Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Itachi_]

he can do stuff like fair-bair and fair - flash, but I don't think any are guaranteed except with bad DI... which isn't implausible, because fair and nair are so fast you are likely to DI it poorly.

You mention a fair - bair combo. How exactly does one go about performing said combo? I have no clue how that's supposed to work. Am I just missing some easy way to turn wolf around quick enough to combo the fair into the bair? So far the only actual kill confirm (I think) combo I've been able to do is fair -> shine -> bair, and that's pretty situational...

 

[Y2Kay]

In my opinion, Ness, ROB, and Yoshi are the fakest "high" tiers at the moment. They all got some new tools that make em more annoying than past iterations for sure, especially Ness Down smash, Ness PK Magnet, ROB Rotor, Yoshi's random kill moves, to be short and sweet.

But all the things that made them mid tier last game are almost perfectly in tact. Rob still can't land, Ness' recovery is still garbage, Yoshi can't outmash swordies, etc.

I'd watch out for characters with gameplans that got weaknesses adressed and their kit is still good (ie: PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN)

 

[NairWizard]

how the **** do you end essays

Off topic but just end the big post with something inspirational, like

"Say what you will about Rage; in the end, it's a critical piece of the puzzle that helps make smash the unique fighting game that we all enjoy"

Praising a character, player, concept, or smash brothers at the end of the post is usually well received and will get you ~+10 extra likes for no good reason.

Alternatively, sounding like you know what you're talking about, even when you might be totally wrong, gets you a similar effect. Authoritative finishes make people ooo and aaaah

cough sorry, carry on

 

[J0eyboi]

You mention a fair - bair combo. How exactly does one go about performing said combo? I have no clue how that's supposed to work. Am I just missing some easy way to turn wolf around quick enough to combo the fair into the bair?

Yes. In short, whenever you cancel a dash forwards into a dash backwards, there's a 2ish frame window in which you can jump out of the dash while retaining your forwards momentum and turning around. So you can do landing Fair, dash forwards, cancel the forwards dash into a dash backwards within the first 6 frames, jump within the first two frames of that dash, then Bair. It's a lot less complicated than it sounds, trust me.

 

[Gleam]

To say Ness isn't high tier right now would be to give a massive middle finger to his vastly increasing results, both regular placements and 1st placements through Ultimate's career. I'm going to say the exact same thing I said about Ganondorf and that, no matter how good (or bad) you think he is, no matter if he has the best data on him or the worst, if he can't show those results, they don't matter.

Ness has results and nobody can deny it.

Week 4: (10 Placements and 2 First Places)
Week 5: (15 Placements and 5 First Places)
Week 6: (11 Placements and 5 First Places)
Week 7: (24 Placements and 8 First Places)
Week 8: (17 Placements and 4 First Places)

Results always speak louder than words and as long as Ness continues to show these double digit placements and these multiple first place advances, especially equal or greater than other expected high tier characters such as Lucina, Chrom, Roy, Shulk, Fox, Pichu, Peach, Inkling, Link, etc...

Then either he's a High Tier character with all the results to show.

Or

You all suck, can't play the game well and are letting this apparently "worst character ever" garbage tier gimmicky POS wash over your tournaments (Small or Large) like the sweat of a fat man basking in a sauna.

And I honestly don't know jack about Ness in the long run except that as a main, screw this kid and his BS Anti-Ridley moveset. However, I can't look at these results and not give Ness the respect that other players have clearly given him throughout Ultimate's career as of now. You don't get these results by being just popular, or gimmicky but, for this long?

By actually having some merit to your name.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

I'm sorry but Ness is a top tier. I really don't care if the best Ness in EU dropped him. That's the most irrelevant **** ever. He has strong reps in the US and Japan whivh is more than a lot of the cast can say. His biggest weakness is his recovery and that's basically it. His buttons are really good. If swordies sheik or Rosa was more prevalent then he'd get pushed down. However, that's not the case so he'll continue to be a massive threat.

The metagame is still developing and nothing thus far shows anything that's going to push Ness out of the meta. Also a poor craftsman blames high tools.

 

[webbedspace]

Random aside but people keep uttering "A poor craftsman blames his tools" in fighting game tier discussions and it drives me nuts. Fightgames aren't "crafts" in any way or shape. It's tennis, not a ballet. You could use a guitar for a racket and it'd absolutely be the guitar's fault you lose.

Anyway, the better question to ask is: will the meta shape up where Ness's worst matchups (let's say, the swordsters and the rushdown crowd) start to dominate the field? It doesn't seem unlikely, but then, maybe some Snake or Duck Hunt breakthroughs will happen and make them super-relevant.

 

[Nysyr]

No Lucarios in top 64, Tsu thinking of dropping him as well and Anti seems on the fence. I think people are really overrating the character. He's extremely difficult to play, loses the weirdest matchups, and is entirely read based. As time goes on, everyone will figure out Lucario's jank.

The character is going to need some serious help if he ever really is to be a high tier. I think a lot of Lucario mains are having an identity crisis with the character, especially when they try out actual high tiers.

 

[DJ3DS]

In my opinion, Ness, ROB, and Yoshi are the fakest "high" tiers at the moment. They all got some new tools that make em more annoying than past iterations for sure, especially Ness Down smash, Ness PK Magnet, ROB Rotor, Yoshi's random kill moves, to be short and sweet.

But all the things that made them mid tier last game are almost perfectly in tact. Rob still can't land, Ness' recovery is still garbage, Yoshi can't outmash swordies, etc.

I'd watch out for characters with gameplans that got weaknesses adressed and their kit is still good (ie: PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN)

I would place ROB in the upper half of the cast but would definitely agree he's not a high tier - most ROB mains don't think so either. This said, his buffs extend past having a useful side special. His neutral aerial has faster startup and increased range which does help with his juggling problem (though doesn't eliminate it) and his boxing game is improved significantly due to changes to down tilt. He has setups into jab locks and techchases at most percents and laser and gyro are both potent edgeguarding tools.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

Random aside but people keep uttering "A poor craftsman blames his tools" in fighting game tier discussions and it drives me nuts. Fightgames aren't "crafts" in any way or shape. It's tennis, not a ballet. You could use a guitar for a racket and it'd absolutely be the guitar's fault you lose.

Anyway, the better question to ask is: will the meta shape up where Ness's worst matchups (let's say, the swordsters and the rushdown crowd) start to dominate the field? It doesn't seem unlikely, but then, maybe some Snake or Duck Hunt breakthroughs will happen and make them super-relevant.

Without any real MUs issues and Ness having really strong tools. It is a matter of the craftsman blaming the tools. If he believes that it's Ness holding him back he should probably look at himself. As long you don't start with self reflecting you'll never improve.

 

[NotLiquid]

The only two cents I have to throw in on this entire "how good is Ness" debate is he's historically always been a character that people look at with some real self-serving optics.

The only Smash game this hasn't happened with is Brawl, where it was commonly agreed early on that he was booty butt cheeks in spite of buffs. But in every other Smash game? There was always a tendency to look at this character with just the instant assumption that "I swear guys, he's actually stupidly good". Yeah, the character gets a bunch of good results early on, that's always been a thing. It happened in Smash 64 (where he was considered top tier at one point - and no, not just in the Japanese version). It happened in Melee as well, to a bit of a lesser extent. It definitely happened with Smash 4 when he was initially ranked as a high tier at 13th, and now I feel like we're having a bit of deja vu yet again with Ultimate.

And I mean, I guess that's not too surprising. Ness is an easy character to get the impression of "being good" - or rather, he's one of the easiest characters to "get good at". His actual stats are nothing to scoff at; good damage, decent combo ability, he's got a few attacks that can really mess with the player both in-game and mentally, he's got the best (well, I guess second best now) kill throw in the game... it's no wonder there's a stupid amount of players online who do well with him in at least in my region; this is a character that does especially well in online environments when you have to deal with delay and all that. That all sounds really good on paper!

But it's not all sunshine and rainbows obviously. Ness' character flaws have been endemic across every single game he's in, and that makes him one of the biggest characters that's suspect to power creep. He gets forced into playing defensively really easily due to his less than stellar mobility, he gets outranged by a bunch of people on the cast (especially when the common sentiment right now is that top tiers have range), and his recovery is still his biggest Achilles heel. Not to mention, the fact that grabs are now not as good as in previous games means he's going to struggle to seal some crucial stocks for what's already a character who usually needs to commit to risky play. I guess he got a cute little buff with the yo-yo, but that only really forces opponents to be a little smarter about recovery.

I guess what I'm saying here is at the end of the day, if there's any character who's results during the first month of any Smash game it's worth looking at with some skepticism.... it's usually always been Ness. He's always going to be a solid character because that's just the way his kit is, players like FOW and Shaky will also get mileage out of him. He's not a bad character, at worst he's an average one, but I wouldn't be surprised if those results start to go down in the future, if only because while he's a comparatively easy character to learn, he's simultaneously an easy character to learn how to play against.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

The only two cents I have to throw in on this entire "how good is Ness" debate is he's historically always been a character that people look at with some real self-serving optics.

The only Smash game this hasn't happened with is Brawl, where it was commonly agreed early on that he was booty butt cheeks in spite of buffs. But in every other Smash game? There was always a tendency to look at this character with just the instant assumption that "I swear guys, he's actually stupidly good". Yeah, the character gets a bunch of good results early on, that's always been a thing. It happened in Smash 64 (where he was considered top tier at one point - and no, not just in the Japanese version). It happened in Melee as well, to a bit of a lesser extent. It definitely happened with Smash 4, and now I feel like we're having a bit of deja vu yet again with Ultimate.

And I mean, I guess that's not too surprising. Ness is an easy character to get the impression of "being good" - or rather, he's one of the easiest characters to "get good at". His actual stats are nothing to scoff at; good damage, decent combo ability, he's got a few attacks that can really mess with the player both in-game and mentally, he's got the best (well, I guess second best now) kill throw in the game... it's no wonder there's a stupid amount of players online who do well with him in at least in my region; this is a character that does especially well in online environments when you have to deal with delay and all that. That all sounds really good on paper!

But it's not all sunshine and rainbows obviously. Ness' character flaws have been endemic across every single game he's in, and that makes him one of the biggest character that's suspect to power creep. He gets forced into playing defensively really easily due to his less than stellar mobility, he gets outranged by a bunch of people on the cast (especially when the common sentiment right now is that top tiers have range), and his recovery is still his biggest Achilles heel. Not to mention, the fact that grabs are now not as good as in previous games means he's going to struggle to seal some crucial stocks for what's already a character who usually needs to commit to risky play. I guess he got a cute little buff with the yo-yo, but that only really forces opponents to be a little smarter about recovery.

I guess what I'm saying here is at the end of the day, if there's any character who's results during the first month of any Smash game it's worth looking at with some skepticism.... it's usually always been Ness. He's always going to be a solid character because that's just the way his kit is, players like FOW and Shaky will also get mileage out of him. He's not a bad character, at worst he's an average one, but I wouldn't be surprised if those results start to go down in the future, if only because while he's a comparatively easy character to learn, he's simultaneously an easy character to learn how to play against.

In sm4sh Ness was severely overrated. I always felt like he was trash and he was. In this game he's ridiculous. Most people say he's going to fall off but don't give reasons why. They never look at his tools and evaluate them. It's just well he was hype in 4 it's probably true now. However, that couldn't be further from the truth. People need less knee jerk and more patience.

 

[NotLiquid]

In sm4sh Ness was severely overrated. I always felt like he was trash and he was. In this game he's ridiculous. Most people say he's going to fall off but don't give reasons why. They never look at his tools and evaluate them. It's just well he was hype in 4 it's probably true now. However, that couldn't be further from the truth. People need less knee jerk and more patience.

That's all well and good for you, but this was obviously not the general sentiment when Smash 4 came out, and it's dishonest to say people give no reasons to believing he might drop when plenty of his crucial flaws that can be exposed across several MUs have been laid out. To say anything would be a kneejerk reaction right now would be to say Ness is an unequivocal top tier contender, because by your admission you want people to have more patience despite working off of a conclusion brought about by early results which Ness, again, has a history of usually doing pretty decently with.

 

[Itachi_]

Yes. In short, whenever you cancel a dash forwards into a dash backwards, there's a 2ish frame window in which you can jump out of the dash while retaining your forwards momentum and turning around. So you can do landing Fair, dash forwards, cancel the forwards dash into a dash backwards within the first 6 frames, jump within the first two frames of that dash, then Bair. It's a lot less complicated than it sounds, trust me.

Ohhhhh, I forgot you could do that. I practiced that a bit with inkling but it totally slipped my mind to try that with Wolf. Thx!

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

That's all well and good for you, but this was obviously not the general sentiment when Smash 4 came out, and it's dishonest to say people give no reasons to believing he might drop when plenty of his crucial flaws that can be exposed across several MUs have been laid out. To say anything would be a kneejerk reaction right now would be to say Ness is an unequivocal top tier contender, because by your admission you want people to have more patience despite working off of a conclusion brought about by early results which Ness, again, has a history of usually doing pretty decently with.

If I say look at the characters tools how am I pointing at results? If you want details on why I think Ness is strong I've already spelled it out. I'm not going to keep repeating myself because every other page someone thinks Ness is overrated. What's Ness worst MU btw? How many losing MUs does he have?

 

[Browny]

No Lucarios in top 64, Tsu thinking of dropping him as well and Anti seems on the fence. I think people are really overrating the character. He's extremely difficult to play, loses the weirdest matchups, and is entirely read based. As time goes on, everyone will figure out Lucario's jank.

The character is going to need some serious help if he ever really is to be a high tier. I think a lot of Lucario mains are having an identity crisis with the character, especially when they try out actual high tiers.

You're over-complicating it.

Lucario simply has the worst combos in the game, the slowest kill moves in the game, below average weight with a mediocre recovery. The character was absolutely gutted from smash 4 to ultimate. The fact that so many 'pros' rated him highly on early tier lists shows how utterly ignorant they are of the character and only ever see him as 'aura makes his bair kill at 70' which is the same way its been since brawl.

2.0.0 made absolutely NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER to his viability. He has critical, glaring flaws with his kill moves all being too slow for how punishable they are, useless combos and that his throws are all garbage. Lucario needs his old weight back, his smashes to be 3-5 frames quicker, make his fthrow a aura-boosted kill throw, dthrow combos for a much larger range, aura sphere stronger, his recovery to go further and utilt FAF like 3 frames faster. Then the character will be decent.

And you know whats funny... some people might look at that and go wow, thats a huge amount of buffs you're asking, he doesnt need all that. No. That was what Lucario used to be like. That gives you an idea of just how much he was nerfed from brawl, to 4, to ultimate.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

You're over-complicating it.

Lucario simply has the worst combos in the game, the slowest kill moves in the game, below average weight with a mediocre recovery. The character was absolutely gutted from smash 4 to ultimate. The fact that so many 'pros' rated him highly on early tier lists shows how utterly ignorant they are of the character and only ever see him as 'aura makes his bair kill at 70' which is the same way its been since brawl.

2.0.0 made absolutely NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER to his viability. He has critical, glaring flaws with his kill moves all being too slow for how punishable they are, useless combos and that his throws are all garbage. Lucario needs his old weight back, his smashes to be 3-5 frames quicker, make his fthrow a aura-boosted kill throw, dthrow combos for a much larger range, aura sphere stronger, his recovery to go further and utilt FAF like 3 frames faster. Then the character will be decent.

And you know whats funny... some people might look at that and go wow, thats a huge amount of buffs you're asking, he doesnt need all that. No. That was what Lucario used to be like. That gives you an idea of just how much he was nerfed from brawl, to 4, to ultimate.

I could dig the changes but real talk **** Lucario.

 

[PK Bash]

I definitely think he wins the Pichu and Snake (he oppresses Snake easy when played right) matchups. And he does have a good enough reward to play. His advantage is really good and he’s good in neutral against most characters. I’m not ready to nail him down yet not do I wanna be somebody who overhypes their main but I still think thus far he’s top 20 or so. He’ll never be a top tier character but he’ll always be viable and he goes even or close to even on a lot of high and top tier matchups. I’m personally optimistic in what he can do and I think more people will pick him up but I understand the other side

I appreciate your respect, man. You're a cool dude.
He may be top 20, he may not be. Either way, if you ask me, he's not viable when we're quite probably not even going to see multiple players breaking multiple top 32s, let alone multiple top 16s or more, at the biggest events. FOW's an exceptional player, we should all know this by now. I'll hopefully explore what I perceive Ness' issues to be adequately later in this post. You don't have to agree of course - in fact I really appreciate your optimism for Ness, we both like this character a lot it seems - but I hope it clears up my position a little bit more!
RE Snake, frankly I've played a lot of Snakes in bracket now and I don't think PSI Magnet is anywhere near enough to make this matchup "oppressive" for Snake. f you are getting at something else here though, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

To say Ness isn't high tier right now would be to give a massive middle finger to his vastly increasing results, both regular placements and 1st placements through Ultimate's career. I'm going to say the exact same thing I said about Ganondorf and that, no matter how good (or bad) you think he is, no matter if he has the best data on him or the worst, if he can't show those results, they don't matter.

Ness has results and nobody can deny it.

Week 4: (10 Placements and 2 First Places)
Week 5: (15 Placements and 5 First Places)
Week 6: (11 Placements and 5 First Places)
Week 7: (24 Placements and 8 First Places)
Week 8: (17 Placements and 4 First Places)

Results always speak louder than words and as long as Ness continues to show these double digit placements and these multiple first place advances, especially equal or greater than other expected high tier characters such as Lucina, Chrom, Roy, Shulk, Fox, Pichu, Peach, Inkling, Link, etc...

Then either he's a High Tier character with all the results to show.

Or

You all suck, can't play the game well and are letting this apparently "worst character ever" garbage tier gimmicky POS wash over your tournaments (Small or Large) like the sweat of a fat man basking in a sauna.

And I honestly don't know jack about Ness in the long run except that as a main, screw this kid and his BS Anti-Ridley moveset. However, I can't look at these results and not give Ness the respect that other players have clearly given him throughout Ultimate's career as of now. You don't get these results by being just popular, or gimmicky but, for this long?

By actually having some merit to your name.

Ness has been a powerful regional threat for a long time now. Even in Brawl, where he was clearly not viable.
I don't even think Ness is bad, and believe me I am well aware of how much he craps on many middling characters (shame all the relevant characters crap on him), but godlike players pulling the godlike results they always pulled even with a significantly less viable Ness is not going to convince me of Ness' newfound potential in this game.

I'm sorry but Ness is a top tier. I really don't care if the best Ness in EU dropped him. That's the most irrelevant **** ever. He has strong reps in the US and Japan whivh is more than a lot of the cast can say. His biggest weakness is his recovery and that's basically it. His buttons are really good. If swordies sheik or Rosa was more prevalent then he'd get pushed down. However, that's not the case so he'll continue to be a massive threat.

The metagame is still developing and nothing thus far shows anything that's going to push Ness out of the meta. Also a poor craftsman blames high tools.

Yes Ness is blessed with his rep I agree. FOW is absolutely broken and probably a top 100 Smash player in history, Shaky and Awestin are both long-time gods (been playing Ness for a decade or more) who sadly don't travel and Best Ness is going to make some serious waves, I've no doubt.

His biggest weakness is not so much his recovery. Plenty of top tiers with bad recoveries. His biggest weakness is that his neutral lost almost all of it's safety, comfirmability and reliability. Everything is very committal now, not that good to begin with and you can't afford to guess wrong because his kit doesn't allow it. You should be able to see this even just watching his sets but try playing him against good people for a bit. This is the problem, this is why he is not going to be able to keep up in the future. His "really good" buttons are back air and neutral air and even those you can't depend on. Forward air is good but it's a massive commitment (a top tier Fair it clearly ain't) which leaves Ness open forever in this game of frame 3 jumpsquats and massive dash distance to punish it, and it loses to too many relevant moves now to be reliable anyway. Apart from everything horizontally disjointed, it loses to Wolf's Nair/Fair/Bair (Wolf's aerial footsies cleanly outclass Ness' in general and he isn't even a swordie), Inkling's FAir and BAir, Palutena's BAir and many more besides. So you can't rely on that. Up air lost all it's neutral utility from Smash 4 (in fact it lost all it's utility from Smash 4, period), there is no way this new one is better for him when you no longer have a safe-on-shield massive hitbox that confirms into grab and other moves, covers Ness' head with a threatening hitbox (Ness has no good options to cover his head in this game, which suuucks) that nobody really could challenge, and kills reliably. PK Fire is just not good (very easy to escape (PSA: you do not SDI PKF), forcing Ness to basically guess the escape option to get a followup, something he is often too slow to do even if you guess right) but with the newfound unreliability of up air for advantage state (doesn't beat other aerials any more so people can challenge it; you can fall out of it) Ness kind of depends on PK Fire now to catch landings. PK Thunder is really good but you'd be a fool to disregard the inherent risk when using it. There are safer and similarly - or more - rewarding advantage states. Fox and Pichu suffocate you in ways Ness is too slow to do; Nikita is PKT except better; Turnips and Inkling's everything are very low risk for the reward you get etc etc I could go on and on. Ness doesn't have one of the best any more. Hold me to that as the game gets older. Dash attack is pitiful now (They nerfed the range on it for some reason, making one of his best tools against superior horizontal disjoint significantly worse, and it lost all it's combos except at extremely low %, making it yet worse still) and it is very very hard to actually get the grabs that Ness needs (shieldgrabbing nerfed, dash grab range very nerfed, still slow as hell, no landing lag on anything).

So yeah his "really good" buttons do not hold up any more. I hope that's an adequate evaluation of his tools for you - you should at least be able to see where I'm coming from.

Swordies are prevalent, they're all really good and they're everywhere. But - and this is where we start getting quite subjective so pleas bear with me - his bad matchups aren't just swords and lol gimps. Wolf walks all over him. Snake beats him 100%, Ness has nothing to "oppress" this man (PSIMag overrated af, both in general and in this matchup). The Fox matchup is significantly better for Fox this game (one of those matchups that illustrates just how hard Smash 4 Ness was carried by his up air lol), he doesn't beat Pikachu, who runs rings around him and kills him offstage risk-free; Pichu players are all souped up on caffeine but if they could control themselves Ness doesn't beat that character either. Belmont is obviously not good for Ness, Ness is carried in that matchup solely by his ability to gimp them there is nothing else going for him there. Inkling is a losing mu who sets a pace Ness cannot keep up with and outclasses him tool for tool; Ness relies hard on down smash two framing. Definitely a struggle.
Ness worst MU? Nobody knows at this point. My money is on Lucina.

This post is big enough by now, I think I've made my case and I'm willing now to drop it here and let time be the judge. But my final point will be this. If you are calling me a bad craftsman, that's fair enough. I've stopped playing Ness in bracket though and am playing some amalgamation of Wolf/Lucina/Pichu/Cloud with the endgoal of committing to one of those, so I won't be able to shift any blame on to my tools in the future.

If however you are calling S1 a "bad craftsman"... you should re-evaluate that. That's just not tolerable and it's certainly not correct.

---

According to the frame data nair is -4 and bair is -5 on shield Nair comes out frame 5 and bair comes out frame 10. I'd consider the moves to be pretty freaking safe but hey I could be wrong.

I never said they weren't safe. I said these moves were his best. What point are you trying to make here?

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

I appreciate your respect, man. You're a cool dude.
He may be top 20, he may not be. Either way, if you ask me, he's not viable when we're quite probably not even going to see multiple players breaking multiple top 32s, let alone multiple top 16s or more, at the biggest events. FOW's an exceptional player, we should all know this by now. I'll hopefully explore what I perceive Ness' issues to be adequately later in this post. You don't have to agree of course - in fact I really appreciate your optimism for Ness, we both like this character a lot it seems - but I hope it clears up my position a little bit more!
RE Snake, frankly I've played a lot of Snakes in bracket now and I don't think PSI Magnet is anywhere near enough to make this matchup "oppressive" for Snake. f you are getting at something else here though, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Ness has been a powerful regional threat for a long time now. Even in Brawl, where he was clearly not viable.
I don't even think Ness is bad, and believe me I am well aware of how much he craps on many middling characters (shame all the relevant characters crap on him), but godlike players pulling the godlike results they always pulled even with a significantly less viable Ness is not going to convince me of Ness' newfound potential in this game.


Yes Ness is blessed with his rep I agree. FOW is absolutely broken and probably a top 100 Smash player in history, Shaky and Awestin are both long-time gods (been playing Ness for a decade or more) who sadly don't travel and Best Ness is going to make some serious waves, I've no doubt.

His biggest weakness is not so much his recovery. Plenty of top tiers with bad recoveries. His biggest weakness is that his neutral lost almost all of it's safety, comfirmability and reliability. Everything is very committal now, not that good to begin with and you can't afford to guess wrong because his kit doesn't allow it. You should be able to see this even just watching his sets but try playing him against good people for a bit. This is the problem, this is why he is not going to be able to keep up in the future. His "really good" buttons are back air and neutral air and even those you can't depend on. Forward air is good but it's a massive commitment (a top tier Fair it clearly ain't) which leaves Ness open forever in this game of frame 3 jumpsquats and massive dash distance to punish it, and it loses to too many relevant moves now to be reliable anyway. Apart from everything horizontally disjointed, it loses to Wolf's Nair/Fair/Bair (Wolf's aerial footsies cleanly outclass Ness' in general and he isn't even a swordie), Inkling's FAir and BAir, Palutena's BAir and many more besides. So you can't rely on that. Up air lost all it's neutral utility from Smash 4 (in fact it lost all it's utility from Smash 4, period), there is no way this new one is better for him when you no longer have a safe-on-shield massive hitbox that confirms into grab and other moves, covers Ness' head with a threatening hitbox (Ness has no good options to cover his head in this game, which suuucks) that nobody really could challenge, and kills reliably. PK Fire is just not good (very easy to escape (PSA: you do not SDI PKF), forcing Ness to basically guess the escape option to get a followup, something he is often too slow to do even if you guess right) but with the newfound unreliability of up air for advantage state (doesn't beat other aerials any more so people can challenge it; you can fall out of it) Ness kind of depends on PK Fire now to catch landings. PK Thunder is really good but you'd be a fool to disregard the inherent risk when using it. There are safer and similarly - or more - rewarding advantage states. Fox and Pichu suffocate you in ways Ness is too slow to do; Nikita is PKT except better; Turnips and Inkling's everything are very low risk for the reward you get etc etc I could go on and on. Ness doesn't have one of the best any more. Hold me to that as the game gets older. Dash attack is pitiful now (They nerfed the range on it for some reason, making one of his best tools against superior horizontal disjoint significantly worse, and it lost all it's combos except at extremely low %, making it yet worse still) and it is very very hard to actually get the grabs that Ness needs (shieldgrabbing nerfed, dash grab range very nerfed, still slow as hell, no landing lag on anything).

So yeah his "really good" buttons do not hold up any more. I hope that's an adequate evaluation of his tools for you - you should at least be able to see where I'm coming from.

Swordies are prevalent, they're all really good and they're everywhere. But - and this is where we start getting quite subjective so pleas bear with me - his bad matchups aren't just swords and lol gimps. Wolf walks all over him. Snake beats him 100%, Ness has nothing to "oppress" this man (PSIMag overrated af, both in general and in this matchup). The Fox matchup is significantly better for Fox this game (one of those matchups that illustrates just how hard Smash 4 Ness was carried by his up air lol), he doesn't beat Pikachu, who runs rings around him and kills him offstage risk-free; Pichu players are all souped up on caffeine but if they could control themselves Ness doesn't beat that character either. Belmont is obviously not good for Ness, Ness is carried in that matchup solely by his ability to gimp them there is nothing else going for him there. Inkling is a losing mu who sets a pace Ness cannot keep up with and outclasses him tool for tool; Ness relies hard on down smash two framing. Definitely a struggle.
Ness worst MU? Nobody knows at this point. My money is on Lucina.

This post is big enough by now, I think I've made my case and I'm willing now to drop it here and let time be the judge. But my final point will be this. If you are calling me a bad craftsman, that's fair enough. I've stopped playing Ness in bracket though and am playing some amalgamation of Wolf/Lucina/Pichu/Cloud with the endgoal of committing to one of those, so I won't be able to shift any blame on to my tools in the future.

If however you are calling S1 a "bad craftsman"... you should re-evaluate that. That's just not tolerable and it's certainly not correct.

According to the frame data nair is -4 and bair is -5 on shield Nair comes out frame 5 and bair comes out frame 10. I'd consider the moves to be pretty freaking safe but hey I could be wrong.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

Okay first off this isn't a S4 thread but to claim Ness was trash in that game is pure ignorance. Ness rarely was below the top 30 in results in that game over its lifespan, that's mid tier not the unfortunate mess that was S4 Zelda or Puff. Ness wasn't a trash character in Brawl either and would had serviced as a alright lower end mid tier if he didn't have grab release shenanigans against many popular characters (Marth one of his historically bad MUs being one of those characters). His overall kit did not get totally overhauled in the Brawl to S4 transition it just got made stronger, ledge hogging was no longer a thing and grab releases were no more. You also had smash being played largely over wifi in greater numbers than in the previous entry with a lot of newcomers into the scene who didnt know how to handle a lot of characters veterans were used to seeing which lead to massive over rating of a lot of characters, Ness included. (Ness doesn't benefit that much from wifi, try recovering when a small lag spike occurs mid PKT lol)

Having said that, Ness returns to Ultimate, weakness are the same as always but his ability to deal with these weakness is better. He has a much better ranged tool in a less laggy PKF to help contest range he once couldn't (when used right). The jury is still out on magnet but I've personally applied and see it applied in higher level play ways get past defenses easier in this game. it offers him mixups that he previously didn't have (With a bit of risk of course). And when combined with his strong aerials that will all kill or his strong throws that will get you off stage and being chased with one of the best projectiles in this game (PKT). It's not a situation you want to be in often against Ness nor is it one you can be in often without losing a stock. With the fact you cant tech moves that launch you at a certain speed in this game, even challenging PKT2 is a lot more risky in this game once you've hit around 60-80% depending on your character and Ness' rage, combine this with DAD and ness has legitimate buffs to his recovery that help out a ton. Ask yourself how often you see a top level Ness player get gimped despite his bad recovery it doesn't happen as much as someone with a bad recovery you would think.

Do I think he's top tier? Absolutely not, he has too many weakness. Do I think he's high tier right now? Sure do, the lower end of it currently. Will people get better at dealing with him? For sure they will, people will get better at dealing with all the characters in this game. Will it affect his future viability? That's yet to be determined and will take a lot longer than 1 and a half months of Ultimate to determine.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

Okay first off this isn't a S4 thread but to claim Ness was trash in that game is pure ignorance. Ness rarely was below the top 30 in results in that game over its lifespan, that's mid tier not the unfortunate mess that was S4 Zelda or Puff. Ness wasn't a trash character in Brawl either and would had serviced as a alright lower end mid tier if he didn't have grab release shenanigans against many popular characters (Marth one of his historically bad MUs being one of those characters). His overall kit did not get totally overhauled in the Brawl to S4 transition it just got made stronger, ledge hogging was no longer a thing and grab releases were no more. You also had smash being played largely over wifi in greater numbers than in the previous entry with a lot of newcomers into the scene who didnt know how to handle a lot of characters veterans were used to seeing which lead to massive over rating of a lot of characters, Ness included. (Ness doesn't benefit that much from wifi, try recovering when a small lag spike occurs mid PKT lol)

Having said that, Ness returns to Ultimate, weakness are the same as always but his ability to deal with these weakness is better. He has a much better ranged tool in a less laggy PKF to help contest range he once couldn't (when used right). The jury is still out on magnet but I've personally applied and see it applied in higher level play ways get past defenses easier in this game. it offers him mixups that he previously didn't have (With a bit of risk of course). And when combined with his strong aerials that will all kill or his strong throws that will get you off stage and being chased with one of the best projectiles in this game (PKT). It's not a situation you want to be in often against Ness nor is it one you can be in often without losing a stock. With the fact you cant tech moves that launch you at a certain speed in this game, even challenging PKT2 is a lot more risky in this game once you've hit around 60-80% depending on your character and Ness' rage, combine this with DAD and ness has legitimate buffs to his recovery that help out a ton. Ask yourself how often you see a top level Ness player get gimped despite his bad recovery it doesn't happen as much as someone with a bad recovery you would think.

Do I think he's top tier? Absolutely not, he has too many weakness. Do I think he's high tier right now? Sure do, the lower end of it currently. Will people get better at dealing with him? For sure they will, people will get better at dealing with all the characters in this game. Will it affect his future viability? That's yet to be determined and will take a lot longer than 1 and a half months of Ultimate to determine.

Ness was trash very slow low range no kill confirms. His but tool was roll grab. Character was terrible.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

Ness was trash very slow low range no kill confirms. His but tool was roll grab. Character was terrible.

Again I reiterate after four years of Smash 4. A hiatus of his top level players and plenty of time for the character to get figured out the character was rarely seen outside of the top 30 range in results, infact the "figured out" character started to have a upward swing in results in the final year of S4 with BestNess becoming better as a player and carrying the majority of his results at tournament. You right he was and still is slow and doesn't have good range but there are many more factors that go into a characters viability than "lol slow". He had confirms, a few but they existed but when you can place safe kill moves on shield in addition to having a grab that kills that bypasses that shield. (Ontop of all the edge guarding you can do) killing isn't as big an issue without having many confirms. I think is a good example of that.

 

[Nocally]

At high level of play, Ness currently seems to be a top tier character. At top level of play, Ness seems to be a high tier character.

His results paints a picture of a highly viable character though.

 

[ARISTOS]

In my opinion, Ness, ROB, and Yoshi are the fakest "high" tiers at the moment. They all got some new tools that make em more annoying than past iterations for sure, especially Ness Down smash, Ness PK Magnet, ROB Rotor, Yoshi's random kill moves, to be short and sweet.

But all the things that made them mid tier last game are almost perfectly in tact. Rob still can't land, Ness' recovery is still garbage, Yoshi can't outmash swordies, etc.

I'd watch out for characters with gameplans that got weaknesses adressed and their kit is still good (ie: PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN)

I agree that these three characters always fall into the "fake-great" trap, but I don't think it's quite for the same reasons you gave.

All three characters are unique in that they're a bit hard to trap and juggle due to being floaty, lot of shifting hitboxes/hurtboxes, and "tricks" which work when you aren't familiar with their gameplans. As people begin to optimize advantage states, the get-out-of-jail cards the characters thought to have actually become null and punishable. Similarly, stuff like S4 Yoshi jab and eventually Ultimate ROB nair become exposed as much more limited tools than originally thought.

Thus, as counterplay trickles down from the top level, these characters at all levels get away with less and less, until they settle in positions where they are compared to characters who can't actively punish the weaknesses these characters have. But these characters always do well at the midlevel, because counterplay to their toolkits is harder than actively using the toolkit

 

[AxelVDP]

You're over-complicating it.

Lucario simply has the worst combos in the game, the slowest kill moves in the game, below average weight with a mediocre recovery. The character was absolutely gutted from smash 4 to ultimate. The fact that so many 'pros' rated him highly on early tier lists shows how utterly ignorant they are of the character and only ever see him as 'aura makes his bair kill at 70' which is the same way its been since brawl.

2.0.0 made absolutely NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER to his viability. He has critical, glaring flaws with his kill moves all being too slow for how punishable they are, useless combos and that his throws are all garbage. Lucario needs his old weight back, his smashes to be 3-5 frames quicker, make his fthrow a aura-boosted kill throw, dthrow combos for a much larger range, aura sphere stronger, his recovery to go further and utilt FAF like 3 frames faster. Then the character will be decent.

And you know whats funny... some people might look at that and go wow, thats a huge amount of buffs you're asking, he doesnt need all that. No. That was what Lucario used to be like. That gives you an idea of just how much he was nerfed from brawl, to 4, to ultimate.

I do agree with the fact that Lucario is being overrated, but I think your outlook on the character is a bit to grim and somewhat biased.
His recovery is indeed one of his biggest problems, but not for the lack of range but for the slooow startup and lack of a hitbox untill the very end of the move. It's very easy to edgeguard Lucario once he commits to the move.
I also disagree on his throws being bad: uthrow is good for low% (and aura) combos, dthrow scales way less than uthrow and can combo with DI in and sets up tech chases on high platforms like bf top one reliably, backthrow at mid %s sets up tech situations where you can punish with a simple aurasphere to rack up good damage and also kills at high%+aura, fthrow might not be amazing but it's quick and sends at a good angle.
His combo game is not amazing but it's certainly not bad: at low %s ff nair > dtilt > grab > uthrow > uair/fair chain does around 30%, fair comboes into stuff well up to mid %s, including charged aura spheres and with aura low% uthrow > uair is an easy 35ish%.
At higher %s yes, he lacks real combos but that usually does not matter when you have pretty good damage per hit (with aura) on key moves such as aurasphere, uair, bair, force palm (even as a projectile) etc
Killing is also not a huge problem, at least not when you have among the best ledgetrapping in the game with aura sphere. Also uair is a f10 kill move, bair is f13 and force palm command grab comes out as early as f7. I'd not consider these moves slow.
His fsmash is also a great whiff punish move with good disjoint and below average endlag.
Aura sphere also has incredible utility, aura powered aurasphere is probably amongst the best moves in the entire game, you can do basically anything with it: punish landings, great okizeme potential, it's a movement option, it's a combo starter, it's kill move, can be used as a poke when Lucario's buttons cannot contest the opponent, conditiones the opponents and so on.
Overall I feel Lucario is a pretty mediocre character held together by an incredible move in aura sphere

 

[peekpeek]

In my opinion, Ness, ROB, and Yoshi are the fakest "high" tiers at the moment. They all got some new tools that make em more annoying than past iterations for sure, especially Ness Down smash, Ness PK Magnet, ROB Rotor, Yoshi's random kill moves, to be short and sweet.

But all the things that made them mid tier last game are almost perfectly in tact. Rob still can't land, Ness' recovery is still garbage, Yoshi can't outmash swordies, etc.

I'd watch out for characters with gameplans that got weaknesses adressed and their kit is still good (ie: PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN PACMAN)

I think this gets at something interesting. With 72 "real" characters right now, it is pretty easy for people to come up with very rough top-third, middle-third, bottom-third tier lists. If forcing a rigid 24-per-bin, Ness, Yoshi, and Rob would probably be some of the higher variance on the lists. Top 24 might be generous in a way that benefits them, but they'd probably end up on quite a few middle chunks.

In a three tier, 24-per-tier list, there's probably 12 characters for each tier that would be in that tier on ~85%+ of lists. Ness, Yoshi, and Rob definitely wouldn't be that high on agreement.

 

[Rocketjay8]

I wasn’t sure if it was me who said that and I didn’t mean it was bad. Just the fact that you both drop down on it and counter it is exploitable but not bad. They’re not that hard to gimp either. That said I think they all have average to above average recoveries and I didn’t mean to say they were bad. Especially as far as recoveries go in this game they can definitely land and recover

For Link's recovery, he does have the new bomb recovery that allows him to mix it up much better than his old one. The only problem with it is that it's hard as hell to master. Wh

I do agree with the fact that Lucario is being overrated, but I think your outlook on the character is a bit to grim and somewhat biased.
His recovery is indeed one of his biggest problems, but not for the lack of range but for the slooow startup and lack of a hitbox untill the very end of the move. It's very easy to edgeguard Lucario once he commits to the move.
I also disagree on his throws being bad: uthrow is good for low% (and aura) combos, dthrow scales way less than uthrow and can combo with DI in and sets up tech chases on high platforms like bf top one reliably, backthrow at mid %s sets up tech situations where you can punish with a simple aurasphere to rack up good damage and also kills at high%+aura, fthrow might not be amazing but it's quick and sends at a good angle.
His combo game is not amazing but it's certainly not bad: at low %s ff nair > dtilt > grab > uthrow > uair/fair chain does around 30%, fair comboes into stuff well up to mid %s, including charged aura spheres and with aura low% uthrow > uair is an easy 35ish%.
At higher %s yes, he lacks real combos but that usually does not matter when you have pretty good damage per hit (with aura) on key moves such as aurasphere, uair, bair, force palm (even as a projectile) etc
Killing is also not a huge problem, at least not when you have among the best ledgetrapping in the game with aura sphere. Also uair is a f10 kill move, bair is f13 and force palm command grab comes out as early as f7. I'd not consider these moves slow.
His fsmash is also a great whiff punish move with good disjoint and below average endlag.
Aura sphere also has incredible utility, aura powered aurasphere is probably amongst the best moves in the entire game, you can do basically anything with it: punish landings, great okizeme potential, it's a movement option, it's a combo starter, it's kill move, can be used as a poke when Lucario's buttons cannot contest the opponent, conditiones the opponents and so on.
Overall I feel Lucario is a pretty mediocre character held together by an incredible move in aura sphere

The biggest gest problem with his recovery is that it's really sensitive. If you just miscalculated your angle from extreme speed, he would just be sent into a curve, miss the ledge, and fall to the blast zone like an idiot. I have no Idea why they made his recovery so unreliable.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

Again I reiterate after four years of Smash 4. A hiatus of his top level players and plenty of time for the character to get figured out the character was rarely seen outside of the top 30 range in results, infact the "figured out" character started to have a upward swing in results in the final year of S4 with BestNess becoming better as a player and carrying the majority of his results at tournament. You right he was and still is slow and doesn't have good range but there are many more factors that go into a characters viability than "lol slow". He had confirms, a few but they existed but when you can place safe kill moves on shield in addition to having a grab that kills that bypasses that shield. (Ontop of all the edge guarding you can do) killing isn't as big an issue without having many confirms. I think is a good example of that.

did he have confirms? I dont reaelly remember to be honest playing vs Ness was pretty much throw him off stage gimp him. Never really seen the hype behind the character at all. As I said his best option was roll throw outside of that he was lack luster. I feel as though wolf has a lot more going for him than sm4sh Ness I can understand the comparison. One of the things that really took me by surprise was some of the angles at which Zackray would recover with him.

 

[Frihetsanka]

Then either he's a High Tier character with all the results to show.

Or

You all suck, can't play the game well and are letting this apparently "worst character ever" garbage tier gimmicky POS wash over your tournaments (Small or Large) like the sweat of a fat man basking in a sauna.

False equivalence. Ness might be a high-mid tier character, nothing strange about a high-mid tier character getting results, Pikachu recently got 2nd at Genesis 6 in Melee. Ness had a lot of results in Smash 4 despite only being a mid tier (high-mid tier at best) character. People overrated Ness for years in Smash 4, it's possible they will in Ultimate as well.

Is Ness a high tier character? I don't know, at this point. He might be, or he might be a high-mid character. I do think he's better than in Smash 4, but I'm not sure if it's enough to truly make him a high tier character.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Ness seems a bit polarizing, the matchups where isn't totally opressed in (hint: it's sword characters) he does real good against. But he suffers when there's enemies that can easily deal with his PK traps, semi zoning, and aerial moves. He also doesn't love gimps. In theory, he might do okay vs Fox and Pichu, but I doubt any Ness player can beat the current top players of those characters. Then he still isn't gonna do well vs the likes of Palutena and the Fire Emblem swordies.

I think he's in a similar boat to R.O.B. indeed. A great character, but with glaring weaknesses.

What are the thoughts of Diddy in Ultimate currently? I see him place higher in local tournaments now than in the early days of Ultimate. So guess what I said was true, that people will realize quickly he isn't all that bad. I still don't see him being more than a niche pick though, because he's clearly outclassed by Fox, Greninja and Pichu in terms of what he can deliver, but his neutral is significantly better than them, or so I feel.

I also haven't seen much DK play around honestly. What happened with that?

 

[MG_3989]

Ness seems a bit polarizing, the matchups where isn't totally opressed in (hint: it's sword characters) he does real good against. But he suffers when there's enemies that can easily deal with his PK traps, semi zoning, and aerial moves. He also doesn't love gimps. In theory, he might do okay vs Fox and Pichu, but I doubt any Ness player can beat the current top players of those characters. Then he still isn't gonna do well vs the likes of Palutena and the Fire Emblem swordies.

I think he's in a similar boat to R.O.B. indeed. A great character, but with glaring weaknesses.

What are the thoughts of Diddy in Ultimate currently? I see him place higher in local tournaments now than in the early days of Ultimate. So guess what I said was true, that people will realize quickly he isn't all that bad. I still don't see him being more than a niche pick though, because he's clearly outclassed by Fox, Greninja and Pichu in terms of what he can deliver, but his neutral is significantly better than them, or so I feel.

I also haven't seen much DK play around honestly. What happened with that?

I played Diddy Kong in Brawl along with Ness so naturally I gravitated towards him when I picked up this game. I really don’t like him that much in this game. I mean this has nothing to do with his viability but only having one disappearing banana is way different (I understand 2 bananas was probs broken) and I relied on rolling a lot with him. I can’t play him that well in this game probably because I haven’t adapted my play style to his changes. Plus he can’t recover the way he could in Brawl

 

[Diddy Kong]

I played Diddy Kong in Brawl along with Ness so naturally I gravitated towards him when I picked up this game. I really don’t like him that much in this game. I mean this has nothing to do with his viability but only having one disappearing banana is way different (I understand 2 bananas was probs broken) and I relied on rolling a lot with him. I can’t play him that well in this game probably because I haven’t adapted my play style to his changes. Plus he can’t recover the way he could in Brawl

Hahahah it's always so funny to read your post and have the background information that you never played Smash 4. In Smash 4, it was already changed to one banana at a time, and they disappeared rather quickly but at least they where safe on shield, and a real danger in neutral. Now, not so much any more, but I still feel like Diddy is able to punish very well with the banana, because the range on the thrown banana is farrrr further than Smash 4 and Brawl. So what I generally do is punish lagging move with banana, rush for a grab, or rush for a kill with a dash > F Smash (I play with Smash C Stick). Haven't really seen any other Diddy use these sort of tactics, everyone is basically playing a watered down Smash 4 Diddy currently...

 

[MG_3989]

Hahahah it's always so funny to read your post and have the background information that you never played Smash 4. In Smash 4, it was already changed to one banana at a time, and they disappeared rather quickly but at least they where safe on shield, and a real danger in neutral. Now, not so much any more, but I still feel like Diddy is able to punish very well with the banana, because the range on the thrown banana is farrrr further than Smash 4 and Brawl. So what I generally do is punish lagging move with banana, rush for a grab, or rush for a kill with a dash > F Smash (I play with Smash C Stick). Haven't really seen any other Diddy use these sort of tactics, everyone is basically playing a watered down Smash 4 Diddy currently...

I played a Diddy in elite last night who didn’t even use bananas. Idk, he’s just not the character for me anymore. I really wanna like him but he’s so different

 

[Gleam]

Right now, Ultimate Ness is getting similar results, if arguably not better results than other typical high tier characters and it's been a continuous trend. It's not like Ness once in a while gets some good results, he's the character right now with some of the greatest improvements in results since Ultimate first started. Where as people like K. Rool and even the Belmonts have fallen to varying degrees, Ness still continues to show these amazing results.

If Smash4 Ness was getting similar results compared to other high tier characters of that game, than maybe that means Ness was far better than what his Mid Tier placement indicated. Although according to the latest list I saw, Ness was on the border between "C" and "B" and as far as I'm concerned "B" is essentially "High Tier."

While the placement of Ness may change as the Meta goes on, I believe it is insulting to both the character and the players who have brought him this far across multiple tournaments and proven him to be a very capable character only to get demoted to these lower levels when other characters are in a similar boat but still considered High or Top tier.

As far as I'm concerned, it's not Ness' job or his players to prove he's High Tier, they've already done that. 25+ first place showings and nearly 100+ overall placements. It is now the job of the detractors to come together and prove, not just with words, but with evidence, that Ness isn't as good as his results first claim. If Ness is only "Mid tier" than I expect drastic drops in his results. I expect him to go from having double digit 20+ rankings to maybe getting 5-6 placements and once in awhile, a first place ranking. I expect more people to be able to counter him, recognize his flaws and exploit it. The same way people have done for King K. Rool, Belmonts and some may even arguably say Inkling.

But until then, I see a pretty darn awesome character and his players should be proud of how far they've gotten him in this time.

 

[ARISTOS]

Right now, Ultimate Ness is getting similar results, if arguably not better results than other typical high tier characters and it's been a continuous trend. It's not like Ness once in a while gets some good results, he's the character right now with some of the greatest improvements in results since Ultimate first started. Where as people like K. Rool and even the Belmonts have fallen to varying degrees, Ness still continues to show these amazing results.

If Smash4 Ness was getting similar results compared to other high tier characters of that game, than maybe that means Ness was far better than what his Mid Tier placement indicated. Although according to the latest list I saw, Ness was on the border between "C" and "B" and as far as I'm concerned "B" is essentially "High Tier."

While the placement of Ness may change as the Meta goes on, I believe it is insulting to both the character and the players who have brought him this far across multiple tournaments and proven him to be a very capable character only to get demoted to these lower levels when other characters are in a similar boat but still considered High or Top tier.

As far as I'm concerned, it's not Ness' job or his players to prove he's High Tier, they've already done that. 25+ first place showings and nearly 100+ overall placements. It is now the job of the detractors to come together and prove, not just with words, but with evidence, that Ness isn't as good as his results first claim. If Ness is only "Mid tier" than I expect drastic drops in his results. I expect him to go from having double digit 20+ rankings to maybe getting 5-6 placements and once in awhile, a first place ranking. I expect more people to be able to counter him, recognize his flaws and exploit it. The same way people have done for King K. Rool, Belmonts and some may even arguably say Inkling.

But until then, I see a pretty darn awesome character and his players should be proud of how far they've gotten him in this time.

People have provided the reasoning. It is that Ness has always been a character that does well initially then falls off as people spend time with the game. People are using past experiences to predict future trends.

 

[Ziodyne 21]

Hahahah it's always so funny to read your post and have the background information that you never played Smash 4. In Smash 4, it was already changed to one banana at a time, and they disappeared rather quickly but at least they where safe on shield, and a real danger in neutral. Now, not so much any more, but I still feel like Diddy is able to punish very well with the banana, because the range on the thrown banana is farrrr further than Smash 4 and Brawl. So what I generally do is punish lagging move with banana, rush for a grab, or rush for a kill with a dash > F Smash (I play with Smash C Stick). Haven't really seen any other Diddy use these sort of tactics, everyone is basically playing a watered down Smash 4 Diddy currently...

Unfortunately, as it looks now Diddy is basically a watered-down version of his Smash 4 self in most regards

Banana's are not as safe on shield
Recovery is worse (and it was already not good)
All his kill setups and confrims from Smash 4 are less effective. Either they are harder to pull off consistently , do not work till later percents, or both

Plus he did not really get enough buffs or improvements to compensate for all those nerfs. Right now ZeRo many other previous Smash 4 Diddy mains say he is far too much effort for too little reward. Especially when you compare to characters considered top and high tier right now

 

[Gleam]

People have provided the reasoning. It is that Ness has always been a character that does well initially then falls off as people spend time with the game. People are using past experiences to predict future trends.

I'm sorry but I really don't care what Ness "might" be in the future, I care about what he and everyone else is like right now. People can make predictions all they want. I can just as easily say Chrom is a Mid or Low Tier character because he has one of the worst recoveries in the game and is easily gimpable by a decent projectile.

But if he's still going to show good to great results, that doesn't matter.

I think the majority of people honestly do believe Ness to be High Tier, with all the results to back it up. But if what you say is true, detractors are basing their points not on how current Ultimate Ness is doing, but apparently how old Smash4 Ness did and making biased claims that well of course Ultimate Ness must follow that format.

Personally I "think" actually has a very decent moveset, whose variety of specials, mixups and damage racking moves can make for a decent Mid Tier character in the right hands. However if Plant shows poor results, it doesn't matter what I think. It doesn't matter what Plant or Ness or anyone else might be. I again apologize but this should not be based upon what a character might be but what they are now and they should change, whether for good or bad, in how the current meta goes on, not what the Meta might be 3 months or a year or two.

And certainly not based on an entirely different game.

 

[MG_3989]

Unfortunately, as it looks now Diddy is basically a watered-down version of his Smash 4 self in most regards

Banana's are not as safe on shield
Recovery is worse (and it was already not good)
All his kill setups and confrims from Smash 4 are less effective. Either they are harder to pull off consistently , do not work till later percents, or both

Plus he did not really get enough buffs or improvements to compensate for all those nerfs. Right now ZeRo many other previous Smash 4 Diddy mains say he is far too much effort for too little reward. Especially when you compare to characters considered top-tier right now

I mean from what I’ve heard about Smash 4 Diddy was borderline broken and to be fair he would’ve been borderline broken in Brawl too if it wasn’t for MK (and the fact that he could challenge MK was huge), so I guess they decided they had to tone him down a lot. The main thing I couldn’t get past when trying to play him is his recovery and I play Ness so I can deal with iffy recoveries. His is just bad

 

[NotLiquid]

While the placement of Ness may change as the Meta goes on, I believe it is insulting to both the character and the players who have brought him this far across multiple tournaments and proven him to be a very capable character only to get demoted to these lower levels when other characters are in a similar boat but still considered High or Top tier.

Given that players here have already voiced their misgivings about the character and even has one former main speaking out against him, all I can really say is - spare the melodrama. Criticizing a character isn't criticizing the player, and it's not like anyone here is calling him bottom tier trash. If you care so much about what top players have accomplished you should probably be more cognizant of the fact that at least one of those top players have given up on him despite "results" indicating he shouldn't be so quick to give up on the character.

Which, on that note, we need to admit to a simple truth about results - in most cases, using the "amount" of such, they completely lack context. If a week has ten tournaments where a character wins, yet we have one tournament that has way more entrants than said tournaments combined, that lacks the presence of a character anywhere near Top 8, petering out at the bottom of Top 32 at best, those ten tournaments don't really have all that much to say. Mid tiers win regionals all the time; even bottom tiers do on occasion. I know at least one Wii Fit player in our regional that consistently makes it to Top 3, but that doesn't have an iota of impact on the main stage, nor detract from the fact that Wii Fit is garbagio.

Also as great as players as FOW and Shaky are, quite frankly, there's always going to be a sense that players like them are held back by character loyalty. That's always going to be a thing, FOW at the very least did way better in Brawl once he picked up Meta Knight. That players like them did so well with the character in previous games is very impressive and a good representative of their skills, don't get me wrong, but I'm pretty convinced players with their skill level would likely perform better if they put that same amount of effort into better characters, and that's not an insulting thing to say - that's just a statement of fact.

 

[Gleam]

Name me the number of "expected" Mid Tier characters that have even half the results Ness has gotten.

Sorry but there's a big difference between a Mid tier winning 1-2 tournaments and a Mid tier winning 15-25. If Ness is only a Mid Tier, his results are shockingly skewed to show a primarily higher result than what he should naturally be getting.