It's been near a month now, and I'm starting to figure out the current pattern of how the game runs, officially. Defense is just awkwardly nerfed, and I've found more success being offensive as a defensive option (via movement and spacing) than actually using shield and OoS options. Shield drop got gutted hard, so any character that had to rely on the near-instant shield drop cancel with tilts is going to have a rough time in this game unless they are blessed with good OoS options, or their advantage state supercedes it. Rolls and spotdodges just seem disproportionately strong compared to shield/shield-drop right now, so those stats might be something to look at further down the road. But hey, they changed shield in 4, so we know that changes in mechanics isn't out of the question. For now, I've been looking at characters with the offensive meta in mind:
: Wario is just awesome in this game, and has a lot of attributes that'll propel him to bigger and better things in the future. His tilts (especially the new F-Tilt and re-designed U-Tilt) are nice buffs to add to his ground game, and either combo or KO to boot. His aerial speed is amazing and while the Bike respawn nerf gives him a mediocre recovery by the end of it, his air speed, Waft, and such can give him a good chance to come back. Chomp is awesome as well, allowing a character that already was hard to KO to heal himself, no matter how little the amount. The biggest takeaway from Wario, however, is his OoS game. Having two already stellar aerials in N-Air and F-Air be superb OoS options in both size and speed (F4 and F5, iirc; so anything -7 or beyond is unsafe, which is A LOT) and leading to big punishes, if not a KO, is really what pushes this character to his higher-tier status. This character is going to be fun to watch in the long run.
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: I'm starting to join the bandwagon of Simon and Richter not being as good as we once thought they'd be. Don't get me wrong, having such long range, an Up-B that is great OoS and has KO potential, and having such amazing projectiles that can make getting back onstage very oppressing...until you realize that there are dead-zones aplenty, shorter characters can crouch Cross and even catch Holy Water right after because of the endlag, and their recoveries are dismal and exploitable (though has decent enough vertical, I guess). Worst off, bar their Uppercut, their other OoS option is N-Air, which is a bootleg version of Palu's. I don't think they are bad, but the trends of aggression and their dead-zones, weak recovery and OoS, will hold them back by quite a bit.
: So I come to a confession: I think Kirby is on the same boat as Junior right now in that he is "incomplete" in terms of essentials, but has some pros still on him that, when coupled with potential changes, could propel him up. After seeing Captain L and Komota some more, and reading some of Tim's points in the past, if there is any reason to pick him, it will likely be as a counterpick (though you could go with many others as well). Range, air speed, and an undertalked point of lack of OoS options is what holds him back a lot. Doesn't help that while parry helps him with swordies, the new shield is making his life worse with how powerful zoners can abuse slower-mobile characters like Kirby (coupled in with how awful RNG treats his Copy Abilities). But what he lacks in those departments right now, he has it all filled up in various, scattered areas. His size is underrated by a lot in that he can crouch so many things (they've made a list on the amount of stuff, and some of the things he can crouch are headscratchers), and his decent dash speed (almost as fast as Young Link's, in comparison) can make it easy to create over-commitments. That frame data he kept, while his range is stubby, is awkward to handle when Kirby can get an advantage, with all those F3-F4 moves hitting shield, especially D-Tilt. His air-to-ground game, most notably with F-Air 1 is just dumb, and overcommitting to hitting Kirby can lead to a slew of options that is just not wanted, especially with how hard some of his Smash attacks can be. While he has generally bad OoS, B-Air and U-Smash come to mind. B-Air because of it being F6 and quite some range (though you have to be turned around to do so), and U-Smash because it shares a trait with Olimar's that makes it so good: it's F12 (though its more towards aerials like F-Air when punishing F-Smashes and such). Does this mean he isn't the worst character? Who knows, but after further inspection, I cannot in good faith say he is in a tier of his own concurrently. He's still bad relative to the higher echelons of the cast, for sure, but he's on that awkward boat with Junior in that he lacks some vital, meta-defining attributes, but can be solid if he gets them. If. Enough of my mini-rant.
