Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Hydreigonfan01]

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Character Representation for OrionStats:

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I didn't count secondaries but based on that list, this is the character representation for the Top 100 players (I may have screwed up on one or two, hopefully not).

This is only based on slightly over 2.5 months of data, so some things on here may look weird, but I think there are some interesting things to note here:

• Dark Wizzy is ranked much higher on here than on the PGR (22nd > 9th, and I'm guessing that would have continued into 2020).
• ESAM also had a decent jump going from 14th to 8th, entering the Top 10. Not sure if that would have continued going forward.
• Wrath is ranked 20th, likely due to his Top 8 placing at Frostbite. Toast is ranked 22nd most likely for the same reason.
• In terms of characters, has 3 players who ended up in the Top 100 and even though Dabuz does use her as a co-main, this is still a huge leap up from the days before she was buffed and was considered to be a Bottom 10 character who most people had given up hope in.
• and all have mains who barely made it into the Top 100: HIKARU, Shadow_PR, and Jesuischoq.
• Interestingly, has no representation in the Top 100 of OrionStats, making him the only character who seems to be universally considered high tier to not have any ranked players on this list.

Other jumps include Zackray going from 7th to getting 3rd, Paseriman popping off and being considered better than Light and QuiK and other European players being more highly valued instead of the PGRU not having any except Glutonny, Mr R and Leffen. No is because T really dropped off recently and got 33rd at EVO Japan. If you count co-mains and secondaries, Joker, Mr Game and Watch and Olimar get bumped up to 2, and Mario gets bumped to 3.

 

[Nobie]

Over the past day or two, I've been practicing dash walking, which is the movement technique that not only extends your dash slightly but transitions straight into a walking state, which thus allows for even more options out of a dash. I'm sure it's come up in this thread at some point, but just in case:

When I began labbing the technique, though, I noticed something: If you dash walk and then immediately jump the opposite direction, you can initiate the jump without incurring any air acceleration penalties that normally would occur if you tried to dash and then jump away.

For characters that already have excellent air acceleration, e.g. Yoshi, Palutena, Mega Man, Jigglypuff, this doesn't matter a whole lot.

But for characters that have subpar air acceleration but high air speed, this can potentially make a significant difference. Think Mewtwo, Roy, Bowser, Little Mac. Even the Belmonts, who have bad air speed, can benefit from avoiding their abysmal air acceleration.

One possible use is for ledge trapping. You can dash walk away from the ledge and immediately spring back toward the ledge with an aerial, perhaps covering more options in the process.

And for Mewtwo in particular, it looks like the jump away from a dash walk pulls its body back slightly, making it potentially harder to get hit in the tail.

 

[Lacrimosa]

Over the past day or two, I've been practicing dash walking, which is the movement technique that not only extends your dash slightly but transitions straight into a walking state, which thus allows for even more options out of a dash. I'm sure it's come up in this thread at some point, but just in case:

When I began labbing the technique, though, I noticed something: If you dash walk and then immediately jump the opposite direction, you can initiate the jump without incurring any air acceleration penalties that normally would occur if you tried to dash and then jump away.

For characters that already have excellent air acceleration, e.g. Yoshi, Palutena, Mega Man, Jigglypuff, this doesn't matter a whole lot.

But for characters that have subpar air acceleration but high air speed, this can potentially make a significant difference. Think Mewtwo, Roy, Bowser, Little Mac. Even the Belmonts, who have bad air speed, can benefit from avoiding their abysmal air acceleration.

One possible use is for ledge trapping. You can dash walk away from the ledge and immediately spring back toward the ledge with an aerial, perhaps covering more options in the process.

And for Mewtwo in particular, it looks like the jump away from a dash walk pulls its body back slightly, making it potentially harder to get hit in the tail.

Does that mean characters are already at max air speed then?

 

[Nobie]

Does that mean characters are already at max air speed then?

I think it's not so much that they have max air speed instantly, but that they don't have to incur as much of a penalty decelerating to go in the opposite direction.

I was also informed that you can already do something like this by making sure you let go of the control stick right after starting a dash before jumping (which also means that the dash ends up shorter compared to a dash walk). Still, I wonder if it's possible to incorporate both into a game to create an additional movement option.

 

[B_Burg]

Other jumps include Zackray going from 7th to getting 3rd, Paseriman popping off and being considered better than Light and QuiK and other European players being more highly valued instead of the PGRU not having any except Glutonny, Mr R and Leffen. No is because T really dropped off recently and got 33rd at EVO Japan. If you count co-mains and secondaries, Joker, Mr Game and Watch and Olimar get bumped up to 2, and Mario gets bumped to 3.

I was actually kind of wondering about this as a concept. If a player has a co-main or secondary they start playing more to the point where it starts to overtake their 'main,' at what point does that sort of thing get reflected by OrionStats? Is it just who the player says is their main or is it based on their results or something? Or is there no real 'criteria' for that sort of thing in the first place?

 

[NairWizard]

Nairo, Leo, and Tweek in top 3, with Dabuz making top 8? That's hilarious.

The state of smash online is such that a random-mains tournament is literally more consistent with offline results than everyone going their mains.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Nairo, Leo, and Tweek in top 3, with Dabuz making top 8? That's hilarious.

The state of smash online is such that a random-mains tournament is literally more consistent with offline results than everyone going their mains.

I found that rather amusing as well.
I also found amusing that throughout the tournament, people kept getting , and it was probably the character that appeared the most often, which is ironic considering how rare Mewtwo players are.

 

[Nemesis561]

Idk if its true or not, but I saw multiple people saying that picking random on the character selection screen isn't actual true RNG, but that characters you use less have a higher chance of being picked. If that is actually the case, It would make sense why characters like M2 and duck hunt kept showing up

 

[SwagGuy99]

Idk if its true or not, but I saw multiple people saying that picking random on the character selection screen isn't actual true RNG, but that characters you use less have a higher chance of being picked. If that is actually the case, It would make sense why characters like M2 and duck hunt kept showing up

I've never seen proof of this being a thing, but I wouldn't be surprised if it is.

 

[Lacrimosa]

Idk if its true or not, but I saw multiple people saying that picking random on the character selection screen isn't actual true RNG, but that characters you use less have a higher chance of being picked. If that is actually the case, It would make sense why characters like M2 and duck hunt kept showing up

There are a lot of rumors regarding game mechanics. Animal Crossing is a big and recent example that we mustn't believe what most people say but instead, it may be worth to take a look into the game code instead.

 

[Rran]

If that is true, Nairo definitely had a little... divine intervention... w/ his characters hah (getting Palutena, Robin and Hero (multiple times!) was kinda funny to see play out)

 

[DougEfresh]

So this is a pretty interesting tech that I think a number of characters besides Pika (who was showcased for demonstrating this) can use to help decrease 2-frame vulnerability when trying to recover back to ledge. This is actually quite significant for once it's mastered enough to be consistent with extreme speed. Many of his more challenging MUs like and are largely difficult because of having such reliable and strong 2-framing options in dsmash and usmash, respectively. It may not be groundbreaking enough to completely change how his MUs play out, but it's a nice quality of life boost for us that can reduce stress a bit in MUs where one or more 2-framing options are relevant to work around and maybe even swing the Palu MU from 45/55 to even over time.

Curious to hear thoughts on this and if anyone's character(s) here can make use of it.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

That’s not anything particularly new or even unused, you’ve been able to null the two frame by grabbing the ledge from whatever the game considered above the ledge since 4 and it wasn’t uncommon to see teleport recovery characters go for ledge this way when they could. Its good to spread awareness of this around. This does come with the caveat that you will need to recover at certain angles to bypass your two frame, Pika is a bit more lenient since he can alter his angle during his up b. Joker and Ness have been able to use this and have been for a while now but with a bit more effectiveness due the in the intangibility they have during their up b’s (I’m sure other characters can as well but I play these two characters so they are my frame of reference). By holding down during the intag frames of Wings of Rebellion and PKT2 and letting go the moment you are considered “above the ledge” you are able to transition straight into the ledge grab intangible frames during the intangible frames of your up b, granting even more protection from two frames as well as the any attempt to just hit you before you can begin your ledge grab animation.

With Ness you can even do silly stuff like this while completely invulnerable the entire time using this technique making even standing on the ledge a really bad idea.

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[DougEfresh]

That’s not anything particularly new or even unused, you’ve been able to null the two frame by grabbing the ledge from whatever the game considered above the ledge since 4 and it wasn’t uncommon to see teleport recovery characters go for ledge this way when they could. Its good to spread awareness of this around. This does come with the caveat that you will need to recover at certain angles to bypass your two frame, Pika is a bit more lenient since he can alter his angle during his up b. Joker and Ness have been able to use this and have been for a while now but with a bit more effectiveness due the in the intangibility they have during their up b’s (I’m sure other characters can as well but I play these two characters so they are my frame of reference). By holding down during the intag frames of Wings of Rebellion and PKT2 and letting go the moment you are considered “above the ledge” you are able to transition straight into the ledge grab intangible frames during the intangible frames of your up b, granting even more protection from two frames as well as the any attempt to just hit you before you can begin your ledge grab animation.

With Ness you can even do silly stuff like this while completely invulnerable the entire time using this technique making even standing on the ledge a really bad idea.

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Yea, sorry. Just learned that it wasn't anything particularly new...I guess I just hadn't really caught onto it till it was shared in the Luc cord last night and everybody was so excited about it lol. Does seem like a slightly more niche tech though, since not every character's recovery can capitalize on it very well and to your point, it's a good reminder for knowing how it can be used by certain characters in those MUs at least (for the record, I didn't play Smash 4, so that's probably part of the reason for my knowledge gap on this tech prior to sharing it).

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

Yea, sorry. Just learned that it wasn't anything particularly new...I guess I just hadn't really caught onto it till it was shared in the Luc cord last night and everybody was so excited about it lol. Does seem like a slightly more niche tech though, since not every character's recovery can capitalize on it very well and to your point, it's a good reminder for knowing how it can be used by certain characters in those MUs at least (for the record, I didn't play Smash 4, so that's probably part of the reason for my knowledge gap on this tech prior to sharing it).

No need to apologize it’s good to make more people aware of this. I could see Lucario benefiting a lot by going for this as trying to avoid two frames by going around onto the stage isn’t always a great idea due to extremespeed various amounts of landing lag and the general ease of reacting to Lucario’s startup when timing a two frame if they go for ledge.

 

[DougEfresh]

Yes exactly. Recovering back to ledge safely after getting knocked off-stage is probably the most difficult and stressful form of disadvantage as Lucario for the reasons you stated Envoy of Chaos . Having this plus ES bonk tech on FD and BF is very good for added recovery mix ups on top of mastering various angles of ES to remain unpredictable even if it is challenging to reliably use the recovery well in some situations.

 

[The_Bookworm]

The thread has been inactive for a while. Little tournaments happening, and we haven't got an update is over 5 months.

Just want to put this comment here, but the next update is likely going to happen at June 16th, therefore releasing our ARMS character.
Why? June 16th, 2017 is the release date of ARMS. They are likely going to nail the release of the character on the anniversary of the game.

And because we haven't got an update in almost 6 months (by far the biggest gap between updates so far in Ultimate), there is a likely chance that we are going to get a wealth of character changes when the update drops.

Any predictions? Want to comment this in order to give the thread some life before the character drops.

 

[Djmarcus44]

The reveal is happening on June 14th. https://twitter.com/NintendoAmerica/status/607910067447472129?s=19

EDIT: I didn't realize this is from 2015.

We can also discuss this video and reddit data for results.

Spoiler: My findings on the data

There are a quite a few issues that I found after looking at the reddit page and the data. The biggest issue is that the list isn't entirely based on results as labeled. On the first link, the results are averaged in with several different polls including average matchup charts and a separate poll for "Who can win supermajors?" (I don't know how PT got first on that poll). The second big issue is that I am not sure how they came to their results section. The second link shows a different results tracker with different rankings. There are other issues such as inconsistencies with the matchup chart list, but I haven't gotten far enough to see all of those issues. https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/gyp700/smash_ultimate_tier_list_based_on_results_patch/ https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/0/d/1yOUnrhyjsCV6yn1HAvTcuC5TIvAxMC9fV6ZbxTsyx7Y/htmlview

https://youtu.be/W5QmF5tbcjk

https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/gyp700/smash_ultimate_tier_list_based_on_results_patch/

 

[Game7a1]

The reveal is happening on June 14th. https://twitter.com/NintendoAmerica/status/607910067447472129?s=19

That's a tweet from 2015, though. Are you sure the reveal will be on the 14th?

 

[Djmarcus44]

That's a tweet from 2015, though. Are you sure the reveal will be on the 14th?

I didn't see that part.

 

[DougEfresh]

The thread has been inactive for a while. Little tournaments happening, and we haven't got an update is over 5 months.

Just want to put this comment here, but the next update is likely going to happen at June 16th, therefore releasing our ARMS character.
Why? June 16th, 2017 is the release date of ARMS. They are likely going to nail the release of the character on the anniversary of the game.

And because we haven't got an update in almost 6 months (by far the biggest gap between updates so far in Ultimate), there is a likely chance that we are going to get a wealth of character changes when the update drops.

Any predictions? Want to comment this in order to give the thread some life before the character drops.

I've seen others suspect it's the 16th as well for that exact reason, but I don't really think Nintendo cares enough about lining things up with a series' anniversaries and their smash presentations in general. We'll see, though.

Anyway, more on topic. I've been thinking a lot about the potential changes we could see in this next patch since we're now in June and the reveal and drop of the ARMS character will be soon regardless, and I'll mention a few of the ones I'd like to see:

1) waft nerfed a bit. Not to the point where it's useless, of course, but we already had the discussion about this move just a few weeks ago and even a number of times before that, so I don't think I need to go in depth on this one.

2) nikita being toned down a bit. Maybe this is a little more controversial, although I do think this move alone straight up invalidates certain characters because of their lackluster recoveries and Snake already has plenty of strong tools to make him difficult to deal with for most of the cast.

The other two characters I'd like to see changed (buffed in this case, more specifically) might seem a bit biased because they're my two most played characters, but it is still based on genuine knowledge of them since I play Luc and Banjo so much.

:

- reduce start up on ftilt and dtilt (ftilt: f12->f7, dtilt: f9 to f6 and reduce its total frames from 22 to say, 19 to keep it relatively safe for spacing while being faster as a get off me option)

- reduce start up on Nair (f10->f7/f8). It's such a core piece of his neutral that this move should be faster than it is

-reduce start up and end lag of aura sphere, and ideally, increase its priority so it doesn't clank with so much and increase the hitstun of ASC hitbox to help make those confirms more consistent. I also mentioned some time ago how frustrating it is getting punished for using AS in neutral just because it's rather high commitment with it's slow start up and end lag and this move is far and away what makes Lucario a character at all, so this is probably the best change he can get.

-increase range of force palm grab to minimize jank between the command grab and hurtbox shifts while the opponent is in shield, which allows for far too many unnecessary whiffs.

:

-increased grab range (seriously, it's pathetic as it is right now and it's a shame since he does get good reward off of throws).
- start up reduction on fair: f15->f11/12. This is one of banjo's best moves to space opponents out in neutral, but it's just a bit too slow as it is right now to really get that job done. Shaving off a few of its start up frames would make a big difference in terms of his keep away game with his aerials against rushdown characters particularly.

Nair: start up frame reduction and landing lag reduction. Currently, it's frame 10, which again is just a little too slow. It is quite disjointed and active for a long time, so making it f8 seems reasonable to me. It does have 16f landing lag though, and I really think that should be halved.

-reduce start up and end lags of both rear eggs and egg shots. Doing this would be huge, as he wouldn't be as prone to rushdown since it's now lower commitment, and this also allows Banjo to play more aggressively now that he's not stuck in so much lag from using his projectiles to keep opponents out.

-reduce start up frames on dtilt (f12->f9). Again, a very good disjoint and grounded spacing tool, but slower than it should be.

-increased base KB and shield damage on up smash: it's Banjo's only legitimate OOS option, so make it kill earlier without rage and make it better for shield pressure while being less unsafe on shield.

-increased bury time on dthrow: if this were made better so there could be legitimate percents where dthrow->utilt/usmash actually confirmed much like snake's dthrow->utilt at 160%, this alone would make his ability to kill much more consistent.

I think these changes are reasonable and fair to build the characters I mentioned up to become better characters without being broken or toned down while still being very good. Curious to see what others' thoughts are on overall changes, though.

 

[Lacrimosa]

Just give Zelda Palutena's air acceleration.

:>

 

[Rizen]

Wrath's won Captain's Quarters beating MKLeo's and Maister's. Sonic was a solid high tier offline but he's even better on wifi. I have no doubt he's a wifi top tier.

Apart from that we've been going through a real dry spell. Just some wifi randoms tournament with even less competitive value than what we've had for several months. There's little to talk about. :/

 

[MrGameguycolor]

Any predictions? Want to comment this in order to give the thread some life before the character drops.

• Another tiny universal change to a minor stat/attribute.
• Gutting or redesigning
• More minor nerfs to some top tiers.
• Slight buffs to some low tiers that may or may not matter.
• More quality of life fixes.
• Still no toggle for the Auto Short-Hop Attack macro.

 

[Lacrimosa]

But seriously, given the dominance of Sonic in off-line play, it wouldn't surprise me to see him getting nerfed.
What exactly, I don't know and I don't know what makes Sonic that good besides his run speed and the resulting ability to whiff-punish. I doubt they'll change a character's attributes (here: Run Speed), although they did so in the past with Mii Brawler I think (only to revert them the patch after).

Game&Watch, Samus and Cloud are also chars that do super-well in Wi-Fi, so they are big targets as well. But we'll see. I barely care for Smash anymore, I don't know how the bigger Online tournaments went, since there are much more important things going on right now but still.

 

[ZephyrZ]

Here's my patch predictions:

Flame Breath now does 999% damage per hit.
Increased invincibility on side b start up.
Sweetspotted jab is now +10 on shield.
All lance, axe, bow and whip attacks are replaced with generic sword swings.
Wendy is now the default alt.
Whenever K.Rool enters an online match, the game automatically lags without the need to unplug your lan adapter.

Edit: Uh I thought I was in a different thread for some dumb reason, I hope this ****post is allowed.

On a more serious note, I'm not holding my breath for a Sonic nerf just yet. It's too recent.

 

[Firox]

But seriously, given the dominance of Sonic in off-line play, it wouldn't surprise me to see him getting nerfed.
What exactly, I don't know and I don't know what makes Sonic that good besides his run speed and the resulting ability to whiff-punish. I doubt they'll change a character's attributes (here: Run Speed), although they did so in the past with Mii Brawler I think (only to revert them the patch after).

Game&Watch, Samus and Cloud are also chars that do super-well in Wi-Fi, so they are big targets as well. But we'll see. I barely care for Smash anymore, I don't know how the bigger Online tournaments went, since there are much more important things going on right now but still.

If they nerf Sonic at all, I think increasing the end lag on Homing Attack would be pretty fair. A move that fast should never go as unpunished as it does.

 

[NairWizard]

I don't know what makes Sonic that good besides his run speed and the resulting ability to whiff-punish.

Offline Sonic is good because the smash community uses a silly timeout ruleset wherein the character with lower percent wins the match on even stocks.

this ruleset encourages running away once you’re in the lead and pressuring the opponent into overcommitting; Sonic is good at punishing commitments.

if we had a ruleset that used almost any metric other than percent to determine match outcome, this wouldn’t be the case.

something someone suggested to me in private before was determining winner based on who had stage control more often during the match. hard to implement but would basically solve the problem entirely

 

[Arthur97]

I hope they don't jump the gun with wi-fi Sonic, and they almost certainly aren't going to redesign him. Even if they do nerf him, that dash speed is his staple. He isn't even that good offline (good, but not the best), and there are fighters above him.

Remember, just because you don't like them or their playstyle is not a legitimate reason to nerf. If we were going off personal bias, I would nerf Roy's recovery and Joker. Likewise, online results aren't the best indicators.

If anything, this might actually be a pretty mild patch due to how little has been going on in Smash. That, or an uptick in Elite Smash gameplay might impact it if they decide to use that as their main metric this time even if that isn't a great rubric either. I hope they don't put too much stock in online tournaments.

 

[DunnoBro]

I've seen others suspect it's the 16th as well for that exact reason, but I don't really think Nintendo cares enough about lining things up with a series' anniversaries and their smash presentations in general. We'll see, though.

Anyway, more on topic. I've been thinking a lot about the potential changes we could see in this next patch since we're now in June and the reveal and drop of the ARMS character will be soon regardless, and I'll mention a few of the ones I'd like to see:

1) waft nerfed a bit. Not to the point where it's useless, of course, but we already had the discussion about this move just a few weeks ago and even a number of times before that, so I don't think I need to go in depth on this one.

2) nikita being toned down a bit. Maybe this is a little more controversial, although I do think this move alone straight up invalidates certain characters because of their lackluster recoveries and Snake already has plenty of strong tools to make him difficult to deal with for most of the cast.

The other two characters I'd like to see changed (buffed in this case, more specifically) might seem a bit biased because they're my two most played characters, but it is still based on genuine knowledge of them since I play Luc and Banjo so much.

:

- reduce start up on ftilt and dtilt (ftilt: f12->f7, dtilt: f9 to f6 and reduce its total frames from 22 to say, 19 to keep it relatively safe for spacing while being faster as a get off me option)

- reduce start up on Nair (f10->f7/f8). It's such a core piece of his neutral that this move should be faster than it is

-reduce start up and end lag of aura sphere, and ideally, increase its priority so it doesn't clank with so much and increase the hitstun of ASC hitbox to help make those confirms more consistent. I also mentioned some time ago how frustrating it is getting punished for using AS in neutral just because it's rather high commitment with it's slow start up and end lag and this move is far and away what makes Lucario a character at all, so this is probably the best change he can get.

-increase range of force palm grab to minimize jank between the command grab and hurtbox shifts while the opponent is in shield, which allows for far too many unnecessary whiffs.

:

-increased grab range (seriously, it's pathetic as it is right now and it's a shame since he does get good reward off of throws).
- start up reduction on fair: f15->f11/12. This is one of banjo's best moves to space opponents out in neutral, but it's just a bit too slow as it is right now to really get that job done. Shaving off a few of its start up frames would make a big difference in terms of his keep away game with his aerials against rushdown characters particularly.

Nair: start up frame reduction and landing lag reduction. Currently, it's frame 10, which again is just a little too slow. It is quite disjointed and active for a long time, so making it f8 seems reasonable to me. It does have 16f landing lag though, and I really think that should be halved.

-reduce start up and end lags of both rear eggs and egg shots. Doing this would be huge, as he wouldn't be as prone to rushdown since it's now lower commitment, and this also allows Banjo to play more aggressively now that he's not stuck in so much lag from using his projectiles to keep opponents out.

-reduce start up frames on dtilt (f12->f9). Again, a very good disjoint and grounded spacing tool, but slower than it should be.

-increased base KB and shield damage on up smash: it's Banjo's only legitimate OOS option, so make it kill earlier without rage and make it better for shield pressure while being less unsafe on shield.

-increased bury time on dthrow: if this were made better so there could be legitimate percents where dthrow->utilt/usmash actually confirmed much like snake's dthrow->utilt at 160%, this alone would make his ability to kill much more consistent.

I think these changes are reasonable and fair to build the characters I mentioned up to become better characters without being broken or toned down while still being very good. Curious to see what others' thoughts are on overall changes, though.

I'd actually prefer Wario's recovery be nerfed than his waft. It's not too good or un-edgeguardable or anything, but I feel like it should be easier to avoid letting wario get rage and waft. Kinda like Lucario, Little Mac, Terry, etc. His recovery is way better than theirs at least. An increased timer on Bike would also soft nerf waft since he'll need to use it to recover more often.

Similarly with snake. I feel like he should be forced to c4 more often. Similarly to Link. If he wants to guarantee a high recovery and avoid getting janked at lower percents, he should have to take a hit. This would also soft nerf c4 since he has to really think if he wants it on stage.

So even if he still has Nikita which can single-handedly edgeguard some characters with zero committment, he himself has similar trouble getting back.

I wouldn't want a major nerf though. Something like 6-8 extra frames of lag after cypher if he didn't cancel it early (So he can still do rare cypher combos). Not really guaranteeing many more direct punishes, but giving him less frame advantage to set up stuff like c4/nades and not also get the max height/safety of cypher.

 

[DougEfresh]

I'd actually prefer Wario's recovery be nerfed than his waft. It's not too good or un-edgeguardable or anything, but I feel like it should be easier to avoid letting wario get rage and waft. Kinda like Lucario, Little Mac, Terry, etc. His recovery is way better than theirs at least. An increased timer on Bike would also soft nerf waft since he'll need to use it to recover more often.

Similarly with snake. I feel like he should be forced to c4 more often. Similarly to Link. If he wants to guarantee a high recovery and avoid getting janked at lower percents, he should have to take a hit. This would also soft nerf c4 since he has to really think if he wants it on stage.

So even if he still has Nikita which can single-handedly edgeguard some characters with zero committment, he himself has similar trouble getting back.

I wouldn't want a major nerf though. Something like 6-8 extra frames of lag after cypher if he didn't cancel it early (So he can still do rare cypher combos). Not really guaranteeing many more direct punishes, but giving him less frame advantage to set up stuff like c4/nades and not also get the max height/safety of cypher.

So can you clarify how you'd want Wario's recovery nerfed? Is it an increased timer on Bike or something else? Either way, even if a change doesn't directly nerf waft, something that allows him to use it as easily as he can should be nerfed. You could reduce his air speed and/or acceleration so he has a harder time camping you out to build it up, though so far there really haven't been any notable changes to characters' base attributes in the patches we've gotten if I'm not mistaken, especially as it pertains to mobility. I do think the simplest way is some type of direct nerf to waft so it's a bit less apt to just straight up cheese people so easily; whether that's a KB reduction or a mild increase in start up frames. If I could just make it to 60 or 80% before I start worrying about waft and its combos destroying my stocks rather than 0-40%, that would be great.

You have some interesting ideas about adjustments for Snake, though I don't think cypher is as much of a necessity to get altered as nikita. I totally accept that a ton of characters have really strong tools of some kind that tend to invalidate large portions of the cast (in the tiers below them especially), but nikita really just seems too free of an edgeguard option for Snake. I know his aerial mobility is lacking so he can't really go out there himself to edgeguard well that often outside of mix ups and hard reads, but I think nikita can be toned down a bit without it getting hit too hard either.

I definitely don't want hard nerfs to high or top tiers btw, but wario waft and nikita are examples of tools that these characters have that are just straight up ridiculous in how effective they are for what they're used for. Another example I can think of that fits this bill Imo is ZSS boost kick: it's an OOS option that's insanely fast and its kill power is absolutely bonkers on most characters and still kills quite early on even the heavier characters in this game. Her mobility is unbelievably good with tons of great options for fast, safe pressure and imo, Idt the nerf to flip kick grounded bury in patch 7.0 was significant enough to really lessen the jank she can pull with her up b (unrelated to this buffs/nerfs discussion and this may be a hot take, but I think ZSS is quite possibly the best character in Ultimate because of some of the things I just mentioned).

 

[The_Bookworm]

In terms of character changes, this is what I would want to see:

Above posts on Waft and Nikita I am fine with. Probably a more urgent change with Wario, because he is top 5 right now, and while Snake is still very good, he is not as meta defining as he used to be.
Possibly lower some of the invincibility of her Flip Jump, particularly the second half of her current Flip Jump invincibility. The move will still be a great option for OoS and recovery, but it should a bit easier to challenge, especially at the apex of the move.
Salem made a nice suggestion about Mario that should help tone him down a little while retaining everything that makes him Mario: make his up air send more horizontally, somewhat similar to Pika's up air. This change will change Mario's combos to be more horizontal base, so it would still be potent, especially with his variety of finishers, but it will prevent Mario from taking his opponents to the skies.
Increase the hurtbox size when Pikachu lands, lands with up B, and lands with back air. The pancaking of this character, while definitely not a dealbreaker as some people says, can be obnoxious at times, especially with characters with precise hitboxes. This is more of a "let's make an aspect of the character less annoying" change than an actual nerfing to the character.
Decrease turn-around frames to be like everyone else. This change alone will make him high tier, but right now he is merely a mid tier that feels more finicky to control than he should be.
Make his sourspots a bit stronger, and his sweetspot to once again take priority over his sourspots. His sword feels like a wet noodle right now ( got his revenge). These changes alone will be a big boon to Marth (and honestly all he needs).
#MakeFairGreatAgain
Everything Doug suggest about Lucario (and Banjo), I am keen with. However, I want also add an increase to the hitbox size of Aura Sphere's pre-charge hitbox when fully charged. The pre-charge hitbox of the move matches the animation as it increases, but then it shrinks down when it reaches full charge, making it hilariously smaller than it is visually.
Make this character functional please?
This is a character that has went down the drain as time goes on, similar to and , however to an even greater extent as it's results are currently some of the worse in the entire game. Two big changes that can happen to fix this is to decrease the startup of all of it's aerials (all of it's aerials have 10+ frames of startup) and increase it's sword size in a similar vein to SSB4 Marthcina in patch 1.1.4. These two changes will be two pretty good steps for the character reach it's former early metagame glory.
Some general buffs to Corrin will be nice to see. However, there is one specific thing I want to be addressed more than anything else. There are some instances on when you pin the opponent, the followup kick would whiff for absolutely no reason whatsoever. This instance happens more often than it seems like (at least to me), and it has even costed me the game once. A simple fix is to simply increase the hitbox size of the start of each kick.
Edit: Oh, and also fix the kick hitboxes of 's down tilt too.
While these two characters are in definite need of some buffs, the main thing I would want to see them changed, is fixing hilariously big blindspots in their smash attacks. I lost a game to a PkMn Trainer player once as Ganondorf, where I did an up smash against an Ivysaur above me, then when the Ivysaur landed in front of me, my up smash completely whiffed.


Certain characters, such as and especially , gets easily gimped onstage because their fists/arms clip through the stage when using their recovery moves, exposing their hurtboxes onstage despite being below the ledge. A simple fix is to simply give their arms intangibility throughout the duration of the move, in a similar vein to Terry's leg intangibility when using his charged up B. This in particular would a big buff to Mac's recovery, which he definitely needs.


Outside of this, slight nerfs to other top tiers like , buffs to lower tiered characters like etc., and multi-hit fixes to especially , all of which is essentially a given.

 

[Arthur97]

For Marth, considering how they balance, they might do one of those changes, but don't expect both. Personally hope he gets neither.

 

[DougEfresh]

The_Bookworm you mentioned something crucial with regards to the ASC hitbox size actually matching its animation. That is another important factor that would make ASC confirms more consistent (especially ASC -> up smash), so thanks for bringing that up. The hurtbox on his ears is actually another thing I'd hope the dev team can fix as well.

 

[SwagGuy99]

With a patch on the horizon, I'm just going to copy you guys and list some changes I would personally like to see. I'm not listing everything here, just the things I can think of right now.

• Fix his initial dash to be in line with everyone else's. It's debatable as to how much this affects his viability overall but it should be changed. I'd also like to see some other buffs for him, as he feels like a very underwhelming character overall, but I'm not really sure what it would be.
• Increase his air speed significantly, allow up-b to travel slightly higher. These are the only changes he needs to be a much better character as it improves his offstage and onstage presence significantly.
• Increase his air speed just a tiny bit. He's so close to being pretty good, especially after the buffs he received in earlier patches, but a slight air speed buff is the one thing I think he really needs at this point.
• Meta Knight doesn't need much, but maybe fixing the issues with f-air's multihits and giving up-air and d-air an extra active frame would be enough?
• I saw this on Twitter where a modder changed Luigi's n-air to function like Melee's n-air which actually removes the main 0-to-death off of down throw. Weird change but if the devs actually want to remove the 0-to-death (which I doubt they will at this point since it's been well known to have existed for months at this point) this would be the way I'd go about it.
• Decrease the hitbox on the startup of up-b.
• I don't really know how to go about nerfing this character. I'm of the opinion that this character is somewhat unhealthy for Ultimate in the long term due to how strong his kit it, but the problem is that I feel like to truly bring this character in line with everyone else, he needs some fairly significant nerfs. Here's a list of possible ones that I'd like to see:
  • Change the landing lag and auto cancel window on b-air to match Smash 4.
  • Alter the knockback of up-air to be a worse combo tool.
  • Remove the spike hitbox on d-air.
  • Quick Attack has more endlag when used onstage.
• / Fix the hitboxes on n-air and f-air, make the multihits on f-air, up-smash, and up-tilt more reliable, increase the kill power on back throw and up-smash. Just some random changes to make some of his less functional moves work better and to give him a few more reliable kill options.

 

[DunnoBro]

Pika's bair angle/loops definitely need a nerf. Nair loops are fine because they typically just rack damage. But bair loops set up unreasonable death scenarios vs a lot of characters. This wouldn't really make pikachu less of a top tier threat, but at least make him not as much of an auto-lose for a lot of characters.

Salem made a nice suggestion about Mario that should help tone him down a little while retaining everything that makes him Mario: make his up air send more horizontally, somewhat similar to Pika's up air. This change will change Mario's combos to be more horizontal base, so it would still be potent, especially with his variety of finishers, but it will prevent Mario from taking his opponents to the skies.

That doesn't really make sense. Uair is a huge part of his kit. Combos and kill confirms into fair/dair/sjp and general damage racking tool. If people are worried about fair/ladder strings, then nerf sjp/fair.

I actually wouldn't mind if SJP sent more horizontal and thus safer on hit. Some chars it's not even truly safe on hit until about 80 cause they fall so fast.
Fair spike could be a smidge weaker so it lines up less with the grab combo percents.

 

[Firox]

/ Fix the hitboxes on n-air and f-air, make the multihits on f-air, up-smash, and up-tilt more reliable, increase the kill power on back throw and up-smash. Just some random changes to make some of his less functional moves work better and to give him a few more reliable kill options.

Amen, Reverend. Hit the nail on the head with this.

 

[MrGameguycolor]

I actually wouldn't mind if SJP sent more horizontal and thus safer on hit. Some chars it's not even truly safe on hit until about 80 cause they fall so fast.
Fair spike could be a smidge weaker so it lines up less with the grab combo percents.

While we're at it, add some of that SJP safety to Doc...

It'd be appreciated.

 

[arbustopachon]

I'm hoping they fix Dedede's f-smash so the spike hitbox actually combos into the sweetspot.

Also i hope they give Zard his short hop autocancel Fair back, or they reduce it's landing lag. That move feels terrible to use right now.

i'd like parry to be better against projectiles as well but im not really sure how they would do that.

 

[Kiligar]

All this character needs is for his up special to go higher than Mario’s. The whole gimmick this character is based around us being a slow but powerful Mario, giving him great air speed would ruin his design. Simply give Dr.Mario an up special which travels further than Mario’s (since people complain that giving him one that travels the same distance as Mario would make him too similar) which would give Dr.Mario a great recovery instead of a poor one. Especially if this buff is alongside allowing Doc’s Super Sheet to stall like regular Mario’s. If these two buffs are given Dr.Mario would be just where he needs to be.