Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Heracr055]

When multiple posts about Snake counters comes up and Mega Man doesn't warrant a mention smh

 

[DelugeFGC]

I don't know MM enough to talk about him, lest I would.

 

[PURGE THEM LIKE THE]

One weakness snake has in neutral is having 3 aerials ranging from awful to mediocre in nair, fair, and up air. Nair's awful frame data combined with its lack of range limits its usefulness to only being a followup. Up air is in a similar situation but with even less horizontal range, limiting its usefulness even for juggling. Fair...is there ever a point in using this move? These 3 moves being awful in neutral leaves the air wide open. I want to more people dancing around that area 45 degrees above and in front of snake because unless timing up tilt appropriately is easier than I thought, I don't see what he has that will stop anyone from jumping in front of him.

 

[Kiligar]

Tone down Dash Attack (take away the intang-frames on the front and make it like F7-8) and make UTilt have a bit more startup/endlag.. and Snake is pretty damned balanced imo. If all it takes are two minor changes to 'fix' a character, they're not THAT broken to begin with..

I didn’t say that Snake himself is way broken and needs to be nerfed to oblivion, it’s simply a few tools which have too low risk and too high reward. I agree with those changes, and I’d add 5 more frames of end lag to Nikita. Snake has amazing recovery in terms of height so he definitely can get out there and edgegaurd. Ally pulled it off multiple times in the past but now I see a lot more of him sitting on stage and letting Nikita do the dirty work. I believe it wouldn’t only make recovering a little more tolerable for many characters, but also encourage Snake to actually get out there and make plays that have just risk/reward ratios. The Nikita end lag in tandem with DelugeTN’s nerfs are all that would be needed to balance Snake. He’s not so broken that defeating him is near impossible, but still a little overtuned, and these changes would encourage Snake players to adapt their play rather than using a flow-chart that is more effective than it should be for its repetitive nature.

As for the rest of the meta, given the last patch had a universal change I think the next thing to address is recovery. How many top tier characters have a short recovery? 0. Some may have exploitable ones like Fox and Snake, but recovery height is so essential to success in this game that the lowest recoveries should be buffed, not to the point where everyone has amazing recovery, but to the point where all characters can recover from being knocked a fairly far distance offstage without being interfered with. Several characters cannot fit this requirement and thus have to be adjusted. My universal buff to recovery would be a simple equivalent of 1 training room cubit of extra height. Some characters would receive two extra cubits due to unique situations.

+1:
+2:

Feel free to discuss this idea, Marth and Lucas are buffed to avoid being overshadowed by their counterparts. My second idea for recovery is that all recoveries without a hitbox don’t put the user in free fall. Recoveries without hitboxes face heavy competition from teleports, and I feel that if you fail to edgegaurd a recovery lacking a hitbox they should have an easier time getting back. It also already exists to an extent with Olimar, Snake, and Game&Watch. Not to mention Sonic and Mega Man. Why should the hitbox lacking recoveries of Duck Hunt, Rosalina, Wii Fit Trainer, Isabelle/Villager, Mii Gunner and Pit be left out? I feel this would better balance the competition between teleports and no hitbox recoveries.

 

[Repli.Cant]

One weakness snake has in neutral is having 3 aerials ranging from awful to mediocre in nair, fair, and up air. Nair's awful frame data combined with its lack of range limits its usefulness to only being a followup. Up air is in a similar situation but with even less horizontal range, limiting its usefulness even for juggling. Fair...is there ever a point in using this move? These 3 moves being awful in neutral leaves the air wide open. I want to more people dancing around that area 45 degrees above and in front of snake because unless timing up tilt appropriately is easier than I thought, I don't see what he has that will stop anyone from jumping in front of him.

I believe there's more to it than that. True, Snake's aerials leave a lot to be desired in terms of covering the space in the air in front of him, but there's also the fact that in order to get there, you have to first weave through his wall of nades and the C4. Very rarely will Snake not have something covering that space in front of him. If he's sitting behind a platform with a C4 on it, that route's closed. If he's on the platform holding a grenade, you have to find out how to safely get to that angle to poke him in the first place. You can't poke him from underneath the platform, since you'll probably hit the grenade, which hits below platforms. Finally, if you do manage to get in the position, it has to be during the endlag of something else, otherwise you're eating a f6 leg with great vertical reach that deals 14% and kills even heavyweights at decent percents.

I don't think Snake is OP, and he's definitely beatable, but he has a lot without sacrificing too much. But I feel like saying anymore will just be throwing my voice into the echo chamber. (But to satisfy myself, Nikita is still one of the dumbest moves in the game.)

 

[DelugeFGC]

I didn’t say that Snake himself is way broken and needs to be nerfed to oblivion, it’s simply a few tools which have too low risk and too high reward. I agree with those changes, and I’d add 5 more frames of end lag to Nikita. Snake has amazing recovery in terms of height so he definitely can get out there and edgegaurd. Ally pulled it off multiple times in the past but now I see a lot more of him sitting on stage and letting Nikita do the dirty work. I believe it wouldn’t only make recovering a little more tolerable for many characters, but also encourage Snake to actually get out there and make plays that have just risk/reward ratios. The Nikita end lag in tandem with DelugeTN’s nerfs are all that would be needed to balance Snake. He’s not so broken that defeating him is near impossible, but still a little overtuned, and these changes would encourage Snake players to adapt their play rather than using a flow-chart that is more effective than it should be for its repetitive nature.

As for the rest of the meta, given the last patch had a universal change I think the next thing to address is recovery. How many top tier characters have a short recovery? 0. Some may have exploitable ones like Fox and Snake, but recovery height is so essential to success in this game that the lowest recoveries should be buffed, not to the point where everyone has amazing recovery, but to the point where all characters can recover from being knocked a fairly far distance offstage without being interfered with. Several characters cannot fit this requirement and thus have to be adjusted. My universal buff to recovery would be a simple equivalent of 1 training room cubit of extra height. Some characters would receive two extra cubits due to unique situations.

+1:
+2:

Feel free to discuss this idea, Marth and Lucas are buffed to avoid being overshadowed by their counterparts. My second idea for recovery is that all recoveries without a hitbox don’t put the user in free fall. Recoveries without hitboxes face heavy competition from teleports, and I feel that if you fail to edgegaurd a recovery lacking a hitbox they should have an easier time getting back. It also already exists to an extent with Olimar, Snake, and Game&Watch. Not to mention Sonic and Mega Man. Why should the hitbox lacking recoveries of Duck Hunt, Rosalina, Wii Fit Trainer, Isabelle/Villager, Mii Gunner and Pit be left out? I feel this would better balance the competition between teleports and no hitbox recoveries.

I'll admit that as an Olimar player, I have not had huge issues with Nikita in the MU as Olimar has a very.. adaptable, recovery plan and a VERY good recovery overall on top of his utility that comes from Side B which makes them either shield, throw out an an attack (usually an aerial like NAir) or just have to eat % from the Pikmin clings. Otherwise you can bounce Pikmin off of their shield, catch them in your recovery then get right back up on the ledge. Point is, Olimar has a VERY good recovery, and as such I haven't had a massive struggle avoiding Nikita edgeguarding.. but now that I've started to play around more with Snake as one of my own secondaries.. you're not really wrong. It's WAY too hard to punish Side B from mid-range or further out if not outright impossible, and as an edge guarding tool you can just shoot the things out like no tomorrow with little commitment. It's like a roided out PK Thunder with far more general use, it's probably the most busted thing about him imo.

 

[DunnoBro]

I'll admit that as an Olimar player, I have not had huge issues with Nikita in the MU as Olimar has a very.. adaptable, recovery plan and a VERY good recovery overall on top of his utility that comes from Side B which makes them either shield, throw out an an attack (usually an aerial like NAir) or just have to eat % from the Pikmin clings. Otherwise you can bounce Pikmin off of their shield, catch them in your recovery then get right back up on the ledge. Point is, Olimar has a VERY good recovery, and as such I haven't had a massive struggle avoiding Nikita edgeguarding.. but now that I've started to play around more with Snake as one of my own secondaries.. you're not really wrong. It's WAY too hard to punish Side B from mid-range or further out if not outright impossible, and as an edge guarding tool you can just shoot the things out like no tomorrow with little commitment. It's like a roided out PK Thunder with far more general use, it's probably the most busted thing about him imo.

Comparing it to PK Thunder is very apt. Since they often turn it back inward to cover themselves.

There's also duck hunt's reverse can, but that takes a LOT of set-up and doesn't have nearly the same control or power.

(And both these characters have terrible recoveries to compensate them for not being able to safely go offstage for edgeguards.)

Also, idk if Olimar is really that great about playing around Nikita. Yea, going out and hitting him with it is hard. But no hitbox means Snake can hover it around for the 2-frame to force high recoveries he can punish. (MVD got at least 1 stock like this vs dabuz every game)

 

[DelugeFGC]

Comparing it to PK Thunder is very apt. Since they often turn it back inward to cover themselves.

There's also duck hunt's reverse can, but that takes a LOT of set-up and doesn't have nearly the same control or power.

(And both these characters have terrible recoveries to compensate them for not being able to safely go offstage for edgeguards.)

Also, idk if Olimar is really that great about playing around Nikita. Yea, going out and hitting him with it is hard. But no hitbox means Snake can hover it around for the 2-frame to force high recoveries he can punish. (MVD got at least 1 stock like this vs dabuz every game)

Oh it's still a potential issue, but Side B + Up B delays and Olimar's general floaty nature in the air all compound to make it much harder for Snake to land missiles than it is in other MU's.. which probably contributed to the reasoning as to why for a while I didn't see Nikita as this big issue. Now I kinda see it.

Also if Snake Nikita's, if the Side B doesn't hit the missile, it'll likely hit him which means he's taking % and will have to cancel the missile to do anything about it.. or just eat more %. Otherwise the only options he has are shield or throw out an aerial, both of which prevent Nikita. The main thing is it's not always the best idea to use Nikita when Olimar is offstage, as he can make you pay dearly for it in some instances. Sure he has the option to try to 2-frame with it as you said, but that's not nearly as viable as just using it as normal.

Like if you're even SLIGHTLY off with the arc / whiff, or if he's too far out / at a wonky angle.. then you're likely to have problems from Side B if you don't do something defensive like shield or throw out a dead aerial.. and if Olimar has a purple and/or white in the lineup, the problems that can stem from Side B get larger. A purple can knock Snake back, and if Olimar can cover the distance / execute this can potentially put Snake into disadvantage.. albeit likely briefly. A white can cause him to eat a fair amount of % if he commits to the Nikita.. otherwise it'll make him panic, cancel the missile and save you. Worst case scenario, you at least damage Snake some before dying.. though most of the time Side B can just hit the missile. Having a purple pikmin in your lineup is always important, but the Snake MU has it become especially important for these reasons.

 

[Shaya]

Hmmm.


1. Snake has been doing VERY well since day 1. I'm pretty sure the general tournaments numbers always had him as the 2nd most represented character, yet he wasn't taking big results "yet".
Why has it taken this long for people to start clamoring on about him?

2. The very wide-spread and generally valid mantra of "he started out borked in brawl and ended up not being seen that way + newgens need to learn the match up".
Depending on your perspective one could call it propaganda. But again, it's a true statement to make.
This notion did succeed in persuading people to "hold out" on raising pitchforks over Snake. Of course the moment that some top level anecdotes match people's opinions, they go into full throttle BELIEF ITS ACCEPTABLE TO JOHN mode. This dynamic is seen time and time again "I knew they were broken" etc etc. Feel free to toot your own horn on this, but maybe back it up with proof of your earlier analysis, kay?

3. Comparing Snake to Bayo in terms of "if balance changes should happen"/etc isn't very helpful.
We're not talking about Snake as if he's suspect of being banned, whilst in S4 our situation was one of
"Bayo is fine, learn to SDI.", "Maybe Nintendo will save us." or "we should['ve] ban[ned] this character before the game dies".
I doubt we'll get to that dynamic. If you're going to compare, make sure you really are understanding the difference in paradigm.

4. Snake probably will not avoid being hit. Patch cycle for Smash4 and thus far in Ult, indicates they're 3+ months behind the meta.
They stealth nerfed ZSS's Flip Jump in the last patch and it echoes the dev team disliking the very common dynamic seen early on by Choco in Japan. A neutral predominantly using full hop and flip jump to reset close to the ground - Japanese players complained about ZSS and she was seen as potentially top 3 in late December/January, but this was not seen reinforced at any point of late Jan, Feb or March.

5. IMO - but I think it approaches objectivity to some extent - Snake's disadvantage is radically stronger than in Brawl. Sure, Snake literally didn't die in Brawl, but Snake literally couldn't land in Brawl either. There are very strong, tournament anecdotal and fair-observational reasons Snake's disadvantage is radically better - you can reinforce your belief in Point-2, it's reasonable to believe people will get better at it, but I don't think there's any way you can genuinely say it's worse, at the least.

6. The game designers want single options to be powerful/strong, thus (I believe what they want) is to invoke more cerebral-to-fight (step by step by step to overcome in neutral) characters being towards the top, like Snake. They've done this by hurting the potency of reactive game play, and by having options that require extremely precise-moment 50/50 or RPS guesses to capitalize on.

I believe Bayonetta in S4 was also a reflection of these intentions, but as I've said before, they royally ****ed up by allowing her an always-available option feasibly result in a stock loss at any % (Witch Time). For whatever reason, the skill which Smash players have prided most: whiff punishing ("reactively") is something they don't want; through very potent retracting animations, sometimes higher start ups but less cool downs, you generally cannot - bizarre, but what can you do?

7. Hurting reaction in the multitude of ways they did (input delay + HALVED shield hit lag !!!!!!!, etc) goes against people being able to keep at the necessary pace to allow those RPS guesses - THUS FAR.
Take Snake's 5f dash attack that is -26 on block - this would be laughable as something "difficult" to punish in any past smash game - BUT IT IS. The animation for it helps the most, giving it a supreme amount of faux-range by after his crossing over his most vulnerable hurtboxes (his legs) retract significantly in cool down.
The animation is busted.

We've also lost 3-4 more frames of being able to react to it due to the shield hit lag changes. Assuming a non-anticipated reaction, by the time you react to Snake having dash attacked your shield he's already towards -15 frame disadvanage - then it's 11 frames to drop shield - then if you weren't facing backward you have to deal with a 4ish frame turn around animation (or instant dash attack/turn around attacks, but most chars don't have the range or speed).

In previous smash games, similar thing would be giving you 3-4 frames more to react, but you can't look at this linearly as if it's "10% less reactable", but rather how it would impact the bell-curve distribution: 3-4 frames could be the difference between 10% of the competitive player base reacting reliably and 50-80%.

They don't want us to be able to beat things like this on reaction/through passive play like you would've been taught to in previous games.

This is the depth-hole / mode of skill / intended difficulty-curve of the game. It rings true to Brawl in a lot of ways, except reacting was a lot stronger (thus favouring MK and Marth; spacies were kinda in that group too). On the other side of things though, the necessary "skill" to succeed in those RPS guesses was something which most players/characters couldn't (or didn't want to) achieve.
Chain grabs, Meta Knight and all other sorts of "spam"-tier things carried a lot of players on their shoulders (for me it was f1 invincible dolphin slash, fyi) during the extended period of time people weren't gud enough to otherwise handle the neutral-bork of Falco, Snake and not too long after Diddy, Olimar, etc.
There's less of this, I guess, or alternatively, so much more of it across the cast which is drawing all the focus. True privilege is relatively uncommon though, I'd say.


8. In theory, the endgame of something like Brawl being caused by Snake/Oli seems unlikely. A character getting more out of their stuff and thus accentuating tier differences is inherent to the imbalance of any game (or thing). Characters which freely get away with certain actions are fine - it becomes an issue when a single option results in such a skewed risk/reward that has no real mitigation.

9. I don't think the game is at a perfect point of balance with their intentions - shield hit lag being reduced seems to make literally EVERYONE less happy (they/you just don't know this is the reason for it - yet, they still think it's the 1f worse input latency, GORL, we be losing 5+ frames not just 1).
I'd say the feature should be on a move by move basis: "risky" and "fake" things like Jab mix ups can afford to be difficult to react to (well, they nerfed Zero Suit's jab end lag between games by 2f to match the shield hit lag lost, thanks, assholes, it's probably quite similar with a lot of characters but I'd prefer having my 2 frames of end lag removed and just give me more shield hit lag instead, assholes).

It seems feasible they'll still be introducing tweaks in every patch - the widespread projectile change and tweak to parries indicates this. I also dislike that parry activation is on a completely different system rather than just a "frames 1-5 of your shield drop" (it seems to be more like frames 1-5 of you releasing your shield trigger); I'm not entirely sure, but this could be why parrying on wifi seems so stupidly hard. Changing this would mean "reactively" parrying that chrom or roy tilt after a landing aerial wouldn't be that difficult at all. Perhaps the way it is now is fine though. But I think those opportunities for the interactive RPS situations people (including me) yearn for would be more easily obtained if parrying wasn't THAT particular.

-

Either way, our whiff punishing super-reaction-bros Valhalla days are likely over (press [F] for respects). Players labbing intently to find means of implementing near riskless situations that result in consistent massive reward is likely to "finally" not be the most-dominant strategem at higher levels of play. They know they messed up with Bayonetta, but they/Sakurai want risk to be inherent in forcing a neutral win on a match-up and player basis.

It's not like those old-guard staples are unviable, quite the opposite - they've still been dominating and causing people to ***** internally/privately, and then the moment Leo or Tweek won something, externally, all this time already. Sheik might even be back already, and it just took one [crucial] buff on her forward air to really get her going again (she got more than this, of course).

Before continuing, if you looked at "riskless ... consistent massive reward" and wanted to retort Snake grenades or Oli's smashes -
What, other than a yearning for punishes to come "reliably" (I fail this hook like and sinker a lot) and a predisposition to match-up specific aggressive commitments (just because you can landing aerial with Lucina in most match ups easily doesn't mean it it must be universal) is actually forcing you to get hit by these things? And if you falter are you really losing the game for it?

Falling back on the point of Snake's dash attack though - shielding backwards gives your character up to 4 more frames to deal with the crossover if you needed to run punish; trying to bait it and committing to a jump (or similar 'riskyish' choices) at the right time will likely have to be learned... for a lot of match ups.
Or you pick the character who themselves have a simple option that can handle it - Olimar nor Snake seem to be fans of their 'easy zoning' being shut down by the likes of Pacman (it seems).


I had a lot longer rant after this, but I think this'll do, it might struggle to be coherent anyway.

 

[DelugeFGC]

Am I the only one who likes mental Smash? Sometimes I feel like I might be. I understand why nobody (including me) was a huge fan of Brawl and Sm4sh, but Ult is a far cry from that.. and it's still plenty competitive as the game itself continues to prove with the scene it has. This very forum, even. I understand it's not what made Smash big.. it's not 100% Melee.. none of that. But is it really so bad? I don't know, I personally like an involved neutral, it's only a problem for me when neutral is the ENTIRE game which is the problem the games between Melee and Ult had. Ult, despite what some may say, is NOT like that.

Ult is my favorite Smash game, and while it isn't perfect.. I don't know man. I dig it. That's all I'm saying, it may not be everyone's cup of tea.. but this 'cerebral-to-fight' style of fighting is very appealing to me. I like to win matches by knowing I not just outplayed someone, but outsmarted them. Out-thunk them. However you wanna call it, THAT is what makes a win most satisfying to me personally. Not everything has to be 100% safe to be fun, I don't know man, take some risks.

All that said, there's still plenty of button mashing and reacting to be done in Ult.. so the medium the game finds itself in is a pretty good one, in my opinion. It feels like real effort is being made this time. Granted the online is piss and plenty of other things suck too.. and balance isn't 100% perfect, no.. but this still is my favorite Smash. I'm grateful for Ultimate, that's all I'm saying.


TL:DR: Galaxy Brain Plays > Everything Else. For me personally, at least.

 

[NairWizard]

Snake breaks the rules of the game.

You always hear the word "fundamentals" in these threads. "X player has great fundamentals." "Marth is a fundamentals-heavy character." But what are fundamentals, exactly?

One adage that you may have seen from pre-2009 Azen is "Don't get hit." This is a fundamental of smash: every character bases decisions on this principle (and some characters even devote playstyles to it, such as Marss with ZSS). Because smash has so much room per stage and movement options compared to 2D fighters, you can minimize risk in neutral situations by avoiding hits altogether. Trapping and zoning characters definitely abide by this rule, but even heavies do--because otherwise they get juggled and take dozens of percent.

But not Snake. Snake doesn't mind getting hit, as long as there's a grenade nearby. Snake's gameplan is: let's both get hit, and both of us will take 12%, but oh, I'll die much later than you will, so hah, I guess that "trade" was in my favor, huh? Oh wait, you're heavy? Too bad, you just took 50% because I pulled a frame-1 grenade based on your ever-so-slight mistiming and then popped you up into d-air.

Since Snake doesn't mind getting hit, the onus of spacing well is on the non-Snake player: hit Snake without popping the grenade, or suffer. If the space around Snake were a pie with 7 slices, 5/7 would belong to the Snake, and 2/7 would belong to the opponent.

This is entirely unique to Snake; every other character benefits more from not getting hit than Snake--even Lucario doesn't really want to be taking unnecessary damage, despite getting rewarded for it. Snake himself doesn't want to get juggled for thousands of percent, of course, but the reality is that he doesn't, and that's why his gameplan works.

Another fundamental of smash is: push your advantage, but don't overcommit. When you overcommit, you allow for a reversal; that's the risk of pushing advantage too hard. You want to trap your opponent in disadvantage, but not go so far into setting up your trap that you're the one on the ledge/in the air with your opponent on stage/below you.

Snake doesn't care about this. When Snake is in advantage, he uses up-smash or Nikita and completely safely pushes advantage state. Snake is the only character in the game who can edgeguard other characters without any risk, without going offstage at all. And he doesn't need to jump to catch your landing/airdodge.

It goes on this way for so many Snake attributes. Snake's playing a radically different game, and it'll be a while before people catch on--but even if they do, Snake will still be top 5-10, because being able to rewrite the rules is just too good.

 

[Rocketjay8]

I thought general consensus after that was that Roy was better now that they took away one of Chrom's most effect tools? I don't know, with Lucina taking up so much attention, Roy and Chrom don't seem to be hot topics for discussion.

That wasn't even the reason why Chrom was considered to be high tier. He has so many other busted potions (Fsmash, Ftilt, jab combos, balanced sword with Roy's speed, really good ledge trapping). But naw he sucks now because muh Crombo is gone.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

To everyone talking about snake's disadvantage state, remember who made it hard for him to come down. Metaknight.

Metaknight had a frame 2 Uair with insane endlag, so in a short hop he could throw 3 out. He also had an assortment of tools for catching air dodges (tornado, shuttle loop, nair. Fair, bair), and landings (dash attack dash grab. Tornado, shuttle loop, uair, etc)


We remember snake to have a bad disadvantage in brawl because of metaknight. That metaknight isn't here (he meditated on a mountain and came back transformed). We don't have anyone with the exceptional juggling game metaknight had. So, snake's disadvantage has improved.

Also, talking about balance and patches, patches makes finding solutions less necessary. Why look when the devs are doing the hard work for you? Why dig and shift through the game and explore it to better your character? You have no idea if your character gets changed. you might even get your character nerfed with exposure and backlash. Nintendo is a unpredictable entity, as are all companies and people that you don't know.

Oh, and that means patches run the risk of eliminating depth. Not because of the game, but the lack of incentive. You won't be finding people like aMSa from melee, Kuroda from 3S, Isai/jouseke from 64, or so on. They're the people that you want to see, as they display master understanding of facets of the game (aMSa, Pepedai from USF4 (his RSFs are craaaazy) and Tea who plays pac-man from smash 4), or the game itself (isai, kuroda, and bas).

At some point, being content with what you have has to come. Perfect balance is impossible without eliminating massive swabs of variety and diversity.

that playstyle triamgular spectrum thing looks a bit confused. What is bait&punish? What is footsies and aren't every swordsman in there? I'd try to divide it by effective range like close, mid, long. Cuts all that out.

EDIT: typing on the phone is the most unpleasant experience ever. Eve everbevvwevevevenever.

 

[KakuCP9]

I told a buddy of mine that I didn't know what game Snake was playing, but it sure as hell wasn't Smash and I glad I'm not alone on this notion. SoildSense covered everything I would want say about the character with how grenades pervert and warp the flow of neutral (and to a lesser extent disadvantage) and how the sheer fact he breaks the rules to such a degree can't make anything less than a top tier character (not mention the dastard still has a strong frame 7 OOS option that does disturbing amounts of damage because the dev team didn't think of changing his dair from Brawl).
The only I wonder is what's more infuriating, his explosive BS or the fact that he has really good CQC on top of it all.

 

[DunnoBro]

Snake doesn't care about this. When Snake is in advantage, he uses up-smash or Nikita and completely safely pushes advantage state. Snake is the only character in the game who can edgeguard other characters without any risk, without going offstage at all. And he doesn't need to jump to catch your landing/airdodge.
.

Mostly agree with the post, but this isn't quite true. Plenty of characters edgeguard with projectiles. (Turnips, Fireballs, Trick Shot, Pk Thunder)

But these lack the versatility to cover every option, and often carry less reward/more risk, thus demanding the character mix things up.

Snake literally never has to mix it up. The most of a mixup he'll do is just go harder on the ledge trap.

 

[DelugeFGC]

I don't have too big of a problem with the grenade, all said, it does make his disadvantage virtually non-existent but I do feel if he got the nerfs discussed (slowing DA to like F7-8 and removing the intang-frames on his arms, making UTilt have either / both more startup OR endlag and adding more endlag to Nikita.) he'd be a pretty balanced character overall.

I'm no expert of balance or the finer nuances of how a FG meta progresses.. before anything else I'm just a player and not a theorycrafter / scientist, but I feel it would be hard to properly nerf the grenades without either A. not having any real effect on their BS or B. mitigating their usefulness almost entirely and making them basically worthless. So I think the nerfs covered above would be best.. but the likelihood of getting those exact nerfs is not fantastic imo, at least not right now.

Snake doesn't care about this. When Snake is in advantage, he uses up-smash or Nikita and completely safely pushes advantage state. Snake is the only character in the game who can edgeguard other characters without any risk, without going offstage at all. And he doesn't need to jump to catch your landing/airdodge.

This isn't true at all.. Ness / Lucas PK Thunder is an extremely / completely safe edge-guarding tool that requires no risky commitment period from them. Simon and Richter also would like to say hello, as would Adult Link and a few other characters..

 

[SwagGuy99]

Am I the only one who likes mental Smash?


TL:DR: Galaxy Brain Plays > Everything Else. For me personally, at least.

players probably do. Literally everything they do is meant to set up into something else. Watching players is actually really fun.

 

[Untouch]

Snake has the same problems that release Smash 4 Rosalina had.
They're characters designed around spacing, but have tools to punish players who get up close.
I don't think Snake is even NEARLY as bad as Rosalina (I'm still of the opinion that if Smash 4 didn't have patches, Rosa would have been banned) but it is a problem.
I don't think removing the way grenades work would be a good way to deal with the problem, maybe just make them do considerably more damage to snake or something?

 

[DelugeFGC]

Is there even a viable way to make the SAME hitbox damage one character x amount, and then the other character, y amount..? Two separate percentages values out of the SAME attack, basically?

The only way I can see that would realistically help is to increase their knockback, but then that could turn them into a DIFFERENT sort of problem. We don't need the Frame 1 Neutral B turning into a viable kill option on its own. Either that or they have enough knockback to at least be a problem, ala knocking you far offstage or up into the air for a super easy juggle even at lower %'s. So I don't see this helping either, honestly.

I'll say it again, I really don't think there's much you can do to fix the grenade issue without either totaling ruining all utility it possibly could have, or by redirecting the problems elsewhere / not putting a dent in the real issue.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

To everyone talking about snake's disadvantage state, remember who made it hard for him to come down. Metaknight.

Hmm, maybe I'm misremembering, (and Shaya I'd be happy for you to chime in here) but I remember multiple characters becoming an issue for Snake in the air over Brawl's lifetime. Marth, ZSS, Olimar, Pikachu, etc., could all stop him from landing for days.

 

[Kiligar]

Since we’re talking about Snake, I’d like to speak about Olimar as well. Increase the end lag of Pikmin pull and call it a day. This character relies so heavily on Pikmin to pull off all these shenanigans so increasing the end lag would make each Pikmin of more value. It would make it more possible to pressure Olimar into disadvantage and Olimar players would have to combat this. Rushing down Olimar would become more viable of a strategy since the pressure could actually work. Less and more skilled Olimars would be more highly differentiated due to having to overcome this problem.

As for Inkling, which it might not be popular to say a nerf for now, but one is needed, and one only. Make roller more punishable on shield. As of now when Inklings want a kill, many don’t go for reads. They just randomize their movement and suddenly click side Special. And do it again. And again. And it hits a shield, and it’s safe. The reward of this move doesn’t counterbalance with risk. My main has great Oos yet still struggles to punish out of shield, pro DP players I’ve seen struggle as well.

 

[Diddy Kong]

I don't know MM enough to talk about him, lest I would.

There’s some characters that just seem doomed to be excluded from the public’s eye. Mega Man is one of them. Diddy is one, DK is one, Shulk is definitely one (everyone calls him Top Tier nobody plays him), Marth is one ironically, Falco does still exist as well despite being overshadowed, and there’s probably a few others.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

Since we’re talking about Snake, I’d like to speak about Olimar as well..

This is a great idea if you want to delete Olimar from the game.

Just decrease his damage output on his aerials a bit, and he'll be fine.

Ness is underrated. His strengths are so strong they more than compensate his weaknesses. Awestin just 3-0’d an Olimar main since brawl in GF.

I don't know if I think Ness is "underrated" as such (most players have him in tier 2 or 3 at worst, and I think the big issue is that Awestin's health issues prevent him from travelling), but I do think he is very very good. One of the big things you realize playing Ness (and watching Awestin) is that his recovery is much stronger than you'd think it is due to his very large second jump and incredible airdodge + magnet stalls. Ness can come in from almost any direction and he can even alter his trajectory to juke opponents' offstage commitments. I'm sure there are situations where he isn't super great off-stage, but for the most part he makes it back.

Once you realize that his biggest weakness isn't as big a deal in reality as it is on paper, you start to see how scary Ness actually is... most of the time.

I say most of the time because Ness seems to struggle against the projectile characters IMO. DJ Magnet helps him navigate projectile walls and get inside, but you've double jumped you're vulnerable to getting knocked offstage and being forced to up-b. That means approaching becomes a bigger risk at high %s.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Oilmar is a simple character to nerf. I would probably nerf him by decreasing range and priority of the Pikmin. It doesn’t make sense these little creatures are able to tank this much. Also Olimar could be around Pichu’s weight realistically seeing how tiny he is.

 

[Sean²]

This isn't true at all.. Ness / Lucas PK Thunder is an extremely / completely safe edge-guarding tool that requires no risky commitment period from them. Simon and Richter also would like to say hello, as would Adult Link and a few other characters..

Ness has to hit you with the tail of PK thunder for it to compare to Nikita in terms of edgeguarding, hitting them with the body pops them up and Ness has to act himself to continue the edgeguard. Lucas's is closer...but will be more of a gimp tool than something that causes a damaging explosion. The Belmonts don't have a remote-controlled hitbox that they can throw out from midstage, their projectiles are easily telegraphed, and again, usually involve them having to do something else to continue the edgeguard. Link can send his bomb at some goofy angles if he hits it right, but only has control of when it goes off, not throughout the entire duration of the attack. If he doesn't attack the bomb, he's limited to throwing up, down, to the side, or Z drop.

Honestly the closest thing to it is Duck Hunt's can.

Since we’re talking about Snake, I’d like to speak about Olimar as well. Increase the end lag of Pikmin pull and call it a day. This character relies so heavily on Pikmin to pull off all these shenanigans so increasing the end lag would make each Pikmin of more value. It would make it more possible to pressure Olimar into disadvantage and Olimar players would have to combat this. Rushing down Olimar would become more viable of a strategy since the pressure could actually work. Less and more skilled Olimars would be more highly differentiated due to having to overcome this problem.

As for Inkling, which it might not be popular to say a nerf for now, but one is needed, and one only. Make roller more punishable on shield. As of now when Inklings want a kill, many don’t go for reads. They just randomize their movement and suddenly click side Special. And do it again. And again. And it hits a shield, and it’s safe. The reward of this move doesn’t counterbalance with risk. My main has great Oos yet still struggles to punish out of shield, pro DP players I’ve seen struggle as well.

Adding endlag to anything is a horrible idea for any character. That's a much more drastic change than what it looks like on paper. Think of one of your main's BnB moves, then add 3 frames of endlag onto it. Wouldn't be very fun, would it? It can ruin the enjoyment of the characters for some folks. Something more reasonable would be to say, maybe "make up smash not combo into itself" or "decrease damage output slightly".

 

[Rizen]

Hmmm.


1. Snake has been doing VERY well since day 1. I'm pretty sure the general tournaments numbers always had him as the 2nd most represented character, yet he wasn't taking big results "yet".
Why has it taken this long for people to start clamoring on about him?

2. The very wide-spread and generally valid mantra of "he started out borked in brawl and ended up not being seen that way + newgens need to learn the match up".
Depending on your perspective one could call it propaganda. But again, it's a true statement to make.
This notion did succeed in persuading people to "hold out" on raising pitchforks over Snake. Of course the moment that some top level anecdotes match people's opinions, they go into full throttle BELIEF ITS ACCEPTABLE TO JOHN mode. This dynamic is seen time and time again "I knew they were broken" etc etc. Feel free to toot your own horn on this, but maybe back it up with proof of your earlier analysis, kay?

3. Comparing Snake to Bayo in terms of "if balance changes should happen"/etc isn't very helpful.
We're not talking about Snake as if he's suspect of being banned, whilst in S4 our situation was one of
"Bayo is fine, learn to SDI.", "Maybe Nintendo will save us." or "we should['ve] ban[ned] this character before the game dies".
I doubt we'll get to that dynamic. If you're going to compare, make sure you really are understanding the difference in paradigm.

4. Snake probably will not avoid being hit. Patch cycle for Smash4 and thus far in Ult, indicates they're 3+ months behind the meta.
They stealth nerfed ZSS's Flip Jump in the last patch and it echoes the dev team disliking the very common dynamic seen early on by Choco in Japan. A neutral predominantly using full hop and flip jump to reset close to the ground - Japanese players complained about ZSS and she was seen as potentially top 3 in late December/January, but this was not seen reinforced at any point of late Jan, Feb or March.

5. IMO - but I think it approaches objectivity to some extent - Snake's disadvantage is radically stronger than in Brawl. Sure, Snake literally didn't die in Brawl, but Snake literally couldn't land in Brawl either. There are very strong, tournament anecdotal and fair-observational reasons Snake's disadvantage is radically better - you can reinforce your belief in Point-2, it's reasonable to believe people will get better at it, but I don't think there's any way you can genuinely say it's worse, at the least.

6. The game designers want single options to be powerful/strong, thus (I believe what they want) is to invoke more cerebral-to-fight (step by step by step to overcome in neutral) characters being towards the top, like Snake. They've done this by hurting the potency of reactive game play, and by having options that require extremely precise-moment 50/50 or RPS guesses to capitalize on.

I believe Bayonetta in S4 was also a reflection of these intentions, but as I've said before, they royally ****ed up by allowing her an always-available option feasibly result in a stock loss at any % (Witch Time). For whatever reason, the skill which Smash players have prided most: whiff punishing ("reactively") is something they don't want; through very potent retracting animations, sometimes higher start ups but less cool downs, you generally cannot - bizarre, but what can you do?

7. Hurting reaction in the multitude of ways they did (input delay + HALVED shield hit lag !!!!!!!, etc) goes against people being able to keep at the necessary pace to allow those RPS guesses - THUS FAR.
Take Snake's 5f dash attack that is -26 on block - this would be laughable as something "difficult" to punish in any past smash game - BUT IT IS. The animation for it helps the most, giving it a supreme amount of faux-range by after his crossing over his most vulnerable hurtboxes (his legs) retract significantly in cool down.
The animation is busted.

We've also lost 3-4 more frames of being able to react to it due to the shield hit lag changes. Assuming a non-anticipated reaction, by the time you react to Snake having dash attacked your shield he's already towards -15 frame disadvanage - then it's 11 frames to drop shield - then if you weren't facing backward you have to deal with a 4ish frame turn around animation (or instant dash attack/turn around attacks, but most chars don't have the range or speed).

In previous smash games, similar thing would be giving you 3-4 frames more to react, but you can't look at this linearly as if it's "10% less reactable", but rather how it would impact the bell-curve distribution: 3-4 frames could be the difference between 10% of the competitive player base reacting reliably and 50-80%.

They don't want us to be able to beat things like this on reaction/through passive play like you would've been taught to in previous games.

This is the depth-hole / mode of skill / intended difficulty-curve of the game. It rings true to Brawl in a lot of ways, except reacting was a lot stronger (thus favouring MK and Marth; spacies were kinda in that group too). On the other side of things though, the necessary "skill" to succeed in those RPS guesses was something which most players/characters couldn't (or didn't want to) achieve.
Chain grabs, Meta Knight and all other sorts of "spam"-tier things carried a lot of players on their shoulders (for me it was f1 invincible dolphin slash, fyi) during the extended period of time people weren't gud enough to otherwise handle the neutral-bork of Falco, Snake and not too long after Diddy, Olimar, etc.
There's less of this, I guess, or alternatively, so much more of it across the cast which is drawing all the focus. True privilege is relatively uncommon though, I'd say.


8. In theory, the endgame of something like Brawl being caused by Snake/Oli seems unlikely. A character getting more out of their stuff and thus accentuating tier differences is inherent to the imbalance of any game (or thing). Characters which freely get away with certain actions are fine - it becomes an issue when a single option results in such a skewed risk/reward that has no real mitigation.

9. I don't think the game is at a perfect point of balance with their intentions - shield hit lag being reduced seems to make literally EVERYONE less happy (they/you just don't know this is the reason for it - yet, they still think it's the 1f worse input latency, GORL, we be losing 5+ frames not just 1).
I'd say the feature should be on a move by move basis: "risky" and "fake" things like Jab mix ups can afford to be difficult to react to (well, they nerfed Zero Suit's jab end lag between games by 2f to match the shield hit lag lost, thanks, ********, it's probably quite similar with a lot of characters but I'd prefer having my 2 frames of end lag removed and just give me more shield hit lag instead, ********).

It seems feasible they'll still be introducing tweaks in every patch - the widespread projectile change and tweak to parries indicates this. I also dislike that parry activation is on a completely different system rather than just a "frames 1-5 of your shield drop" (it seems to be more like frames 1-5 of you releasing your shield trigger); I'm not entirely sure, but this could be why parrying on wifi seems so stupidly hard. Changing this would mean "reactively" parrying that chrom or roy tilt after a landing aerial wouldn't be that difficult at all. Perhaps the way it is now is fine though. But I think those opportunities for the interactive RPS situations people (including me) yearn for would be more easily obtained if parrying wasn't THAT particular.

-

Either way, our whiff punishing super-reaction-bros Valhalla days are likely over (press [F] for respects). Players labbing intently to find means of implementing near riskless situations that result in consistent massive reward is likely to "finally" not be the most-dominant strategem at higher levels of play. They know they messed up with Bayonetta, but they/Sakurai want risk to be inherent in forcing a neutral win on a match-up and player basis.

It's not like those old-guard staples are unviable, quite the opposite - they've still been dominating and causing people to ***** internally/privately, and then the moment Leo or Tweek won something, externally, all this time already. Sheik might even be back already, and it just took one [crucial] buff on her forward air to really get her going again (she got more than this, of course).

Before continuing, if you looked at "riskless ... consistent massive reward" and wanted to retort Snake grenades or Oli's smashes -
What, other than a yearning for punishes to come "reliably" (I fail this hook like and sinker a lot) and a predisposition to match-up specific aggressive commitments (just because you can landing aerial with Lucina in most match ups easily doesn't mean it it must be universal) is actually forcing you to get hit by these things? And if you falter are you really losing the game for it?

Falling back on the point of Snake's dash attack though - shielding backwards gives your character up to 4 more frames to deal with the crossover if you needed to run punish; trying to bait it and committing to a jump (or similar 'riskyish' choices) at the right time will likely have to be learned... for a lot of match ups.
Or you pick the character who themselves have a simple option that can handle it - Olimar nor Snake seem to be fans of their 'easy zoning' being shut down by the likes of Pacman (it seems).


I had a lot longer rant after this, but I think this'll do, it might struggle to be coherent anyway.

I entirely agree about not being able to react in Ultimate. Not only on shield but on wiff too. When I was having my character crisis it was from trying to optimize 's advantage state with more reactionary play. I would rush in and try to punish lag only to be punished for punishing. It didn't work out. Now I see my best success came with safe flowchart options based on predictions.

IMO Ultimate has better balance but a worse system than SSB4. Parrying is a poorly executed mechanic that doesn't have enough reward for the risk, airdodges with a ton of lag can lead to SDs from trying to tech, the "hold buffer" system makes this even worse and you can't react to anything.

 

[Kiligar]

Adding endlag to anything is a horrible idea for any character. That's a much more drastic change than what it looks like on paper. Think of one of your main's BnB moves, then add 3 frames of endlag onto it. Wouldn't be very fun, would it? It can ruin the enjoyment of the characters for some folks. Something more reasonable would be to say, maybe "make up smash not combo into itself" or "decrease damage output slightly".

If it has too little end lag right now, then increase it to make it more balanced. And I know what end-lag is from Pit side Special.

 

[Repli.Cant]

As for Inkling, which it might not be popular to say a nerf for now, but one is needed, and one only. Make roller more punishable on shield.

If you want to nerf Inkling, forget about Roller. Her bair is infinitely more dumb. People tend to look over it because it's not crazy strong in the same vein of Snake's utilt, but it's utility is a bit overboard.

It's a frame 7 respectable disjoint with 6 frames of landing lag that combos, sets up jab locks and tech chases, edge guards amazingly, and is probably her best neutral tool. While not giving some characters as much trouble as pre-patch Nikita gave them, Inkling bair is also one of those moves that lets her get a leg up or even beat a character.

After that, maybe look at Roller again, but I don't much care about the move anymore tbh.

EDIT: Also Roller isn't even that safe on shield. A swift usmash/nair/uair OoS punishes pretty much all options she could want to go for (which is jump or keep Rolling even though it won't have a hitbox for another 30-something frames.)

 

[Kiligar]

If you want to nerf Inkling, forget about Roller. Her bair is infinitely more dumb. People tend to look over it because it's not crazy strong in the same vein of Snake's utilt, but it's utility is a bit overboard.

The Bair is silly strong, but that can be left as a trait of Inkling. Inkling doesn’t have to be weak, but the roller has higher reward than any other move at high percent yet it’s too safe. The Bair is strong, but not everything has to be nerfed. By buffing weaker characters and adjusting the roller the matchup could be easier. Also the Ink mechanic is a little iffy at times, it feels too easy to get a recharge, but not everything has to be touched. At this moment Inkling is beatable with lower tier characters, it just requires lots of skill. With buffs to lower tiers and roller nerf it would accentuate Inkling’s weakness of struggling to kill outside of two confirms (Roller and Down Throw Uair), and tighten the gap in effort required by each players. The Bair I feel is so vital to Inkling that its nerf would be devastating. Still, I see where you’re coming from, a careful nerf would be best.

What do you guys think of a universal recovery buff? I posted it earlier, and I think it’s a good idea.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Hmm, maybe I'm misremembering, (and Shaya I'd be happy for you to chime in here) but I remember multiple characters becoming an issue for Snake in the air over Brawl's lifetime. Marth, ZSS, Olimar, Pikachu, etc., could all stop him from landing for days.

That is because Snake in Brawl suffered from a frame 9 jumpsquat (the highest in the entire series) and aerials with a high amount of landing lag. It is not too difficult to beat him in an aerial moveset contest if you have a good air game. His utility comes from his amazing ground game and special moveset.

Ultimate mostly fixed this issue by giving him a frame 3 jumpsquat and lower lag from his aerials (though still laggy to randomly throw out), though they have toned down the utility of his ground game a bit to compensate while making it still great overall (no more up tilt range that makes Melee Marth's grab blush, while making it still a great move).

 

[SwagGuy99]

There’s some characters that just seem doomed to be excluded from the public’s eye. Mega Man is one of them. Diddy is one, DK is one, Shulk is definitely one (everyone calls him Top Tier nobody plays him), Marth is one ironically, Falco does still exist as well despite being overshadowed, and there’s probably a few others.

and probably will be in this category as well until they are optimized. And I do think they will be optimized eventually, they just need time. Also, I think that and fit as well.

 

[DelugeFGC]

Ness has to hit you with the tail of PK thunder for it to compare to Nikita in terms of edgeguarding, hitting them with the body pops them up and Ness has to act himself to continue the edgeguard. Lucas's is closer...but will be more of a gimp tool than something that causes a damaging explosion. The Belmonts don't have a remote-controlled hitbox that they can throw out from midstage, their projectiles are easily telegraphed, and again, usually involve them having to do something else to continue the edgeguard. Link can send his bomb at some goofy angles if he hits it right, but only has control of when it goes off, not throughout the entire duration of the attack. If he doesn't attack the bomb, he's limited to throwing up, down, to the side, or Z drop.

Honestly the closest thing to it is Duck Hunt's can.


Adding endlag to anything is a horrible idea for any character. That's a much more drastic change than what it looks like on paper. Think of one of your main's BnB moves, then add 3 frames of endlag onto it. Wouldn't be very fun, would it? It can ruin the enjoyment of the characters for some folks. Something more reasonable would be to say, maybe "make up smash not combo into itself" or "decrease damage output slightly".

I'm not disputing that nothing has that level of control and such offstage, I was simply saying there are several other characters who can edge guard you, safely, without ever leaving the stage. As effectively as Snake? Hell no, but they can still do it.

 

[Sean²]

Curious as to how and when this derailed so hard to talk about hypothetical patch changes/wishlists over actual current character impressions in their current state.

 

[DelugeFGC]

Curious as to how and when this derailed so hard to talk about hypothetical patch changes/wishlists over actual current character impressions in their current state.

..Been a solid minute. I forgot this thread was even about anything else.

and probably will be in this category as well until they are optimized. And I do think they will be optimized eventually, they just need time. Also, I think that and fit as well.

I see Sheik somewhat often now that FAir and such was buffed, I also remember seeing a ton of Luigi players closer to launch spamming the hell out of his 0-death grab combo. I've seen a lot of Lucas players online, but not many in tournament. Meta Knight and Lucario are pretty dead in Ult, though. Pretty much ALL the talk of MK was about a supposed 0-death I never even bothered looking into closer to launch, otherwise I've heard little about him besides that he's fallen from grace quite hard. Lucario I've actually played around with, though I really don't like his character dynamic.. but I do NEVER see people use him.

 

[DunnoBro]

I honestly think Inkling is fine besides getting roller back after being hit.

If they go for roller, and get punished OOS, they shouldn't then also get to use it again for a recovery.

I think the character kinda needs bair to function. Everything else is a little too committal for the low reward in neutral. It's balanced by the fact they need to sacrifice time/stage control to get into position for it, less so than a fair.

 

[NotLiquid]

Roller is not safe on shield.

If Inkling's roller is blocked, she has two options - jump out of it or cancel / cross-up. The former generally gives her way more chances to escape, but jumping is one of the universally strongest out-of-shield options in Ultimate, meaning if your character has good aerial frame/hitbox data, Inkling gets punished by most jumping attacks. If she stays grounded, she can get grabbed out of it, and possibly even eat a harder punish.

Yes, she's likely not going to die if she eats a punish after jumping, but that's still a lot more punishable of a move in a game where Wolf and Olimar can throw out KO moves without any fear of reprisal.

 

[PK Bash]

This isn't true at all.. Ness / Lucas PK Thunder is an extremely / completely safe edge-guarding tool that requires no risky commitment period from them.

No, he's right. I know the point you're making but you need to read between the lines a little here.
It's pretty safe and probably the next best thing to Nikita, but there is always a risk attached to PKT because Ness can't cancel it with a shield button (which, let us remember, doesn't remove the hitbox) and immediately segue into something else if he needs to.
This goes double for Lucas, as his PKT is considerably slower and doesn't launch people away. For Lucas, it is actually pretty risky and you'll rarely find a golden chance to use it.

Also Ness can't make his missile artificially stronger/safer by covering other zones with a mortar.

In every conceivable edgeguard situation, Nikita literally risks/gives up nothing. There's nothing quite comparable to it.

Edit: I was hoping not to have to say this so explicitly, but the point here is the argument you're making does not at all adequately refute the original assertion it is addressng. You're making a different argument entirely that is not all that relevant to what was originally said.
What makes Nikita "risk-free" is not that Snake can't get hit using it, but that it doesn't commit him at all. That is the key point you seem to be missing.

 

[SwagGuy99]

I see Sheik somewhat often now that FAir and such was buffed, I also remember seeing a ton of Luigi players closer to launch spamming the hell out of his 0-death grab combo. I've seen a lot of Lucas players online, but not many in tournament. Meta Knight and Lucario are pretty dead in Ult, though. Pretty much ALL the talk of MK was about a supposed 0-death I never even bothered looking into closer to launch, otherwise I've heard little about him besides that he's fallen from grace quite hard. Lucario I've actually played around with, though I really don't like his character dynamic.. but I do NEVER see people use him.

Sheik is becoming more common, it's true. Again, I think both her and Luigi need a bit more optimization to become actual threats in the meta but they could both probably make it to that point eventually.

I just think that Meta Knight is uncommon simply because he seems to be a lot harder to play in Ultimate, and all of his Smash 4 jank was nerfed, despite receiving buffs to the rest of his kit. He still has some good things about him, he's just kind of a really odd character to play.

IDK why Lucas was never more popular in Smash 4 (and by extent, Ultimate) as I see no good reason to consider him a bad character but whatever.

I'm not sure Lucario will ever be popular but I think that he has the potential to be a better character than people are considering him to be atm. Aura is still pretty good, and his recovery travels very far, but he still has all of his drawbacks from Smash 4 in addition to his weight nerf. Not horrible, but very inconsistent.

 

[Vika]

IM NICE AS HELL AT THIS GAME, ME GODLIKE, PIKACHU BUSTED PIKACHU BUSTED! IM NICE!
-Esam

this pretty much sums it up

 

[DelugeFGC]

No, he's right. I know the point you're making but you need to read between the lines a little here.
It's pretty safe and probably the next best thing to Nikita, but there is always a risk attached to PKT because Ness can't cancel it with a shield button (which, let us remember, doesn't remove the hitbox) and immediately segue into something else if he needs to.
This goes double for Lucas, as his PKT is considerably slower and doesn't launch people away. For Lucas, it is actually pretty risky and you'll rarely find a golden chance to use it.

Also Ness can't make his missile artificially stronger/safer by covering other zones with a mortar.

In every conceivable edgeguard situation, Nikita literally risks/gives up nothing. There's nothing quite comparable to it.

I said this already, but I was entirely referencing a characters ability to edge guard you without leaving the stage or risking themselves. PKT cannot be cancelled in the same way Nikita can, no, but there's still plenty of situations where it can be used pretty much risk-free as an edge guarding tool. Same with some of the other stuff I mentioned.

I've already stated Nikita is the most busted thing about Snake, I'm simply saying Snake is not the only character who can go for low-risk edgeguards without leaving the stage. That is all.. I am not disputing that his ability to do so is disproportionately better than the rest of the roster. It is. I'm just saying he's not the only one who can go for 'safe edge guards' so to speak. He's bar-none the best at it, by miles, but he's not alone in that camp.