Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Emblem Lord]

TATSU TIME!!!

 

[Ziodyne 21]

The mo part about Byleth is that he/she would of been a whole lot better if there was not the universal sheild increase. Considering there big hitboxes and sheild damage with Sheilds now it would be pretty scary what they could of done. Any character would feel like pre-sheild fixed Olimar vs them.

 

[Thinkaman]

The mo part about Byleth is that he/she would of been a whole lot better if there was not the universal sheild increase. Considering there big hitboxes and sheild damage with Sheilds now it would be pretty scary what they could of done. Any character would feel like pre-sheild fixed Olimar vs them.

I dunno, Byleth doesn't really do Wario-style suffocating shield pressure, she just does big hits. She doesn't want to poke, she wants to break shield, so she can kill you at 25%.

 

[Modesty]

It's pretty early to make any bold claims but I could see Byleth being really bad. Feels slow and read dependent and doesn't really get that much from it at lower percents. Feels like a heavy without the heavy part lol. Seems decent off stage maybe? Really fun for casual play though lol.

 

[Frihetsanka]

so Palu still gets her down-throw combos... I heard that Down-Throw Neutral-Aeerial was made untrue but apparently it was never true to begin with. Her neutral-aerial now combos even better into itself compared to beforehand with the only drawback being that it kills later offstage which is a more than fair tradeoff given her access to an AMAZING ledge game and offstage bair alongside nair being super good at clipping opponents offstage still. So now we have to deal with NOT ONLY that but also a better killing up-tilt for anti-airs AND an even better down-smash. She might ACTUALLY become the best character in the game.

The biggest nerf is probably the reduced knockback on nair, getting kills with nair will be much harder now, some calculations I've seen say it kills around 26% later, which is huge. She seems overall nerfed, with some nice (but not amazing or anything) buffs. My initial impression is that she's still a very good top tier.

Down-throw instant RAR bair is apparently much less consistent now, so that hurts. DI will mess it up even more than before.

 

[Idon]

The mo part about Byleth is that he/she would of been a whole lot better if there was not the universal sheild increase. Considering there big hitboxes and sheild damage with Sheilds now it would be pretty scary what they could of done. Any character would feel like pre-sheild fixed Olimar vs them.

Shield health remains exactly the same, and Byleth has neither the shield pressure or pokes to abuse damaged shields.

But hey, if you land a dsmash on a shield, they can kiss it goodbye.

 

[B_Burg]

Power creep really bout to catch hard.

 

[KakuCP9]

snip

HOLY ****! YOU UNDERSTAND!!!!!
NEEDLES ARE ****ING INSANE!

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Like...what the ****???
The character with one of the best neutrals in the game now has (semi) easybake confirms off a very versatile projectile that more or less fixed any Marthrits she had after certain percent ranges. Ok.

Also slight nitpick on your analysis, I feel Sheik's weight isn't that huge of a deal since aside from her good negative state, she's just really slippery in general and this buff made her slipperiness potentially lethal. bc1910 pointed this out awhile ago as her main issue is dealing with shield since the risk-reward for sitting in shield against her tends to side with the opponent due to her not getting much out of throws (positioning or raw threat potential). Granted with uair->d-smash being more consistent and the new needles, it's not an crippling weakness since she can use those to bully characters above her unless they have a really, really good disadvantage state.

 

[SwagGuy99]

Not nearly as much to say here, but I think this character is extraordinarily good. to get a sense of what I mean, I personally consider him much better than Snake and Pikachu and probably somewhere just below Peach on a tier list. He doesn't want for anything. Advantage, neutral, and disadvantage? He does great in all three. Good matchup spread? Definitely. For people who think he's just a little too well rounded or average compared to other top tiers... Have you seen this character? My money is on this character winning an S tier at some point.

With Dark Wizzy playing as well as he is it's only a matter of time. Having very few really bad matchups helps. Which characters does he lose to by more than -1? maybe and definitely . None of these matchups are undoable either so it's not like these characters are tournament enders for Mario either.

Also, on the topic of Mario's, lets talk about 's buffs since this is the character I've played consistently for the longest time and probably know the most about. I also am going to say that these buffs are better than I originally expected when I saw them yesterday.


He's still slow and his recovery still sucks, yes, but his changes in this patch take his advantage state from average at best to very strong, along with buffing what already was one of the best OOS options in the game to be stronger.


Down-tilt is great. Not only is it a good combo starter setting up into up-air at some percents, but it also has a kill confirm into up-b and down-b around 100%. Also, it's fast and can two frame as well making it much better than the flimsy move that would occasionally set up for up-air pre-patch.


Up-b was already secretly dumb in pre-patch and it's even better now. Frame-3, decent hitbox, deals about 15% damage on the clean hit, and kills quite a bit earlier now, especially when used out of down-tilt (or down-throw). This is one of the best OOS options in the game now IMO with only and being anywhere near the level of this move. I wouldn't mind it being better as a recovery, but whatever, I'm over it now.


F-tilt can set up for edgeguards at earlier percents and can kill Mario without DI around 160%ish. Not a huge change.


D-air's spike lasting longer makes it better for two-framing, comboing, and edgeguarding. Pretty simple change, but it's reliable as a combo starter into up-b.


N-air's sweetspot deals more damage and knockback. The move still doesn't really seem to kill onstage at realistic percents but it can still set for setting up tech chases at some percents and it does make it better for edgegurding so it's not really a bad change.


IMO, this character is mid tier now. His advantage state is legitimately scary now and I can see his matchups against certain characters can't deal with pills, edgeguarding, or advantage state being much better now. and maybe and may end up being decent matchups for him going forward if his punish game and combo game are more heavily optimized and it may give Mario players a reason to pick him up as a secondary.


I do still think he will lose hard to some characters like and , but it may not be as bad as it was before.

Hopefully Locus or Lui$ pick Doc up again, because I feel like nobody will take this character seriously until he gets better results though (even though he is clearly much better than before).

 

[blackghost]

Here's the most notable Zelda placements I can find off hand.

ven

2GG: Prime Saga 17th
Smash 'N' Splash 5 33rd
The Kid, the Goat, the Mango 13th <-- small but highly stacked
CEO 2019 33rd
Super Smash Con 2019 33rd
2GG: SwitchFest 2019 25th
2GG: Kongo Saga 33rd
GENESIS 7 33rd

Mystearica

Pound 2019 25th
Smash 'N' Splash 5 33rd
DreamHack Atlanta 2019 33rd

I know there are others, like a Zelda player by the name of AceAttorney getting 33rd at a recent S tier whose name escapes, but those are the most notable. Not quite top 16 but has some top 32 placements and a whole lot of almost. Whether you want to consider 17th and 33rd as close enough is up to you.

Mostly I just wanted to know what you defined "real results" as, so thanks for answering.

when he said, "real results," i think he what he meant was "notable results" when looking for results that warrant a character tier placement i am personally looking for top 16 or in very strong events top 24. in large event 33rd isnt really notable. only truly awful character cannot break into 33rd consistently at large events. bracket luck can get many characters to 33rd place. when a character repeatedly comes up short of making it to the last day or semis in an event people start to see it as a glass ceiling. this is hardly only a zelda issue is applies to much of the tier list people often argue here are "overlooked"

shiek buffs are impressive idk what the impact will be but i am happy to see void possibly ending a character crisis he's had since launch.shiek is his first love and the fact he hasnt reached nearly his peak even using better characters showed it.

No, it's SUPER vulnerable to DI; if you DI it, no one will end up in the same zipcode as Byleth, who has no means of control/following said DI. Nairo not DI-ing a move properly Day 0 is not a valid data point.



I keep hearing non-shoto players say "This helps Ken even more than Ryu!", but I can't see how that is possibly true. The tatsu changes seem obviously more beneficial for Ryu, the fireball safety changes are nice (and exclusive to him), and all the d-smash cancels have higher reward on Ryu.

Are people just being ignorant about shotos as usual, or am I missing something?

ken benefits from the close range shield pressure this is going to provide. because its already his gameplan to rushdown while ryu wants to zone. with tatsu ken has a new approach option that punishes characters and players for throwing out a poorly spaced projectile. factor in the low recovery frames on ken's tatsu that was already used in mixups and resets and shield pressure and yes it will help ken more than ryu.

 

[Thinkaman]

I think he was right in calling me out that "real results" was a terrible weasel-word term whose meaning could be anything. (Plus 33rd at Genesis or such is SUPER impressive for any player, and me implying in any way that it's not is unacceptable.)

Numbers are our best tool, and we should enjoy their (accurate) use in our discussions.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Imo, the buffs all of these characters got are nice and all, but I think we should all wait to see if it actually impacts the character's metagame in a significant way.
I think we all in general like to overreact to a balance change, think it would make bigger waves in tournaments, but then nothing has changed. is our prime example. People thought the character was going to be much better after it's buffs from the previous update, but its results continue to be among the worst in the game.

For myself, I am still not too impressed with the and buffs. Getting some nice buffs to their advantage state is good, but I think it is merely only trying to improve what they are already good at. The buffs both of them received did practically nothing to address any of their numerous glaring issues, which in my opinion is far more important.
The example I will once again use again is . Very hyped character when the buffs rolled in, with Dabuz and ESAM viewing the character very highly, and ranking it far higher than Kirby, despite Kirby getting actual results after the buffs unlike Puff. However, the buffs did nothing to fix any of Puff's biggest issues, and thus the character continues to stagnate to this day.

is the other lower tiered character got received notable buffs, but I think that she in comparison has received more helpful buffs to address her main issues. The inconsistent n-air that has plagued her since day 1 has been finally fixed (and is actually one of the only multi-hit aerials that actually work lol). Improvements to n-air landing lag buff, stronger f-tilt, stronger up air, and stronger Phantom helps to enforce her playstyle further with far more consistency.

What I am trying to say, is that I think we should wait until we fully judge where the character is now. Who knows, maybe I am wrong about Zelda.

 

[ReVerbIsSuperb]

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Seeing this hilarious, yet accurate tweet about Greninja's shield size increase in Patch 7.0 got me thinking. According to Meshima, Greninja actually received the largest shield adjustment of all 30 or so characters who got changed:

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While it's a shame Greninja doesn't have an OOS option to take advantage of people hitting the top of his big shield and landing with their moves, if I recall correctly, parry active range is determined by the size of your character's full shield. If so, this could mean a buff to landing parries in general?

I don't think this change affects shield health, but like I talked about last time about how good parry is for Greninja, I think I can welcome this change. I've also seen instances of Greninja getting hit by a lot of weird shield pokes (Pika/Pichu are notorious for this) so hopefully this addresses that annoyance.

For the Greninja players that rely on and try to block things too often, it may lead to situations where moves that would previously whiff are going to
start actually landing on the shield and doing damage. However, sticking to abusing his mobility and low profile will make this not as big a deal.

Greninja's "Shadow Parry" technique is also still in the game. If they were to remove it, given how much attention they gave to shields in 7.0, now would have been the time to do it so I guess that means it's hopefully here to stay. Maybe I should actually change my control layout and learn it...

 

[Thinkaman]

*record scratch*

Wait, Sheik got more of the same? She got accessible kill options! Multiple! On Sheik! I can buy it if you say "Oh, it's not enough", or "I don't think it matters as much as you think in matchup X and Y because whatever", but there's no way we can characterize it as "more of the same".

Contrast with , where you're right--his buffs are doubling down on what he's already good at. But I am going to use this as an excuse to talk about Doc, since I haven't yet.

One of the key advantages of Doc over Mario that stems from doing more raw damage is shield safety on ground moves--Doc can get away with just a tiny amount more on shield than Mario. And this patch doubles down on that: F-tilt is now -10, from -12. (Mario is -13.) That's pretty solid for a ground move, especially a 5f move that does double digit damage.

D-tilt has less knockback and 3 more frames of hitstun. It's still fast (5f) but greedy; it's basically f-tilt with less safety (-14/16) and more reward. F-tilt does 10.5%, while d-tilt true combos into uair or up-b, doing up to 18.4 or 22.3 respectively. (Compare with 2f Jab combo that used to outshine both, which is 9.3% and -13/16 on jab1/2; in other words, the safety of d-tilt and the reward of f-tilt.) Doc essentially now has 3 very comparable CQC options, and gets to pick: 2f, better safety, or double reward + kill confirm.

You can also compare new d-tilt to uair, since they are both 5f options that combo into the same things. But new d-tilt has better reach, better safety, and 55 KBG instead of 130--u-tilt was never able to act as a kill confirm like new d-tilt can. But why choose: If you catch someone holding in with d-tilt, u-tilt itself may be available as a followup, complete with its followup. With multipliers, that's like 39% off a 5f startup with only 27 frame commitment. (Much less than a grab)


11.7% late nair is very good damage (great for trading), and is now only -2 best case on block. That's hard to beat, especially when it comes attached to a character with a 2f move, 6f grab, 3f kill option, and 5f kill confirm option.

Double dair active frames is just a nice QoL, especially because it SHACs.

Finally, up-b doing 5% more knockback is very nice. Buffing the kill power of one of the best kill moves in the game (3f, OoS) isn't to be taken lightly. Which, repeating again, new d-tilt confirms into.


Doc's big weaknesses still exist. But he still has, AFAIK, far and away the highest moveset-wide damage-per-startup-frame in the game, bundled with 3 of the absolute best kill moves in the game bar none and (imo) the best reflector. There's something delightful about playing a character throwing out Ganon damage off of Sheik startup, recovery be darned.

 

[The_Bookworm]

*record scratch*

Wait, Sheik got more of the same? She got accessible kill options! Multiple! On Sheik! I can buy it if you say "Oh, it's not enough", or "I don't think it matters as much as you think in matchup X and Y because whatever", but there's no way we can characterize it as "more of the same".

Contrast with , where you're right--his buffs are doubling down on what he's already good at. But I am going to use this as an excuse to talk about Doc, since I haven't yet.

One of the key advantages of Doc over Mario that stems from doing more raw damage is shield safety on ground moves--Doc can get away with just a tiny amount more on shield than Mario. And this patch doubles down on that: F-tilt is now -10, from -12. (Mario is -13.) That's pretty solid for a ground move, especially a 5f move that does double digit damage.

D-tilt has less knockback and 3 more frames of hitstun. It's still fast (5f) but greedy; it's basically f-tilt with less safety (-14/16) and more reward. F-tilt does 10.5%, while d-tilt true combos into uair or up-b, doing up to 18.4 or 22.3 respectively. (Compare with 2f Jab combo that used to outshine both, which is 9.3% and -13/16 on jab1/2; in other words, the safety of d-tilt and the reward of f-tilt.) Doc essentially now has 3 very comparable CQC options, and gets to pick: 2f, better safety, or double reward + kill confirm.

You can also compare new d-tilt to uair, since they are both 5f options that combo into the same things. But new d-tilt has better reach, better safety, and 55 KBG instead of 130--u-tilt was never able to act as a kill confirm like new d-tilt can. But why choose: If you catch someone holding in with d-tilt, u-tilt itself may be available as a followup, complete with its followup. With multipliers, that's like 39% off a 5f startup with only 27 frame commitment. (Much less than a grab)


11.7% late nair is very good damage (great for trading), and is now only -2 best case on block. That's hard to beat, especially when it comes attached to a character with a 2f move, 6f grab, 3f kill option, and 5f kill confirm option.

Double dair active frames is just a nice QoL, especially because it SHACs.

Finally, up-b doing 5% more knockback is very nice. Buffing the kill power of one of the best kill moves in the game (3f, OoS) isn't to be taken lightly. Which, repeating again, new d-tilt confirms into.


Doc's big weaknesses still exist. But he still has, AFAIK, far and away the highest moveset-wide damage-per-startup-frame in the game, bundled with 3 of the absolute best kill moves in the game bar none and (imo) the best reflector. There's something delightful about playing a character throwing out Ganon damage off of Sheik startup, recovery be darned.

I guess I kind of exaggerated in terms of Sheik's changes not directly helping her weaknesses, in terms of KO ability at least.

Still, my main point is that we should proceed with caution on how we perceived these buffs/changes, as it could end up being more/less significant than envisioned.

 

[Ziodyne 21]

Well if there is one thing I can be pretty certain about Byleth, is that they will join that "specail group" of characters that become immensely more annoying and/or dangerous in online wifi play. His/Her tookit seems tailor-made to be abused in online lag.

They have like very strong or big buttons that while normally unsafe, become much more safer , harder to react to and thus more spammable in lag. Charged Failnaught becomes a bigger pain as well, likely not as much as Gordos but it becomes really dumb as an edgegaurding tool.

 

[Thinkaman]

Well if there is one thing I can be pretty certain about Byleth, is that they will join that "specail group" of characters that become immensely more annoying and/or dangerous in online wifi play. His/Her tookit seems tailor-made to be abused in online lag.

I dunno, I found fair/bair to be irritating to position in lag--and that move is crucial to the entire operation. I'd much rather play someone with Ganon-style meaty hitboxes online.

Additionally, it's harder to punish runaway spam in lag, which is the bane of Byleth's neutral. Byleth is probably better with lag than without, but I wouldn't guess she is a top 5 online demon.

 

[|RK|]

Byleth is strange in that her moves are punishable online... which seems absolutely tragic to me.

I feel that a player good at conditioning would me most effective with her, due to her wide range, fair/bair and Failnaught. But that seems useful only when people are trying to get in?

 

[BitBitio]

*record scratch*

Wait, Sheik got more of the same? She got accessible kill options! Multiple! On Sheik! I can buy it if you say "Oh, it's not enough", or "I don't think it matters as much as you think in matchup X and Y because whatever", but there's no way we can characterize it as "more of the same".

Contrast with , where you're right--his buffs are doubling down on what he's already good at. But I am going to use this as an excuse to talk about Doc, since I haven't yet.

One of the key advantages of Doc over Mario that stems from doing more raw damage is shield safety on ground moves--Doc can get away with just a tiny amount more on shield than Mario. And this patch doubles down on that: F-tilt is now -10, from -12. (Mario is -13.) That's pretty solid for a ground move, especially a 5f move that does double digit damage.

D-tilt has less knockback and 3 more frames of hitstun. It's still fast (5f) but greedy; it's basically f-tilt with less safety (-14/16) and more reward. F-tilt does 10.5%, while d-tilt true combos into uair or up-b, doing up to 18.4 or 22.3 respectively. (Compare with 2f Jab combo that used to outshine both, which is 9.3% and -13/16 on jab1/2; in other words, the safety of d-tilt and the reward of f-tilt.) Doc essentially now has 3 very comparable CQC options, and gets to pick: 2f, better safety, or double reward + kill confirm.

You can also compare new d-tilt to uair, since they are both 5f options that combo into the same things. But new d-tilt has better reach, better safety, and 55 KBG instead of 130--u-tilt was never able to act as a kill confirm like new d-tilt can. But why choose: If you catch someone holding in with d-tilt, u-tilt itself may be available as a followup, complete with its followup. With multipliers, that's like 39% off a 5f startup with only 27 frame commitment. (Much less than a grab)


11.7% late nair is very good damage (great for trading), and is now only -2 best case on block. That's hard to beat, especially when it comes attached to a character with a 2f move, 6f grab, 3f kill option, and 5f kill confirm option.

Double dair active frames is just a nice QoL, especially because it SHACs.

Finally, up-b doing 5% more knockback is very nice. Buffing the kill power of one of the best kill moves in the game (3f, OoS) isn't to be taken lightly. Which, repeating again, new d-tilt confirms into.


Doc's big weaknesses still exist. But he still has, AFAIK, far and away the highest moveset-wide damage-per-startup-frame in the game, bundled with 3 of the absolute best kill moves in the game bar none and (imo) the best reflector. There's something delightful about playing a character throwing out Ganon damage off of Sheik startup, recovery be darned.

Too bad he doesn't have swordie range or mobility to go with it. He's like a heavyweight-style character that trades weight for framedata.

Meanwhile, as far as CQC goes, some of the worst characters in the game have the most absurd CQC. Take for example. He has a f5 killing, tech chasing, jab lock setting, safe spacing ftilt. He has a f4 up tilt that landing once at low to mid-high percents results in 20% on average, and is disjointed. He has a f4 dtilt that trips, has frame advantage, lowers his hurtbox, and kill confirms, coupled with decent range. He has a f2 jab that kills (though not much else lol) All of these are super spammable and safe moves. He has a f9 killing burst option with good range and a lasting hitbox in Dash Attack. He has fast, okay ranged, and powerful smashes. A f6 grab that has generous followups. A low short hop means his good aerials hit grounded opponents easily. Lastly, his dash speed is quick enough to use these practically. also has wild framedata with a f1 jab, f4 ftilt, f4 utilt, and f3 dtilt that all combo or do good damage. Or both. He has a fast dash and walking speed, a solid burst in Dash Attack, armored and versatile smashes, and a f3 up-b OoS. Plus he has easy f3 to f4 kill confirms into KO punch as well. Then you have with heavyweight strength, privileged framedata, kill confirms, OoS, fast grab, etc. Lastly, gotta highlight . Excellent grab game, a plethora of kill moves, one of the best dtilts in the game (only can contest for it with him), decent range, combos, a great surprise tool in Revenge, and a versatile killing burst option in side-b. Yet despite all their excellent CQC, they have multiple glaring flaws holding them back in CQC: is light, short-ranged (though okay ranged relative to his size), and slow in the air. has a very linear approach that is limited to the ground, and also is short ranged (yet still short ranged relative to his size) and light. suffers from the dastardly combination of both poor mobility and poor range, and just has garbo mobility. In other words, they all suck at approaching their opponent. If you want great CQC AND tournament viability, your options are ()(still don't know why in all heck Snake, a heavy zoner, has a f3 dair, f5 dash attack, f1 grenades, f6 killing utilt, AND nikita. Stupid).

 

[Diddy Kong]

HOLY ****! YOU UNDERSTAND!!!!!
NEEDLES ARE ****ING INSANE!

There was a problem fetching the tweet

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Like...what the ****???
The character with one of the best neutrals in the game now has (semi) easybake confirms off a very versatile projectile that more or less fixed any Marthrits she had after certain percent ranges. Ok.

Also slight nitpick on your analysis, I feel Sheik's weight isn't that huge of a deal since aside from her good negative state, she's just really slippery in general and this buff made her slipperiness potentially lethal. bc1910 pointed this out awhile ago as her main issue is dealing with shield since the risk-reward for sitting in shield against her tends to side with the opponent due to her not getting much out of throws (positioning or raw threat potential). Granted with uair->d-smash being more consistent and the new needles, it's not an crippling weakness since she can use those to bully characters above her unless they have a really, really good disadvantage state.

Sheik was overly nerfed from Smash 4. Same with Diddy, Bayonetta, Mewtwo and Corrin. This gives me hope again that the previous Top Tiers can easily function again. Would make the game better at this given point to have them at their most successful selves because this meta would absolutely thrive with just a little more differentiation outside of specific character counter picks.

 

[SwagGuy99]

So, OrionStats was updated yesterday, and the battle for #1 continues with stealing the top spot from .

Other than that, there are some things to take note of before these numbers change significantly on the next update.

• has dropped down to #14, which is fairly surprising considering how good Dark Wizzy was doing the last few weeks.
• is down at #6, after battling with for the #1 spot during the end of the last PGR season.
• has rejoined the Top 10 and if Light continues to get similar results to what he has been, I feel like he will probably stay there for a while.
• is in the Top 20 after spending most of last season slightly below that. ESAM's more consistent results recently are probably the reason for this.
• is surprisingly high at #22. I expect that number to rise after 7.0.0.
• has dropped down to #31. Not a significant drop, but it's noticeable.
• Despite some of his players complaining about his various issues due to his nerfs from Smash 4, is sitting comfortably at #32, probably due to Dakpo's performance at Genesis 7.
• is currently placed at 52, surprisingly high considering how lackluster his results were last season.
• and have shot up from near the bottom the past few weeks to #51 and #54 respectively.
• is sitting down at #57, possibly due to some Top Players (like Tweek) not really using him as a secondary anymore.
• are tied for last with no points.

I expect that several characters that were buffed in the patch may start to rise up the list very quickly from this point on. and may move up significantly in the next few weeks while the others may move up at a bit more of a gradual pace. On the other hand, I expect and to maybe drop a bit and I wouldn't be surprised if or rise up to take the #1 spot sometime in the next few months.

 

[PK Gaming]

Insane how Joker basically got away with robbery

Gun nerfs don't really stop him from getting out of aerial disadvantage state for free. Increased Arsene meter lowering on hit is a good change that will likely matter quite a bit at the highest levels of play, but for the most part the character is unchanged

 

[Cap'n Jack]

I think is a pretty hard to character to fully use much like and , but without being a top tier which is why pro’s gravitate towards easier to use top tiers.

 

[StoicPhantom]

I think Thinkaman already said it best, and I don't fault him for loose terminology, as I'm guilty of it too sometimes. He clarified and I responded and it's all good.

Zelda might not have the strongest placings as compared to our top 16 regulars, but they're nothing to sneeze at either. For a supposed fundamentally broken low tier, she certainly is enjoying decent results over a few players. I don't have the numbers off hand and don't have time to look them up (gotta leave on a trip soon), but I'm going to bet she's got a better record than a lot of characters that are considered above her.

bracket luck

Speaking of bracket luck, poor ven ran into Samsora and Light at Genesis. Before that, Kongo Saga had him running into Pandarian and MKLeo. SwitchFest had him run into Kameme, Smash Con Light. SNS had him against Gackt, Captain L, and Salem. Even his peak at Prime, still had him against Esam, Samsora, and Tweek. Almost all of those players went on to place top 8, top 3, or win the tournament.

It's not hard to see why he's constantly at 33rd. That's where you start running into all the monsters. Some were blowouts, but others were really close. Close enough, that if anything had been slightly different, he would have beaten the likes of Salem and MKLeo and broken at least top 32, if not top 16. All he needs is a little push. While I'm confident he could get there over time, these buffs might be just the thing to do it now.

They're not the substantially game changing buffs they're made out to be currently, but they round out her punish game. Most of the complaints about Zelda seem to stem from a neutral perspective, so I feel like the honeymoon period will wear off eventually and people will go back to saying she needs buffs. But for a skilled Zelda main, these buffs are a boon to the rather "peak and valley" nature of her kill moves. Up-air and Phantom buffs alone would be plenty, but Din's Fire and F-Tilt were nice bonuses. And had these buffs been applied earlier, I feel like you would see more top 32 and even 16 placements.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Despite some of his players complaining about his various issues due to his nerfs from Smash 4, is sitting comfortably at #32, probably due to Dakpo's performance at Genesis 7.

Since we talk Diddy, and I'll use any excuse: yes Diddy has been overly nerfed from Smash 4. Literally everything but dash speed is worse. And he was already quite fast. However it helps with his "speedster punishing" type of play style now. Diddy doesn't have good approaches anymore. SH F Air is underwhelming, Monkey Flip is nerfed in range and now more punishable, grab has lower range, and Banana isn't safe on shield anymore. On top of that , his improved dash attack is also a bit punishable, and it's probably his best option.

This is weird for a character his archetype and overall frame data. A good N Air would fix this, however Diddy has low air speed to make that move work, and it lacks range and priority. It has a similar animation to Kirby's, but it's not as good, and I think it has worse range as well. Also definitely not as good for follow ups after Kirby's latest buffs last patch.

Diddy also has bad boxing, and that's also weird considering his archetype. His jab is very situational, F Tilt is a bit too slow to work properly unless you read with the move well, and D Tilt is actually great but not very suitable on reaction. Longer ranged jab and faster more ranged F Tilt would do wonders to him. Also his air speed makes him very easy to combo, while his own combos aren't so effective anymore, or do poor overall damage for the effort. So air speed alone would be a huge boon.

What I would implement for buffs are a faster dash attack with longer duration and it being jump-cancelable, longer F Air with more damage, stronger U Air with more damage too, longer range grab, jab and F Tilt, Monkey Flip basically being like Smash 4, Banana just being slightly more safe on shield, more priority and range on N Air, and his air speed being buffed so he can approach better in the air and doesn't get combo'd as hard.

These changes would probably make him around.. Greninja level. At tops. And I say it's worth it.

 

[SwagGuy99]

So, I played a lot of fights as Dr. Mario today and down-tilt is ****ing stupid now. While a lot of the things you get off it at lower percents aren't true combos with good DI, it's very hard to react to a frame 5 combo starter. While down-tilt previously launched too far to set up into much besides up-air at low to mid percents, now it sets up into a lot more things. D-tilt > regrab, d-tilt > n-air > d-tilt, d-tilt > nair > regrab, d-tilt > regrab, and d-tilt > up-air are all things that can work now on pretty much any character at lower percents.

At mid percents, d-tilt > up-air is still your best bet since it can set up for edgeguards.

At high percents you have d-tilt > down-b (very percise but possible) and d-tilt > up-b (which seems to kill most characters around 100% at the ledge, maybe later with good DI).

Also, sweetspot n-air can kill onstage at fairly high percents although it's pretty hard to land, unfortunately, due to the fact that it's a reverse sex-kick.

D-air is also pretty dumb. I'm guessing most of us Dr. Mario players have never been able to land it often since the hitbox only lasted for 2 frame before. Well, it lasts 4 now and it is also a very good move now. It two-frames, the sourspot (which seems to be easier to land since the hitbox stays out longer) is fairly strong at the ledge, it's a great edgeguarding tool, and it is a good combo move. This move also got really buffed.

Up-b is the 2nd best OOS option in the game. I don't have much else to say but this move is even better than it used to be and it already was really good.

Overall, Doc may have actually benefited from this patch more than anyone. His advantage state is now really good and making his OOS options better along with giving him reliable kill setups may give players a reason to play him over Mario.

Edit: Leffen and Goblin both seem to be pretty optimistic about these changes as well.

 

[TennisBall]

I'm back from terrorizing online with a Cuphead costume.
What the hell did the shotos inject into their legs?!

 

[KakuCP9]

What the hell did the shotos inject into their legs?!

Fundamentals.

 

[Lacrimosa]

They're not the substantially game changing buffs they're made out to be currently, but they round out her punish game. Most of the complaints about Zelda seem to stem from a neutral perspective, so I feel like the honeymoon period will wear off eventually and people will go back to saying she needs buffs. But for a skilled Zelda main, these buffs are a boon to the rather "peak and valley" nature of her kill moves. Up-air and Phantom buffs alone would be plenty, but Din's Fire and F-Tilt were nice bonuses. And had these buffs been applied earlier, I feel like you would see more top 32 and even 16 placements.

It seems that fTilt could replace fSmash now in her gameplan. The latter still has the benefit of being longer out and being a multi-hit.
But fTilt is faster and the sweetspot seems being safe against shields. It's also disjoited and has over 10 frames less endlag. This could also make ledgetrapping easier because you can act faster out of it.

I think this could give her a decent poking tool in neutral, so she has now another good tool outside of Phantom in that regard and it treats her meager mid-range (I think you can say it like that since, as mentioned, it's disjointed and it can be angled upwards.

Maybe I'm overselling fTilt's potential usage because I haven't seen a tournament match of current-patch Zelda but I think it could alter her gameplay quite a bit.

I think framedata-wise it's the same move but before it barely gave any reward, even at high percents.

 

[MrGameguycolor]

What the hell did the shotos inject into their legs?!

From what I've heard, Tatsu is projectile invincible in some games.

 

[Lacrimosa]

It seems like Meru is sharing roughly the same impressions as I do with Zelda

There was a problem fetching the tweet

-Ftilt is now a second neutral tool besides Phantom
-Nair more consistent but not that usable in neutral (which is ok)
-Phantom hits are meaningful. Hitting with weaker versions (Stage 1-3) allows Zelda to build stronger Phantoms because every stage has higher knockback and deals more damage
-UpAir catches jumps over Phantom well, especially on ledge
-SideB's now stronger for edgeguarding but Zelda actually does better at ledgetrapping (see up Air+Phantom if jump or fTilt/fSmash if normal get-up/roll) but it'll force an airdodge off stage even better now.

 

[Thinkaman]

-Ftilt is now a second neutral tool besides Phantom

Yeah, F-tilt is now -10 from -13.

This is what we did in BBrawl actually (make Zelda f-tilt viable in neutral), to salvage pre-phantom Zelda. It was one of the more extreme changes we made, but was deemed necessary and with little alternative.

 

[SwagGuy99]

This is MKLeo's tier list.

I don't think he really considered the buffs and nerfs for most characters when making it (outside of maybe Samus and Zelda).

Also Shotos, and Links being paired seems kind of weird since there are noticeable differences between them.

 

[NotLiquid]

This is MKLeo's tier list.

I don't think he really considered the buffs and nerfs for most characters when making it (outside of maybe Samus and Zelda).

Also, PK Boys, Shotos, and Links being paired seems suspect.

Ven and quiK's performances with their mains arguably validates their placements without accounting for the patch too much. I don't think the buffs prop them up notably higher in as much as they just make people pay a little more attention to what were already sleeper characters in a matter of speaking.

Young Link and Toon Link being paired isn't too strange given that despite their difference in playstyles a lot of their pros and cons generally almost feel like they weigh too arbitrarily. Plus, Leo is from a region where Toon Link is a little more recognized as a threat, so I'm not surprised he holds a particularly high opinion of that character.

Also, Ness and Lucas aren't ordered.

 

[SwagGuy99]

Ven and quiK's performances with their mains arguably validates their placements without accounting for the patch too much. I don't think the buffs prop them up notably higher in as much as they just make people pay a little more attention to what were already sleeper characters in a matter of speaking.

I agree that they were underrated by a lot of people before, and I think this patch might make people think better of them despite the fact they were pretty good before.

Also, Ness and Lucas aren't ordered.

I forgot about that.

 

[B_Burg]

Not to distract too much from the talk of patch notes and Byleth, but there was something I was kind of curious about that I wanted to just put out there and get some thoughts on.

That being, who do you think in this game is solo viable?

On the one hand, almost every character in this game feels like they can be a threat. There are so many good players and almost every character has at least one person who can make them shine pretty well, even if not at a top tournament level. By extension of that it makes it seem like a lot of characters are, to a degree at least, solo viable at a tournament level.

On the other hand, because there are so many characters that are good, that creates a lot of situations where characters can be really good, but also struggle in matchups against other characters because those other characters are also so good. That may make it seem like only the best of the very best in this game can be solo viable then, because they simply have such strong matchup spreads.

I don't know if I articulated my points particularly deeply or well, but I just wanted to see what people here thought. Who you think is solo viable, how that makes you feel about their placement on tier lists, and things of that nature. The meta of this game is still developing of course so I don't expect definitive answers for what is kind of steeped in opinion anyway, I just want to see what people are feeling about this sort of thing as of now.

 

[TennisBall]

Not to distract too much from the talk of patch notes and Byleth, but there was something I was kind of curious about that I wanted to just put out there and get some thoughts on.

That being, who do you think in this game is solo viable?

On the one hand, almost every character in this game feels like they can be a threat. There are so many good players and almost every character has at least one person who can make them shine pretty well, even if not at a top tournament level. By extension of that it makes it seem like a lot of characters are, to a degree at least, solo viable at a tournament level.

On the other hand, because there are so many characters that are good, that creates a lot of situations where characters can be really good, but also struggle in matchups against other characters because those other characters are also so good. That may make it seem like only the best of the very best in this game can be solo viable then, because they simply have such strong matchup spreads.

I don't know if I articulated my points particularly deeply or well, but I just wanted to see what people here thought. Who you think is solo viable, how that makes you feel about their placement on tier lists, and things of that nature. The meta of this game is still developing of course so I don't expect definitive answers for what is kind of steeped in opinion anyway, I just want to see what people are feeling about this sort of thing as of now.

Depends on your definition of solo viable.

In terms of being viable without a secondary, at bare minimum, characters that come to mind are .

Now, in terms of having even or favorable matchups similar to how you described it, there isn't one in my opinion.

The characters that come closest to having a near perfect match up spread are for destroying 3/4 of the roster when he's actually seen in bracket while also being the size of an ant and literally being designed to be able to deal with everything because of the three characters, but even than, Pikachu still loses to and possibly and aren't actually that difficult to counter and adapt against on their own, it's just that they're all one character so the PT can switch and hope that they can do a bit better in that particular match-up.

 

[Tri Knight]

Not to distract too much from the talk of patch notes and Byleth, but there was something I was kind of curious about that I wanted to just put out there and get some thoughts on.

That being, who do you think in this game is solo viable?

On the one hand, almost every character in this game feels like they can be a threat. There are so many good players and almost every character has at least one person who can make them shine pretty well, even if not at a top tournament level. By extension of that it makes it seem like a lot of characters are, to a degree at least, solo viable at a tournament level.

On the other hand, because there are so many characters that are good, that creates a lot of situations where characters can be really good, but also struggle in matchups against other characters because those other characters are also so good. That may make it seem like only the best of the very best in this game can be solo viable then, because they simply have such strong matchup spreads.

I don't know if I articulated my points particularly deeply or well, but I just wanted to see what people here thought. Who you think is solo viable, how that makes you feel about their placement on tier lists, and things of that nature. The meta of this game is still developing of course so I don't expect definitive answers for what is kind of steeped in opinion anyway, I just want to see what people are feeling about this sort of thing as of now.

It depends on where you want to be competitively imo. If you're looking to get top 5 in majors consistently with one character, you wanna pick a top tier character as your best bet as top tiers typically have the best match up spreads.

That being said theres quite a few characters in high and even mid tier that are solo viable as well technically as dedicated players have shown they can reach heights with them.

 

[BitBitio]

This is MKLeo's tier list.

I don't think he really considered the buffs and nerfs for most characters when making it (outside of maybe Samus and Zelda).

Also Shotos, and Links being paired seems kind of weird since there are noticeable differences between them.

A pro that says Kirby is better than Puff

 

[Nobie]

A couple fun Byleth discoveries:

If you use Down B at the ledge, it won't get stuck in the ground. This means it doesn't cause a shockwave, but it also recovers about 10 frames sooner

Kirby's version of Neutral B does 41% or so damage—more than Byleth's own 34%.