Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Nobie]

I don't think the notion of essence and fill fully map onto one-trick pony and well-rounded because I think it's less about how "simple" your character is and more about how direct or indirect your game plan is going to be. It's also worth noting that while ice Climbers are high on the "essence" ranking according to Ginger, it's Melee Falcon who is considered to be the highest.

I'm not sure if what I'm about to say maps properly either, but what I thought of is the difference between an artist who can envision their final product and try their best to replicate their mind's eye vs. someone who slowly builds up an image piece by piece through work.

 

[Constantini]

That's an interesting list, that essence thing. First time I'm seeing something like that and it's pretty neat even if just for fun. Main ridley and pocket samus, wold and some sephiroth now....I can't say I disagree with those from first hand experience. From playing the game a lot for two years, I think most of the other characters are also accurately depicted there. LOL at luigi too, he maybe had a bit more of a non grab combo gameplan but in SSBU it's all about the tether grab 0-death.

 

[RonNewcomb]

For example, Lucina is definitely "dominant" but "fill"; "Incineroar is definitely "essence" but "reactionary." (And Little Mac is dominant/essense while Kirby is reactionary/fill.) You could almost say that he is talking about the macro (win-conditions) and my terms are focused on the micro (neutral interactions).

I am not sure if these are fully orthogonal, and also not sure that plotting them against each other would have any particular value even if they did.

I think such a 2D chart would be cool and useful as a tool in choosing a secondary. I like characters as different as Lucina, Toon Link, and Luigi, which have radically different strategies, but, there's still some sort of similarity running through them in a neutral-obsessed, choose-your-moment kind of way.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

heyyyy some +1s are easier than others but I didn't wanna do 30 tiers but you get the idea hehheheh pic.twitter.com/dWAsOrS9SE

— ShinyMark🌙 (@ShinyMark1) January 12, 2021

Shiny Mark's new matchup chart.

 

[Frihetsanka]

heyyyy some +1s are easier than others but I didn't wanna do 30 tiers but you get the idea hehheheh pic.twitter.com/dWAsOrS9SE

— ShinyMark🌙 (@ShinyMark1) January 12, 2021

Shiny Mark's new matchup chart.

I agree with Sephiroth and Corrin, Lucina is probably -1 as well. This MU spread is still really good for Pikachu. Top 3 character easily, contender for #1, if we're going by MU spread, anyway.

 

[KirbySquad101]

Who wants to see something a little more grounded than pure theorycraft also something different than talking about what an apparent deity Pika is? I know some peeps here are a big fan of numbers, so I figured something like this could catch a few fishies:

Do Balance Patches Actually Change Winrates?

I'm not the most reliable source when it comes to statistics (it's been a while since I took that class lel), but if I were to break down a bit about what's going on in the article (Warning: May involve a few arbitrary math terms):

- What Mr. Author is doing here is taking the win-rates of characters pre-buffs/nerfs and post-buffs/nerfs and using them to calculate a value known as the p-value. What this p-value is doing (I think) is checking to see if the data we have is significant/reliable enough to use as evidence to back up a claim we might have. In other words, if the p-value of our set of data is 4%, that indicates that if the accepted hypothesis or null hypothesis is indeed true (in this case being there isn't a correlation between a character's WR and the buffs or nerfs they've received), then there is a 4% chance of observing said set of data this extreme or rare. Basically, the lower our p-value is, the stronger chance we have of rejecting our accepted hypothesis.

To take an example from their data:

's change in WR between pre-patch and post-patch jumped from roughly 40.5% to a 45.14%! Since our p-value is well below 5% (and 1% for that matter), this suggests that our data is indeed useful/reliable enough to make the deduction that - yes, Falco benefited greatly from his buffs.

On the flip side, 's change in WR between pre-patch and post-patch dipped slightly from 40.6% to 40.4%. However, our p-value is well above 90%, which is more than a big enough indication that our data is too random/not significant enough to make the argument that Marth's buffs were useless and possibly detrimental. Instead, we're left wondering why Marth's win-rate slightly dipped; it could be from the buffs somehow, but it could also very well be that Marth players as a whole just got worse, or that his WR dipped after some of the better Marth players flocked over to Lucina, or any other potential reason the mind can think up.

You can even use the public player database to check to see if any characters you might be curious about benefited/got hurt from their buffs and/or nerfs respectively: https://statsmash.io/blog/public-query-sql

I'm probably mincing what the article's saying horribly, but I did find it interesting, and could be a new avenue to take this thread in.

 

[Melonsismyusername]

I agree with Sephiroth and Corrin, Lucina is probably -1 as well. This MU spread is still really good for Pikachu. Top 3 character easily, contender for #1, if we're going by MU spread, anyway.

I feel like Pika is obv #1

 

[ARISTOS]

Who wants to see something a little more grounded than pure theorycraft also something different than talking about what an apparent deity Pika is? I know some peeps here are a big fan of numbers, so I figured something like this could catch a few fishies:

Do Balance Patches Actually Change Winrates?

I'm not the most reliable source when it comes to statistics (it's been a while since I took that class lel), but if I were to break down a bit about what's going on in the article (Warning: May involve a few arbitrary math terms):

- What Mr. Author is doing here is taking the win-rates of characters pre-buffs/nerfs and post-buffs/nerfs and using them to calculate a value known as the p-value. What this p-value is doing (I think) is checking to see if the data we have is significant/reliable enough to use as evidence to back up a claim we might have. In other words, if the p-value of two sets of data is 4%, then there's a 4% chance that our data isn't reliable enough to use to make correlations or connections. Naturally, we want there to be a pretty big chance that our data is useful, so the limit our p-value will usually be 5% in most scenarios.

To take an example from their data:

's change in WR between pre-patch and post-patch jumped from roughly 40.5% to a 45.14%! Since our p-value is well below 5% (and 1% for that matter), this suggests that our data is indeed useful/reliable enough to make the deduction that - yes, Falco benefited greatly from his buffs.

On the flip side, 's change in WR between pre-patch and post-patch dipped slightly from 40.6% to 40.4%. However, our p-value is well above 90%, which is more than a big enough indication that our data is too random/not significant enough to make the argument that Marth's buffs were useless and possibly detrimental. Instead, we're left wondering why Marth's win-rate slightly dipped; it could be from the buffs somehow, but it could also very well be that Marth players as a whole just got worse, or that his WR dipped after some of the better Marth players flocked over to Lucina, or any other potential reason the mind can think up.

You can even use the public player database to check to see if any characters you might be curious about benefited/got hurt from their buffs and/or nerfs respectively: https://statsmash.io/blog/public-query-sql

I'm probably mincing what the article's saying horribly, but I did find it interesting, and could be a new avenue to take this thread in.

I have a stats background and your understanding of p-values is mostly correct, though not necessarily between two entire sets of data but rather the relationship between two factors (variables) in the data. A lower p-value, the more likely a relationship is not spurious.

if the p-value of two sets of data is 4%, then there's a 4% chance that our data isn't reliable enough to use to make correlations or connections.

This is not correct, but it's a common mistake: https://www.graphpad.com/support/fa...y-significant-conclusion-is-a-false-positive/

 

[KirbySquad101]

I have a stats background and your understanding of p-values is mostly correct, though not necessarily between two entire sets of data but rather the relationship between two factors (variables) in the data. A lower p-value, the more likely a relationship is not spurious.



This is not correct, but it's a common mistake: https://www.graphpad.com/support/fa...y-significant-conclusion-is-a-false-positive/

Yeeeeppp, stepped right into that common pitfall. After reading up a bit on it, the info is starting to come back, which hopefully reflects in my edited post; thanks for the heads-up, don't want to be spreading misinformation and all that lol.

 

[StrangeKitten]

It doesn't surprise me to see Marth's buffs doing pretty much nothing for him. While I don't have the most time on either character, I do well enough as Lucina, but if I pick Marth, he just feels awful. It's weird - you wouldn't think the two would feel worlds apart. But they honestly do. So you have myself and MkLeo, two players who primarily play swordies, reaching a consensus that Marth just isn't very good. And of course, his opinion counts for way more than mine does, but it serves as a way of showing that Marth feels bad to play for both an average-skill player and the best player.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Tweek's Pokemon Trainer matchup chart

 

[Frihetsanka]

While I do think Tweek is being a bit too pessimistic, Pokémon Trainer potentially being overrated shouldn't be news to anyone who has been following the game's competitive progress since the beginning, Leffen has been saying it for a long time now.

I do not think Lucina or Corrin lose this MU, though.

 

[SwagGuy99]

Tweek's Pokemon Trainer matchup chart

I like this chart, and there's only a few things sticking out to me that I would change

• should be even or +1, not +2
• should be even
• should be +2

Overall though, I think this is a pretty good take on how good PT's matchups are in the current meta. The character is pretty good, but not as good as some people were making them out to be about a year ago.

 

[Ziodyne 21]

I think it said that a major weakness that PT has is that all three pokemon have a rather poor disadvantage state. Although in case it it mostly due to being very light.All three pokempn hate getting ledgetrapped in general. Even switching pokemon was once though to be an OP escape disadvantage tool, until players learned how the timing of it worked ad there is a brief peroid where you can punish it hard

 

[ZephyrZ]

I tried watching Tweek's match up video but I only got about 17 minutes in before I got sick of hearing "Squirtle into Ivy flowchart" on any character with less then an amazing recovery. He didn't even talk about how Charizard effected any of the match ups, and made it seem like Ivy's ability to play neutral depends solely on if you opponent is slow enough for Razor Leaf spam to be effective.

I guess that's what irks me about these mass produced match up charts. They boil match ups down to only their most obvious parts and all the nuances are removed.

It also makes these match up charts to be really unconstructive. They aren't trying to push the meta or find match up specific solutions to problems, because how can you go in super in depth on over 80 characters at once?

 

[Arthur97]

You don't. Honestly, maybe it would be better if they made more focused videos on matchups. Generally keeping it to what they know instead of...guessing and/or assuming for fighters they don't fight or play much.

 

[SapphSabre777]

I tried watching Tweek's match up video but I only got about 17 minutes in before I got sick of hearing "Squirtle into Ivy flowchart" on any character with less then an amazing recovery. He didn't even talk about how Charizard effected any of the match ups, and made it seem like Ivy's ability to play neutral depends solely on if you opponent is slow enough for Razor Leaf spam to be effective.

I guess that's what irks me about these mass produced match up charts. They boil match ups down to only their most obvious parts and all the nuances are removed.

It also makes these match up charts to be really unconstructive. They aren't trying to push the meta or find match up specific solutions to problems, because how can you go in super in depth on over 80 characters at once?

I had this exact reaction when watching it live on Twitch, as it did nothing to really teach or explain in-depth why PT competes with the cast other than an oversimplification of the character in the form of the "Squirtle-Ivy flowchart". I think that hurts the character's developmental cycle a lot when top players dummy things down and instead of looking at the whole picture, use an "easy-to-use, read-then-do, rigid flowchart" mentality to determine everything. I understand that there are 80+ characters, but not going into depth about even characters you know and simply judging MUs off of a portion of the characters' abilities, both for PT AND the opponent, is a bit egregious.

For example, the Kirby-PT MU was atrociously mishandled in terms of description in what the MU actually looks and feels like (especially knowing how the matchup feels like watching sets like Ferretkuma and Atelier; I think it is in PT's favor, but not as easily and as clear cut as Tweek thinks). Kirby actually handles Squirtle really well thanks to his tilts, and if Squirtle is still in play at decent percents, then a good hit can KO him. Of course Kirby has to compete against superior air mobility, but it isn't as atrocious as Tweek puts it. Ivysaur isn't too bad, just a slower change of pace for Kirby since he can N-Air through the Razor Leaf and slowly approach. It becomes the same Kirby versus range card that he had to go through, but it isn't as simple as Tweek's "just spam Razor Leaf and B-Air and he can't do anything" mentality.

Hilariously, his biggest blunder was Charizard, because Charizard IS the -1 maker for Kirby, thanks to Zard's better ground mobility and range, along with strong moves and huge weight, that make it the worst MU out of the three Pokemon for Kirby. Granted, Zard gets combo'd hard due to his size and weight, but his weird front hitbox, his OoS with U-Smash and Fly, and other options more than make up for that. But I digress...

I think there is a fine line between overcomplicating MUs and oversimplifying them, and it is very easy to oversimplify everything under the guise of a flowchart like how Tweek did it, which actually starts to become omissive because of how much "fat" has been cut in creating his flowchart. There's a lot to take into Ultimate, and not knowing everything and every scenario is fine due to how gigantic the game is. But oversimplifying MUs can lead to absolute disaster if the opponent is the one to study in detail, and using flowcharts like the above is a one-way ticket to being overtaken by an opponent that defies the flowchart and sees past it.

 

[StrangeKitten]

I had this exact reaction when watching it live on Twitch, as it did nothing to really teach or explain in-depth why PT competes with the cast other than an oversimplification of the character in the form of the "Squirtle-Ivy flowchart". I think that hurts the character's developmental cycle a lot when top players dummy things down and instead of looking at the whole picture, use an "easy-to-use, read-then-do, rigid flowchart" mentality to determine everything. I understand that there are 80+ characters, but not going into depth about even characters you know and simply judging MUs off of a portion of the characters' abilities, both for PT AND the opponent, is a bit egregious.

For example, the Kirby-PT MU was atrociously mishandled in terms of description in what the MU actually looks and feels like (especially knowing how the matchup feels like watching sets like Ferretkuma and Atelier; I think it is in PT's favor, but not as easily and as clear cut as Tweek thinks). Kirby actually handles Squirtle really well thanks to his tilts, and if Squirtle is still in play at decent percents, then a good hit can KO him. Of course Kirby has to compete against superior air mobility, but it isn't as atrocious as Tweek puts it. Ivysaur isn't too bad, just a slower change of pace for Kirby since he can N-Air through the Razor Leaf and slowly approach. It becomes the same Kirby versus range card that he had to go through, but it isn't as simple as Tweek's "just spam Razor Leaf and B-Air and he can't do anything" mentality.

Hilariously, his biggest blunder was Charizard, because Charizard IS the -1 maker for Kirby, thanks to Zard's better ground mobility and range, along with strong moves and huge weight, that make it the worst MU out of the three Pokemon for Kirby. Granted, Zard gets combo'd hard due to his size and weight, but his weird front hitbox, his OoS with U-Smash and Fly, and other options more than make up for that. But I digress...

I think there is a fine line between overcomplicating MUs and oversimplifying them, and it is very easy to oversimplify everything under the guise of a flowchart like how Tweek did it, which actually starts to become omissive because of how much "fat" has been cut in creating his flowchart. There's a lot to take into Ultimate, and not knowing everything and every scenario is fine due to how gigantic the game is. But oversimplifying MUs can lead to absolute disaster if the opponent is the one to study in detail, and using flowcharts like the above is a one-way ticket to being overtaken by an opponent that defies the flowchart and sees past it.

Agreed. Sticking too rigidly to a flowchart can create an ineffective mindset wherein one is always fishing for the same thing. It's good to keep in mind what your most optimal option in theory is, but sometimes, it's better to just go for simple nairs and jabs and whatnot where you can, rather than constantly fishing for some big combo. Also, I feel like Tweek could have just said "PT edgeguards this character well" because repeating "Squirtle to Ivy flowchart" a bunch of times was kinda weird lol.

Also, agreed about Charizard. Zard is a huge win condition for PT and Tweek barely talked about him. Kirby's range and frame data compete really well with both Squirtle and Ivy... But then Zard comes in with his fat butt allowing him to live way longer, and KOs Kirby pretty easily.

 

[DougEfresh]

The superficial and shallow approach most, if not all, top players have taken with their tier lists and character MU charts is something I've noticed and taken issue with for months, and it's refreshing to see others here finally calling attention to the issue(s) with that as well. While I haven't watched Tweek's PT MU chart video above, it saddens me that even he's apparently succumbed to that tendency because I viewed him as one of the few top players left who seemed genuine and grounded in reality when discussing that type of topic.

It actually amazes me in a way that these charts come from top players more often than not, because their half-assed analyses of any given match ups and/or of character's strengths and weaknesses to place them into tier lists give the impression that they're barely competent mid-level players rather than elite ones that frequent top 8s at majors and super-majors. I'm hoping that the nosedive in quality of these types of videos from top players is more testament of the pandemic driving near-constant content creation so they can make their coin in the absence of stacked offline events to compete in with one another than it is an accurate reflection of a glaring incapacity to articulate the finer points of Ultimate's cast and other aspects of the game that they're supposed to possess.

Anyway, all this just reaffirms my prior belief that until further notice, MU charts and tier lists in Ultimate are pretty much all bull**** and while our continued wifi era of smash really sucks, I find the video game a whole lot more fun and fulfilling completely ignoring these charts/lists to instead focus on further development of player and character-specific skills, especially as a player of multiple underrepresented characters (even if online still often has a way of interfering with those goals). Basically all of them are taken way too seriously by players, and that just creates a space of toxicity and dogma which distorts and hinders our perception and knowledge of the game rather than contribute to it.

People are still welcome to post whatever they want, charts and all, but I'll reiterate my recommendation from a while ago for the thread overall to think outside the box a bit to discuss more unexplored and unique topics for productive discourse (though if this ends up falling on deaf ears again, which I sadly suspect it will, this'll probably be my last appearance here for quite a while...only so much I can take of basically every other post being "here's so and so's MU chart!" Lol).

 

[ARISTOS]

MU Charts and discussions have long been made up IMO, even since the Smash 4 days. The nuances needed to understand a matchup take a lot of dedication to understand fully, and there's no way to really do that in a game with 40+ relevant MUs.

I think if you're gonna post a MU chart, you should delve into your understanding of why the MU does/doesn't reflect what the chart says.

As far as Tweek's analysis, I think the Squirtle-Ivy flow is generally correct (I don't play PT) but ignores how much of a ******* Charizard at high percents and how much that alters a lot of MUs, since he pretty much comes out only at percentages that are terrifying.

 

[Gearkeeper-8a]

To be honest it doesn't help that the smash community as a whole has a stigma to the "do your homework" part of fighting games and laser focus on the technnical aspect, this is why almost nobody talks deep matchup interactions because the audience isnt there and sure as hell top players arent build one when profits are on the line.


Hell just look at how lazy stage selection has become when 99 of the people default to the same stage regardless of the matchup.

 

[ZephyrZ]

As far as Tweek's analysis, I think the Squirtle-Ivy flow is generally correct (I don't play PT) but ignores how much of a ******* Charizard at high percents and how much that alters a lot of MUs, since he pretty much comes out only at percentages that are terrifying.

The issue I have with the Squirtle into Ivy flowchart he kept mentioning is that it was assuming Ivysaur would always get the edgeguard as long as the character has a relatively poor recovery. While getting someone of stage then edge guarding with Ivy is an effective strategy, its no the end all of most of those match ups as all characters have ways to mix up their recoveries with double jumps and air dodges. This goes double for characters like Ike and Bowser Jr. who have side specials they can use to recover. Honestly I think edge guarding is just heavily overemphasized in match up discussion in general, as while its a powerful tool its an unreliable one in Ultimate. Yet if your character's recovery is anything less then amazing it seems to be all anyone wants to talk about.

He did claim that the mark of a good match up for PT is if at least two pokemon are effective so I think he knows that you can't just depend on Squirtle for all your neutral interactions (obviously) but the way he talked about a lot of those match ups would make you think otherwise.

Then again, as he's a Wario player I guess it would make sense for him to overemphasize Squirtle. They're both short ranged, combo heavy characters with good aerial manueverability.

 

[KirbySquad101]

Well there was my whole talking about using math to evaluate character buffs/nerfs thing... lol

But on the subject of MUs, I have seen character Discord groups contribute 2-3 page write-ups of interactions between two characters in a specific match-up that continues to grow each time the players in that Discord group experience said MU. Notes like what specific options beat out one of X character's approaching tools, how to zone-break one of X Character's defensive options, what exclusive combos work on that character, how options can bait out X Character's burst option, other character-specific interactions, etc. are constantly jot down each time the match-up is played. I think if top level players did something along those lines, like say, grinding a MU and proceeding to dedicate a 5~10 minute video to said specific match-up and all of its nuances, I think we would be getting a lot more meaningful breakdowns than just "Kirby loses cause he can't approach" or "G&W loses cause sword" or "DK loses because combo food", statements that more or less don't amount to much beyond stating obvious character weaknesses.

If we were to take discussion to a new avenue, we could observe and breakdown breakout performances from uncommon characters (like Ron with Kirby, Tsu with Doc, or Rizesau with Mii Brawler for example), and analyze why those players do well with them/what the opponents can be doing differently to play around their strategies.

 

[Firox]

Also, agreed about Charizard. Zard is a huge win condition for PT and Tweek barely talked about him. Kirby's range and frame data compete really well with both Squirtle and Ivy... But then Zard comes in with his fat butt allowing him to live way longer, and KOs Kirby pretty easily.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, despite all the fan fare Ivysaur gets for being the "more balanced" of the three PT Pokemon, I still contend that Zard is the greatest threat of the three. His speed, range and sheer power are downright terrifying in the right hands. I've never really feared dealing with Squirtle or Ivy, but when a good player switches to Zard, that's when I start to sweat.

 

[StrangeKitten]

I've said it before and I'll say it again, despite all the fan fare Ivysaur gets for being the "more balanced" of the three PT Pokemon, I still contend that Zard is the greatest threat of the three. His speed, range and sheer power are downright terrifying in the right hands. I've never really feared dealing with Squirtle or Ivy, but when a good player switches to Zard, that's when I start to sweat.

Ever since they made Razor Leaf slower, an unneeded nerf imo, Ivy has felt very... there, for me. I'm sure part of it is a me issue, but Squirtle feels good due to being tiny and having a strong combo game, and Zard gets to be a heavy when they're at their best. I feel like if any Pokemon is the weak link, it's Ivy. I find it weird that some people still act like Charizard is bad when he never has been.

 

[Sucumbio]

Just gonna say in addition to m2k's sephiroth videos I'm watching tweek I just love how he talks about the game.

 

[Lacrimosa]

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Seems like an actual tier list.

 

[BlueRando]

Tweek's Pokemon Trainer matchup chart

I'm not a particularly good player, but sometimes I have the impression that a lot of people, even top players, don't really know the most basic information about characters when talking about the game.

For example, I'm a player, and what Tweek said about Lucas being a zoner is just false, the majority of time Lucas wants the exact OPPOSITE.
Don't get me wrong, I have a huge respect for Tweek and I'm not saying this because I have something against him, or because I'm arrogant and I want to teach things to one of the best players in the world. But at the same time, what he said about Lucas is straight up NOT true, it's like saying that is a zoner because he has a good projectile (in fact, PK Fire isn't even that good of a projectile, like Tweek said himself), it's like saying that is a rushdown character because he has fast normals. Basically, it's like saying that the sky is green, it's just misinformation, and that's not something that you can understand only if you have a deep knowledge of the character, everyone that has played as and/or against Lucas for more than five matches can see it. However, a lot of people still think that Lucas is a zoner, even after two years that Ultimate came out.

One of the major criticisms about Ultimate is the fact that the game is not very deep, however, even from my mediocre player's perspective, I feel like a lot of players aren't willing to explore the game outside of the common tunnel vision.
And yes, I know there are 80+ characters and it's impossibile to know everything about everyone, but when so many players still think that Lucas is a zoner, then it's clear that the huge roster isn't the only factor.

 

[SwagGuy99]

Start of 2021 Smash Ultimate tier list. Ordered top tier+barely top tier. pic.twitter.com/httIlNiR4g

— Azrael (AOMA) (@sonermorina) January 15, 2021

Another... interesting tier list

 

[Firox]

but when so many players still think that Lucas is a zoner, then it's clear that the huge roster isn't the only factor.

I mean, to be fair, Lucas isn't not a zoner. 90% of the Lucases I play online live and breath by the PK FAIYAH and PK FREEEEZE and the Snake Zair. Sure, he can scrap and has a lot more depth than your usual spam-heavy zoner, but he certainly wouldn't be considered a rush-down. Maybe a ranged brawler? One could argue bait-and-punish but that depends more on how he's played rather than the tools of his kit.

 

[Krysco]

From my own experience against wifi Lucas, he very much does play like a zoner or turtler. PK Fire is harder to react to and so it's more spammable plus it activates it's hitbox even if it hits another projectile. I get the convenience of having Crownerang going through it and the armor making me not flinch but even that isn't a perfect answer since if the Lucas just waits, he can fsmash the crown back which makes K. Rool have to pick it back up. The vast majority of attempts to jump over PK Fire will have the Lucas shield and then grab any attempted aerials and if he does land a grab, he'll just bthrow you offstage and then go for a meteor, PK Freeze or PK Thunder. I'm sure Lucas is much more than this offline or even just at any level above Elite Smash but there is at least some truth to him being a zoner/turtler at some level of play. I haven't watched Tweek's video nor do I plan to but I can at least see the criticism of a top player talking about a character as if they only play like they do at low level rather than at the top level where Tweek himself is.

 

[BlueRando]

I mean, to be fair, Lucas isn't not a zoner. 90% of the Lucases I play online live and breath by the PK FAIYAH and PK FREEEEZE and the Snake Zair. Sure, he can scrap and has a lot more depth than your usual spam-heavy zoner, but he certainly wouldn't be considered a rush-down. Maybe a ranged brawler? One could argue bait-and-punish but that depends more on how he's played rather than the tools of his kit.

Good point, sure, he can be played ranged to a certain degree, and I wouldn't say that he's a rushdown, he's a mix up character, which means that he can be versatile in his playstyles.

But at the same time when we talk about zoners we usually think about characters that are almost entirely based on keeping the opponent at distance, or at the very least the gain a significant advantage for keeping people away.

In the case of Lucas, his PK Fire is his only one true projectile, because PK Freeze is not usable outside of edgeguarding and ledgetrapping, it's just really hard to punish online, that's why online Lucas players use it so often. Playstyles and character archetypes are still two different things.

From my own experience against wifi Lucas, he very much does play like a zoner or turtler. PK Fire is harder to react to and so it's more spammable plus it activates it's hitbox even if it hits another projectile. I get the convenience of having Crownerang going through it and the armor making me not flinch but even that isn't a perfect answer since if the Lucas just waits, he can fsmash the crown back which makes K. Rool have to pick it back up. The vast majority of attempts to jump over PK Fire will have the Lucas shield and then grab any attempted aerials and if he does land a grab, he'll just bthrow you offstage and then go for a meteor, PK Freeze or PK Thunder. I'm sure Lucas is much more than this offline or even just at any level above Elite Smash but there is at least some truth to him being a zoner/turtler at some level of play. I haven't watched Tweek's video nor do I plan to but I can at least see the criticism of a top player talking about a character as if they only play like they do at low level rather than at the top level where Tweek himself is.

I guess that's fair, a lot of low level Lucas players are quite bad when it comes to show off the character lol

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Thought this was pretty cool. Nietono decided to show a video between and see how many people can guess who is a top player and who is not a top player.

Reddit - Dive into anything

www.reddit.com

 

[StrangeKitten]

Thought this was pretty cool. Nietono decided to show a video between and see how many people can guess who is a top player and who is not a top player.

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"I don't think professionals will use dash attack. Therefore A." is pretty funny when dash attacks are strong options on most characters. I don't know if this player was talking about ZSS or Fox, but I know for Fox, dash attack can be a combo starter. And dash attacks are either combo starters or finishers for plenty of other characters as well.

 

[ZephyrZ]

"I don't think professionals will use dash attack. Therefore A." is pretty funny when dash attacks are strong options on most characters. I don't know if this player was talking about ZSS or Fox, but I know for Fox, dash attack can be a combo starter. And dash attacks are either combo starters or finishers for plenty of other characters as well.

I remember back in Smash 4, a common piece of advice given to new players was to stop rolling. Rolling was (and still is, just to a lesser extent) a very powerful tactic at low level play as a lot of players didn't know how to deal with it. This created the image that rolling was a bad thing newbs did, and I think I remember some people even claimed top players didn't roll. However top players did roll, they just didn't predictably spam it.

I think that same fallacy might exist with dash attacks, to a lesser extent. Dash Attacks tend to have good range and a lot of active frames, but are usually unsafe on wiff or block. This can make a lot of lower level players over depend on them, giving an illusion that they're a rookie move. But even at high level play a move with good range and active frames is still a move with good range and active frames - they can be great for covering certain options.

Another reasoning I thought was funny:

The players in match B were reading each other more.

Hindsight is 20/20. It's easy to call a risky move a "read" when it hits and a "bad option" when it misses. Anyone can land a Smash Attack - the question is why did they choose to risk landing one in the first place? That's something that's not really always obvious just from watching a match.

But this is my favorite citation.

Tsu: It's A. Since Zero Suit's Up B ladder is a violation of the SP peace treaty, it is mandatory to ban it at official tournaments.

It's hard to argue with that logic.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

Thought this was pretty cool. Nietono decided to show a video between and see how many people can guess who is a top player and who is not a top player.

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This is a fun concept I’d love to see more of these, maybe with players with a bit more of a skill gap. I won’t spoil for those who haven’t watched, so

Spoiler

I guess B were the top players but as the game went on I became less and less convinced they were the top players just based on how more erratic and less thought out neutral interactions went as the game went on. The actual top players, game A definitely micro spacing and being a bit more reserved yet they also were definitely a bit more sloppy overall. But the big difference is between them and the players in game B, the quality of play never dipped, the biggest five away that they were the top players. It was consistent if a bit messy at times.

 

[Thinkaman]

is one of the characters I understand the least, but unlike others in that camp I do enjoy playing him quite a bit. I'm glad BlueRando brought him up and would love to hear more thoughts on him.

Wi-fi Lucas is defintiely a thing, yeah? Like, he's not good, per se, but if you are a super nervous (or lazy?) player who just wants to sit back and press the B button online, Lucas is about as good as it gets.

I just watched a few matches of Reumina and Mekos, which paints a pretty diffrent picture. They both show a really "balanced", mundane character, whose bread n butter is constantly alternating defensive PK Fire and offensive fair. Zair looks great in the lab and they both use it a lot, but it's a very low-reward compromise between fair/Fire and not what Lucas wants to be landing. (In real matches, zair seldom leads to much.) And then when the opponent is in a compromised position, Lucas can go in with a bair or nair and try to start a respectable little combo.

Lucas's recovery mixup options are good but not great. Lucas's throws are good but not great. Lucas's edgeguard options are good but not great. Lucas's other kill options are good but not great. Lucas is like Banjo in that he has a lot of options for all of these things, but he has less variety than Banjo for better or for worse. You end up with a really ordinary character, whose many quirks just make him odd rather than extreme.


Where does he stand in the roster? I actually imagine it's controversial in the same way that Pit is. A lot of people will be tempted to just say he's severly underplayed at top level, or that there's some cultural substitution factor with Ness. (Who I'll remind you is the most played character!) But I'm not sure how ironclad those assertions are; this ain't exactly Marth. It's just as easy to say that Lucas's decent usage is artificially propped up the same way Ness or Ganon is, and from there say that he really is a bottom 15 or 10 character. (Insofar as that means anything in this game.)

On a personal Lucas note, I miss Brawl dair. That was the coolest move, and the Ultimate version doesn't work at all the same way. (Brawl dair came out super early and could carry the opponents into the air, and a FHFF would still auto-cancel and let you chase their tech--and if they didn't tech, dair jab-locked. Smash 4 neutered the move by making it come out way later and adjusting fall speed and timings so that FHFFAC wasn't a use case. Now in Ultimate you can't even buffer FH aerials anymore, and if you could hit them dair doesn't even lift grounded opponents off the ground at all! Ultimate seems to have an entirely different purpose for dair, repackaged as a SH weapon: either dragging opponents offstage into the spike or serving as some sort of higher-risk nair alternative with far worse dragging and surprisingly low reward.)

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Where does he stand in the roster? I actually imagine it's controversial in the same way that Pit is. A lot of people will be tempted to just say he's severly underplayed at top level, or that there's some cultural substitution factor with Ness. (Who I'll remind you is the most played character!) But I'm not sure how ironclad those assertions are; this ain't exactly Marth. It's just as easy to say that Lucas's decent usage is artificially propped up the same way Ness or Ganon is, and from there say that he really is a bottom 15 or 10 character. (Insofar as that means anything in this game.)

Data point of one, but I mained Lucas back in Brawl and Ness never quite clicked for me in the same way. I actually attribute it to their different versions of PK Fire -- because Lucas's always goes straight forward, he can use short hops to remain somewhat mobile while using it. Ness, by contrast, has to root himself in place or else deal with that ~45 degree airborne angle, which gives it much less effective (horizontal) range.

Also, a question for the dataminers: Do Ness/Lucas have any special or unusual properties on their double jump? I've never been sure if they actually behave differently or if the twirls and sparkles just do a really good job of making it feel unique.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Also, a question for the dataminers: Do Ness/Lucas have any special or unusual properties on their double jump? I've never been sure if they actually behave differently or if the twirls and sparkles just do a really good job of making it feel unique.

If there is any technical properties within their double jumps, I don't know. However, I do know that their double jump is executed slower than the average character. Same thing with Mewtwo. It gives it that floaty feel.

can actually exploit this with a technique that can make his double jump go higher. If the character uses his airdodge at the same time of using his double jump, he actually travels a little bit higher.
Doing this with actually reduces their double jump height for some reason.
I don't know if this was the case in Brawl, but it is something the character has in SSB4.

Similarly (as well as ) utilizes their unique double jump in order to have access to the double jump cancel technique, a technique essential to their metagames at those games.

I feel like the devs want to have the PSI boys to have unique aerials properties relative to the rest of the cast. This is further shown with having a longer distanced airdodge than everyone else in the game. Not sure why Mewtwo doesn't, but it is what it is.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Dabuz had a rant on the community about Smash tier lists/MU charts today.

Something that annoys me a lot about tier lists, MU charts, ect in the smash community is that they are meant to be opinions that lead to discussion.

Nowadays I feel like there's so much vitriol thrown out towards anything that isn't agreed upon instead of wondering (1/)?

— Liquid | Dabuz (@DabuzSenpai) January 19, 2021