lag on them they aren't exactly the safest moves on the planet. Simon and Richter have more technical range than any other character in the entire game on their attacks, yet the precision on those hitboxes hurts that range at the same time.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Diddy Kong is now as popular as the Miis. What a timeline.

It’s been a pretty terrible ride so far yes. Still think Diddy is underrated, but he’s definitely the worst he’s ever been. Real big shame that even Sheik and Bayonetta show up more often, despite being nerfed harder.

 

[PK Bash]

>Takes a lot of skill and dedication to play
>Palutena

Pick one

I find it a little disappointing that this is your only take away from this post and that you have let your tunnel vision and preconceptions blind you to the context of what is actually being said here.

That is genuinely a real shame for a thread such as this.

Lade does actually clarify this in the Tweet chain. He is not saying that Palutena is inherently difficult to play. He is saying that of Snake's hardest matchups, Palutena is one of the hardest to play well at high or top level, and frankly, he's right. His line of reasoning is that unlike every other top 10 character, Palutena actually has to space and time her aerials and her overall movement is not as smooth as her contemporaries. I think that's a pretty fair argument, personally - you can definitely see where he is coming from. When you have the advantage over Snake but can only act upon that advantage by tangoing around his hitboxes in relatively narrow and inflexible ways, then yes Palutena is far from the easiest character you can be using to try to beat Snake despite having a matchup advantage.
That is the argument he is making, so at the very least, please make an effort to understand the actual argument here before just dismissing it with a meme. Perhaps this could also shed some light on why she is not that popular a pick at higher levels of play and why, unlike other top 10 characters, she shines the brightest at mid and low levels.

Palutena is one of the first of the strongest characters to reach a level of play where she can no longer carry her players wholesale. She is much more heavily reliant on strong player fundamentals than most people seem to think.

 

[$.A.F.]

I find it a little disappointing that this is your only take away from this post and that you have let your tunnel vision and preconceptions blind you to the context of what is actually being said here.

That is genuinely a real shame for a thread such as this.

Lade does actually clarify this in the Tweet chain. He is not saying that Palutena is inherently difficult to play. He is saying that of Snake's hardest matchups, Palutena is one of the hardest to play well at high or top level, and frankly, he's right. His line of reasoning is that unlike every other top 10 character, Palutena actually has to space and time her aerials and her overall movement is not as smooth as her contemporaries. I think that's a pretty fair argument, personally - you can definitely see where he is coming from. When you have the advantage over Snake but can only act upon that advantage by tangoing around his hitboxes in relatively narrow and inflexible ways, then yes Palutena is far from the easiest character you can be using to try to beat Snake despite having a matchup advantage.
That is the argument he is making, so at the very least, please make an effort to understand the actual argument here before just dismissing it with a meme. Perhaps this could also shed some light on why she is not that popular a pick at higher levels of play and why, unlike other top 10 characters, she shines the brightest at mid and low levels.

Palutena is one of the first of the strongest characters to reach a level of play where she can no longer carry her players wholesale. She is much more heavily reliant on strong player fundamentals than most people seem to think.

Okay I get what you are saying. I personally haven’t watched much high level Palutena vs Snake and don’t really play either of them at all.
However, Palutena as a whole doesn’t take the dedication of a Fox or Megaman. She obviously doesn’t carry at high level because no character has been proven to at all. Just because you have to rely on fundamentals and spacing at high level play, it doesn’t some how make you a hard to play character. Otherwise characters like Lucina would be considered ridiculously hard no? Her aerials, while you need to space them, all reliably combo or kill except for down air. Bair kills around 100-130 at ledge, fair and Nair combo into themselves for an extremely long time, and up air kills ridiculously early off the top and has priority over almost every move in the game. She doesn’t require any extraordinary amount of tech skill or mind games to succeed. Her combos are extremely easy to pull off. She doesn’t really even have any losing matchups at any level you need to watch out for. She has a projectile that camps, juggles, kills, and edgeguards all at once. Her only hard aspect is that characters exist who are better than her. In that case, I guess Ike or Yoshi are ridiculously complex despite their simplicity. Palutena doesn’t carry and I won’t argue she does. All characters are extremely hard to play at a high level and succeed with. But compared to most other characters, be honest, she’s rather basic and rather easy.

 

[Terotrous]

SF4 Seth had a toolbox that made even Akuma jealous.

He had an answer for literally every situation and top tier buttons.

That is definitely not Ganon.

That's Brawl MK.

Seth also has no health though and dies really easily. He's a very swingy character because when he gets rolling he can easily win the whole round without you being able to do a damn thing, but if you do get a hit on him he folds like paper. Smash has much stronger defensive options compared to SF so there really aren't any characters who can just run a train to quite the same degree, but I feel the most apt comparison is probably Shulk. When Shulk is working out he feels absurd, he's got great speed, power, and range all at the same time, but then you either make one mistake or something unexpected happens and you don't have the right arte available and you just die. I do agree that I think he has tons of potential and in particular I think he could have the ability to do well in certain matchups that seem very difficult for most of the cast due to his unique tools, but he's so mentally taxing to play that I wonder if anyone will ever be able to be consistent with him.

Brawl MK is ST Akuma, where he's just as good or better than Seth in SF4 but he doesn't have below-average health. He just has it all to such an absurd degree that banning him is the only way to make the game somewhat playable (though Brawl is such a busted game that even banning MK doesn't help that much).

Is it bad I actually think Olimar is fun?

I kind of like playing Olimar too. He was one of the newcomers I was the most hype for from Brawl (I also quite like the Pikmin series) and I think his playstyle is pretty unique and fun, but he's clearly so oppressive even when played in a fairly braindead way that winning with him doesn't really feel satisfying IMO, it feels quite clear that the win comes from the character and not the player. I played a lot of Balanced Brawl back in the day where MK was toned down a fair bit but Olimar was relatively untouched, which allowed his top tier status to shine through, and he's pretty much back at that level of power in this game.

That being said, in the early days of this game where I couldn't find a character I wanted to play, I heavily considered maining Olimar, just to watch the world burn.

 

[Y2Kay]

Idk why yall hyping Ganondorf up. He has an amazing air to air in his Neutral Air and the oki he get's off of Flame Choke is impressive, but he still has the worst mobility of the heavies, the worst disadavantage of the heavies, and still struggles to force approaches without committing too hard.

Definitely a low tier. and maybe are all better in my mind.

 

[Rizen]

but he {Ganon} still has the worst mobility of the heavies, the worst disadavantage of the heavies, and still struggles to force approaches without committing too hard.

Definitely a low tier. and maybe are all better in my mind.

Wizard's foot helps him a lot in these situations. It's a strong burst option that eats weak projectiles. If you mistime Uair/Utilt/Usmash he can rain it down on you from disadvantage. It, like all his moves, has great shield pressure.

 

[B_Burg]

Despite early hype, Mega Man and Ike cannot seem to separate themselves from the pack. This would indicate to me that they do not rank in the same stratum as Wolf and Lucina, as some have suggested. Or that they're just unappealing to most players. Could be either. Could be both.

I feel like early hype for Mega Man was kinda lost more so because he's basically the most nerfed character in the game at this point in time, at least strictly speaking in terms of the balance patches within Ultimate itself.

I mean, he was always tricky to use to the point that it was going to limit his appearances to an extent, but I definitely think we would be seeing more of him if he weren't being hit so hard every update.

As opposed to a character like Ike who people may just be figuring out how to better deal with what he can do well as, at least as far as I know, he hasn't been changed nearly as much in comparison.

I don't know how earlier tournaments looked in comparison to this one though, and it's entirely possible there would have been at least somewhat of a dip in both characters usage.

 

[Heracr055]

Honestly Megaman is fine. The first patch removed a bug they didn't really want in the Leaf Shield combo thing. The second one, again, isn't so bad. Leaf Shield is still fairly formidable and the projectile nerf isn't that horrible for him. People just need to come around to see that he's still a high tier.
Go watch Scatt demolish MVD at Come to Papa to see what a Megaman can do against someone as formidable as Snake for a point of reference. Make of that what you will (I know one set isn't an indicator for a character, but I'm basing my faith in my own instinct and what some other MM players have said.)

Edit: Tweet from Yeti on the changes in 3.0:

https://mobile.twitter.com/yetiyana/status/1118741446448824321

As you can see from this tweet thread, not much changed (but that Up Smash buff is nice).

Edit 2: Oh hey, Kameme won the third supermajor tournament of Ultimate using 3.0 Megaman, among a couple other chars

 

[The_Bookworm]

Breaking news from Umebura SP4 SSBU, but MkLeo has been sent to loser's. The culprit: this skilled Peach player.

Double two stocked. Ouch. Not even his Lucina could save him from this.

 

[Captain Sa10]

Breaking news from Umebura SP4 SSBU, but MkLeo has been sent to loser's. The culprit: this skilled Peach player.

Double two stocked. Ouch. Not even his Lucina could save him from this.

The peach/daisy presence has been hella strong over there.

Actually I believe Leo is completely out now(not 100% sure on this)? Think he lost to a Greninja or a player with the Japanese name for greninja(apologies to the greninja players if I’m butchering it’s name)? Idk for sure, but I know they said a different name so I’m assuming that would’ve been his second loss.

Speaking of him not going Lucina I think that’s actually ending up to be Leo’s failings in down playing the character so hard. It’s obvious the character has always been damn good despite losing things from smash 4(granted I never really played smash 4 so it doesn’t make much a difference to me). I think if he would have learned the matchup and stuck with her, (something else I find as a problem when you branch out into secondaries and such), he would have had better odds.

Here’s an example, same tournament different players, with the matchup looking a bit differently imo. Also in this video is where I heard about him losing to “gekoga” or greninja player on the other stream setup(fast forward to like 10:35 or 10:40 if your interested in that).

Edit: just confirmed it that he’s out(I believe it was actually two peach players according to his Twitter with the second being Umeki?? Idk. Peach/Daisy are so good).

 

[Omastar]

Barnard's Loop posted the Top 8 of Umebura Japan Major on Reddit, thought I should post it here too. Easily one of the most interesting Top 8's I have seen in a while especially for an S tier event.

 

[Idon]

Barnard's Loop posted the Top 8 of Umebura Japan Major on Reddit, thought I should post it here too. Easily one of the most interesting Top 8's I have seen in a while especially for an S tier event.

View attachment 214736

Tsu tri-maining Lucario, Joker, and Mii Sword?
Oh yeah, keeping an eye out for this wild card.

Of course, Raito's a fan favorite as well.

 

[KirbySquad101]

Damn, poor Tea got double eliminated in the Top 8 Winners Can't help but feel bad for the guy, especially seeing how this happened in Prime Saga as well; hoping he wins his first major soon, his Pac-Man is godly.

That said, where in the world was this Raito the whole time? I know he's participated in Ultimate before, but he's been really killing it as of recently.

 

[Anomika]

Cosmos 3-2 over Tsu. Let's see how far he can push his Inkling

 

[NotLiquid]

Inkling had another pretty good run this tournament, which follows a video Armada put out the other day about why you don't see her as much as you'd expect, despite always ranking as a top tier among top players.

There's not that much to disagree with I think. Outside of the well documented "well she sometimes struggles to kill" issue, much of the more evident problems come down to player mentality above all else. Inkling was unfairly overhyped early on in the game, which not only caused a degree of gameplay backlash once players started picking her up and realizing that she's not "the next Bayonetta" or whatever (kept warning y'all about this since day one), but also created a stigma against her - especially among the wi-fi warriors - making most people reticent to picking her up out of fear that she'd be nerfed. There's a lot of truth to that last statement even to this day, going into 3.0.0 there were still people who were expecting - or hoping - that Inkling was gonna get slammed by the nerf hammer, which creeps up on a lot of players who are worried that the hard work they put into their character is gonna get flushed down the toilet (Cosmos was even worried about this himself at one point and was practicing a pocket leading up to 2.0).

Another more understated issue is that the character is new. This is often neglected but a lot of Smash players are character loyalists, or people who settle into a very comfortable groove with certain characters between games. Most of the characters that are doing good right now in Ultimate are characters that also did good in the previous games; Wolf, Snake, Wario (Brawl), Peach, Fox, Olimar, etc. Players like Samsora, Marss, MVD, Dabuz, and Light have gotten varying degrees of good results just sticking to their tried and true mains. It's a trend that was kind of present in Smash 4 as well; if you exclude the DLC which were just too good to ignore, the top 20 of that game are mostly veterans from previous Smash games. Rosalina was the only exception, and it's safe to say she was one of the more unpopular picks at a top level (same applies for Villager if you're counting early tier lists). The end result is you'll get a lot of people not wanting to pick another top tier character because they'll end up being forced to relearn 70+ matchups when certain characters out there still perform fairly similarly or at least markedly better from the previous title, making players more willing in wanting to transition with their past mains.

Given that we're two major patches in and there's no sign that she's going to change that much, maybe people will be more inclined to try her out. We're already seeing Mr.R perform with her every once in a while, and not too shabbily either.

 

[SapphSabre777]

Umebara ended, but boy there was a lot of impressions to be had tonight/today:

Mega Man's nerfs over the past two patches haven't really seemed to dent his potential and results at all. While most notably a Mega Man in Kameme (3-0'd Raito in WFs) won it all, a solo main in Repo also placed in the Top 32. The Blue Bomber had a hay-day today, for sure, and nerfs don't seem to be stopping him any time soon. Coverage for MUs aside, the fact that he can still pull his weight enough to win a major is definitely enough.

Definitely a huge winner in Umebara, thanks to ProtoBanham's stellar performance in Top 8 (beat Ri-ma, Tea, Cosmos, and Raito) to reach Grands. Him along with Eitsugi really displayed how good the combination of range, power, and chasing ability is together, and should hopefully dispel any doubters that she is, in fact, a solid top tier.

A lot of other characters had very respectable performances as well, placed well thanks to Cosmos once more, and ProtoBanham had a secondary Inkling as well, proving their worth in either spot. Some characters not talked about too much in the West shone in here as well, (Kirihara) and (AIR) breaking Top 16, multiple s in Ri-ma and Sigma with the only s found eliminated earlier, superheavies in (HIKARU) and (Zaki) placing well overall, and Tsu's huge line-up of characters in /, and the return of his trademark which managed to eliminate Abadango and helped beat zackray.

Perhaps something baffling to look at is this: no to be found all the way up to Top 32 (possibly beyond). Perhaps it is the way Japan's passive-aggressive neutral smacks Snake around, or something else, but to see no Snake place high at a big major of this caliber is strange to see.

 

[Rizen]

Despite being a popular choice none broke top 32, further making me doubt the character's top tier.

 

[Anomika]

Quite a rich variety of fighters in Top 32, though some of them were placed lower than I expected, some top tiers aren't even in Top 32, like (what Rizen already said), and .

 

[The_Bookworm]

Umebara ended, but boy there was a lot of impressions to be had tonight/today:

Mega Man's nerfs over the past two patches haven't really seemed to dent his potential and results at all. While most notably a Mega Man in Kameme (3-0'd Raito in WFs) won it all, a solo main in Repo also placed in the Top 32. The Blue Bomber had a hay-day today, for sure, and nerfs don't seem to be stopping him any time soon. Coverage for MUs aside, the fact that he can still pull his weight enough to win a major is definitely enough.

Definitely a huge winner in Umebara, thanks to ProtoBanham's stellar performance in Top 8 (beat Ri-ma, Tea, Cosmos, and Raito) to reach Grands. Him along with Eitsugi really displayed how good the combination of range, power, and chasing ability is together, and should hopefully dispel any doubters that she is, in fact, a solid top tier.

A lot of other characters had very respectable performances as well, placed well thanks to Cosmos once more, and ProtoBanham had a secondary Inkling as well, proving their worth in either spot. Some characters not talked about too much in the West shone in here as well, (Kirihara) and (AIR) breaking Top 16, multiple s in Ri-ma and Sigma with the only s found eliminated earlier, superheavies in (HIKARU) and (Zaki) placing well overall, and Tsu's huge line-up of characters in /, and the return of his trademark which managed to eliminate Abadango and helped beat zackray.

Perhaps something baffling to look at is this: no to be found all the way up to Top 32 (possibly beyond). Perhaps it is the way Japan's passive-aggressive neutral smacks Snake around, or something else, but to see no Snake place high at a big major of this caliber is strange to see.

The lack of Snake players in top 32 is probably due to the fact that there isn't really much talent with Snake in Japan. There is players like Shogun, but he is no Ally or MVD.

Reminds me about Brawl, where Pikachu was ranked low in Japan tier lists (22nd-ish, maybe around that area, but I forgot), because there was a lack of Pikachu players placing well with him that warranted the 8-9th placements USA and Europe gave him.

 

[IsmaR]

Wario and Sheik were also used by Kameme, albeit to much less extent than the trademark Mega Man.

Wario in particular was also used by Zackray and Abadango (I only saw him doing exhibition/friendlies with MK Leo after both were eliminated, not sure who Aba used in earlier matches aside from MK/Palutena/Inkling).

Lastly there was an abundance of ZSS players compared to other regions, the highest placing one being Choco falling just short of top 8.

 

[SwagGuy99]

he still has the worst mobility of the heavies

I'm pretty sure takes the title of being the slowest.

Not that is fast, but he's not the slowest. Most of his good attacks have 10 or less frames of startup (with the exception of f-air, specials, and smash attacks) and while some of them do have some endlag, it's not the worst in the game by any means.

multiple s in Ri-ma and Sigma

Nice to see Toon Link get a bit of representation. I feel like he's being pretty underrated right now, because Young Link overshadows him in some ways.

People also seem to forget that Toon Link is the fastest Link and in a game where speed matters, that's never really a bad thing.

 

[link2702]

Is it bad I actually think Olimar is fun? .

I was a ganon main in four, and used him and link heavily in brawl despite mk being hell in that game to play against. In both games ganon was lousy, and link wasn’t too much better.

Even now, ganondorf still isn’t that great(better than 4 and brawl of course) despite what some people keep claiming, he still suffers from his old problems (projectile users/campy playstyles, rushdowns, a terrible recovery that even if he lands it on someone offstage they can wall tech it and get a free punish on him guaranteeing he won’t recover, etc).

I still stick with him. What I’m trying to say is...piss on the haters, use the character you find fun to play.

 

[G. Stache]

I think what keeps DK out of being the best heavyweight in the game to me personally is that fact that his disadvantage state is legitimately awful and might have been the worst in the game had Little Mac never existed. Say what you want about other heavies and their disadvantage state. At least Bowser has a frame 5 option out of shield whenever he’s pressured into his shield and has stall and falls + a forward poke in fair + a much faster fall speed when in a juggle situation. At least DDD and Zard have multiple jumps to escape juggles (and Zard also has extremely good OoS options with up b and up smash if I’m not wrong and he has the option of down b to switch into a much smaller hurtbox while in a juggle situation). I don’t know incineroar as well as other characters, but I’d imagine that he can get some usage out of his aerials and down b to get out of juggles better than DK and I’d imagine that he has better OoS options than DK does when getting pressured. The only other heavy that might have a worse disadvantage state than DK is Ganon, and even then that’s not really an accomplishment. I don’t use DK as much as I used to so I want to open the floor up to people who know more about this character: does DK have any answer to juggling, ledge trapping, shield pressure, etc. that I’m missing? I didn’t even get into recoveries, and most of the other characters I listed I’d say have a better recovery than DK. Is DK’s disadvantage as bad as I think it is? And if so, how can he be the best heavyweight when his disadvantage is that bad? Right now I would put DDD and Bowser over DK as the better heavies. Both have generally more options while in disadvantage (not to say that these two have GOOD disadvantage states, just noticeably better than DK’s) while also getting similar reward for winniing neutral and having competent neutral games. Again, I don’t want to seem like a DK hater, but what does he have that other heavies don’t?

 

[Rizen]

I think what keeps DK out of being the best heavyweight in the game to me personally is that fact that his disadvantage state is legitimately awful and might have been the worst in the game had Little Mac never existed. Say what you want about other heavies and their disadvantage state. At least Bowser has a frame 5 option out of shield whenever he’s pressured into his shield and has stall and falls + a forward poke in fair + a much faster fall speed when in a juggle situation. At least DDD and Zard have multiple jumps to escape juggles (and Zard also has extremely good OoS options with up b and up smash if I’m not wrong and he has the option of down b to switch into a much smaller hurtbox while in a juggle situation). I don’t know incineroar as well as other characters, but I’d imagine that he can get some usage out of his aerials and down b to get out of juggles better than DK and I’d imagine that he has better OoS options than DK does when getting pressured. The only other heavy that might have a worse disadvantage state than DK is Ganon, and even then that’s not really an accomplishment. I don’t use DK as much as I used to so I want to open the floor up to people who know more about this character: does DK have any answer to juggling, ledge trapping, shield pressure, etc. that I’m missing? I didn’t even get into recoveries, and most of the other characters I listed I’d say have a better recovery than DK. Is DK’s disadvantage as bad as I think it is? And if so, how can he be the best heavyweight when his disadvantage is that bad? Right now I would put DDD and Bowser over DK as the better heavies. Both have generally more options while in disadvantage (not to say that these two have GOOD disadvantage states, just noticeably better than DK’s) while also getting similar reward for winniing neutral and having competent neutral games. Again, I don’t want to seem like a DK hater, but what does he have that other heavies don’t?

DK has high air speed, which is something several super heavies lack, and if he's got a giant punch charged up he can turn disadvantage into a KO situation. With that said his disadvantage is very bad.

 

[Frihetsanka]

Despite being a popular choice none broke top 32, further making me doubt the character's top tier.

Maybe he isn't top tier, but in that case, which characters does he lose to? Nicko believes Shulk loses no MUs, and I haven't seen many other MU charts put Shulk as one of their winning MUs. In order to not be top tier he'd have to either have one really bad MU or several slightly bad MUs.

 

[Rizen]

Maybe he isn't top tier, but in that case, which characters does he lose to? Nicko believes Shulk loses no MUs, and I haven't seen many other MU charts put Shulk as one of their winning MUs. In order to not be top tier he'd have to either have one really bad MU or several slightly bad MUs.

IDK, I'm not a Shulk player but the burden of proof isn't mine. If Shulk is top tier he should be doing much more than he currently is.

Just because Esam or Nicko are really good with a character doesn't mean they can accurately place that character on a tier list or even rate their MUs. If we ignored results and believed Esam Pikachu would be the #1 character in almost every smash game. This is the same thing: opinion vs evidence.

 

[DelugeFGC]

DK does have a pretty piss disadvantage, but that's about where his superheavy roots stop showing. He's actually good in the air, and not in the Ganon sense, his aerials are actually viable and can combo / edge guard very well. His aerials can also be used to pretty decent effect in neutral, and retreating FAir can be surprisingly effective during aggressive juggles (this can end up bouncing them off the stage, back up into the air above you.. and then making them eat an UAir depending on %).. as can double jumping into a Down B landing mixup if they're getting super aggressive and try to ladder you. These aren't fabulous options and may not always work, but they're options none-the-less.

Once you move away from his abysmal advantage state, DK is mostly nothing but upsides for a superheavy. He isn't tied down by a lot of the problems most heavies are, outside of a poor recovery which even then isn't THAT horrible. I'd say once the meta settles, the toss up for the best heavy is gonna come down to DK and Bowser depending on how nerfs/buffs went down on the way.

DK has a lot going for him in general, like how it's basically never safe to shield around DK due to how quickly he can decimate your shield with things such as Side B and due to the fact his grab is particularly dangerous when compared to most other characters. He's not terrible OoS which also defies the superheavy traditions, and in general his advantage state can be pretty terrifying if the DK player executes. The MU's he does well in can also REALLY see him do some disgusting stuff in advantage. DK can pound on other heavies all day, in particular.

 

[Frihetsanka]

If Shulk is top tier he should be doing much more than he currently is.

Not necessarily. Shulk is hard to play and thus not very appealing, he might very well be top tier but people would rather play easier characters in order to win. Let's say Shulk is #10 and Wolf is #4, why play Shulk over Wolf if you want to win? So only character specialists stick with Shulk, but that doesn't mean he isn't top tier.

Also, the game is still new, and Shulk has a lot of depth. It might take some time before people have figured him out.

 

[Anomika]

The game is less than one year old, and people are still discovering new tricks. With "improved" game mechanics, maybe people will discover new stuff that may bring Shulk even more fearsome potential. Even if not, Dial Storage brings new combos and KO confirms (and maybe even mindgames?) not possible without it. So, unless it gets patched out, I'm sure we'll see better results from Shulk over time. He's also very difficult to master, arguably more than other top tiers.

Then again, I may overestimate him.