Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[meleebrawler]

Wolf is overtuned.
This is undeniable.
This does not make the character broken by itself, just obviously very good.

What pushes Wolf over the edge of reason is that the counter-play to a character like him is pushed aside by the stupendousness of one single move in his kit. Can you guess (or more like, do you know already) what it is before you reach the end of this post?

An apt comparison for Wolf would be to Ryu, and for good reason, he's the OG shoto(?) and people with traditional fighter backgrounds see the archetype being represented well by Wolf's kit.
Ryu has big attacks - pretty fast start ups for the most part, favourable animations for a lot of them (hurtbox shifting and all of that) that are mostly safe on block plus has a horizontal projectile that's meant to dictate neutral a bit. The other "Smash" similarities of obscene KO power, vulnerable recoveries and 'poor' mobility also are shared by the two.

So why is Wolf doing so much while Ryu has fallen into obscurity? (as in, one's seemingly top tier while the other is seemingly low tier)
Well, Wolf has a lot better aerial mobility for one - while Ryu can go nyooom in the air from a jump he can't weave, this is a big factor in neutral and disadvantage but this still can be played around and Wolf can still be taken advantage of (he still has a pretty bad disadvantage).
Blaster is also obviously doing a lot more than Hadouken, but again, neither of the two moves are game changing. Ryu probably would be very happy to have Wolf's blaster instead of Hadouken though (a 'body' covering hitbox that stops people jumping into him on hadouken reads would gooo verrrrrrrrrrrrry far for him).
Ryu's technical requirements should be noted too, but I won't go into that here.

But the main thing that Wolf has that Ryu doesn't, the thing that makes his neutral feel overbearing and allows him dominance of mid-range (should be obvious now) is his burst option of DASH ATTACK.
Why does a character who should be forcing you to approach with blaster and beats just about everyone in reach, power and safety in close range normals once you do get close also dictate and win in the area similar characters are weak in (not just Ryu, but fox/falco "lose" to being baited in mid range).

His dash attack has ridiculous distance traveled (is there a longer traveling dash attack in the game????), it is practically safe on block [it doesn't just cross over shield, it's basically rolling through them], it combos and then eventually it kills, while not the strongest KO option in his kit, for a dash attack it's monstrous.
It's the best dash attack in the game bar none, and by far ("revenge stacked incineroar though!!!" - Browny).

Have you ever noticed how Wolf can just stand there, that he never needs to really shield at all? He's the character who against practically everyone (Zero Suits an exception~ YAY) never has to go further in neutral than just waiting for a reactive button trigger.
I'm not saying that if you're just standing there in shield and he dash attacks it you can't punish, but if he reads/anticipates a commitment, then the risk vs the reward of him going for a dash attack is hilarious. You playing to avoid said dash attack sets him up to freely hit your commitment with his aerials, tilts or even his pretty safe smash attacks.
When attrition comes and you're both at 120% - he's got the half-stage wide KO option that cannot be reacted to nor barely can be punished, and he's constantly forcing you to be moving or acting amidst lasers, who should be winning between two evenly skilled players a hyper majority of the time?

While Wolf would still be obnoxious in many people's eyes if they neutered that move, he would most assuredly not be able dictate the game vs other mid-rangers like he does right now (it's what the "basic fundamentals goes so far with him" means). Destroying the move wouldn't be necessary - it either just needs to stop KOing, or reduce the distance it travels (that would effect how it can be baited / how it can be punished).

While I have issues with other things Wolf has (why is his sweetspot down smash a faster, safer and easier to sweetspot Marth tipper fsmash??), I hope they don't go the way they did with S4 Sheik and nerf all the wrong things before touching the actual moves causing pragmatic problems.

Long story short, give Ryu Wolf's Dash Attack and have a flock of players suddenly realise Ryu "clicks" for them and start amassing results matching a high tier at minimum. Ryu's burst attacks are "good" in some senses, but they really are trash in comparison.

There are lots of dash attacks with comparable or even greater distance traveled, like Mega Man's Top Spin or even Bayonetta's Stinger. They just tend to lack speed, safety and sometimes cross-up ability compared to Wolf.

 

[KamikazePotato]

Our meta is dominated essentially by swordies

This is objectively false. Sword characters are on average good, but there's plenty of other characters that are at their level or better. If you go back the last few weeks in the SSBU Tournament Results topic, Lucina is the only swordie to ever occasionally crack the Top 8 in results, and none of them are ever Top 4. If you want to look at just the recent Supermajor, out of the Top 128, there were approximately 15 people who used a sword character. The swordies have been buffed due to the engine but they still have most of the inherent weaknesses they did in previous games except for Lucina who is the perfect character

Are they good? Yes. Dominating? No. Using pure results/number as a metric isn't perfect, but I trust it more than twitter overreactions, people's experiences on laggy online, and Ike Nair memes.

 

[Ffamran]

His dash attack has ridiculous distance traveled (is there a longer traveling dash attack in the game????), it is practically safe on block [it doesn't just cross over shield, it's basically rolling through them], it combos and then eventually it kills, while not the strongest KO option in his kit, for a dash attack it's monstrous.
It's the best dash attack in the game bar none, and by far ("revenge stacked incineroar though!!!" - Browny).

I want to say the tackles of Captain Falcon, Ganondorf, and Samus, Little Mac's weird slam punch, and Snake's roll, have about the same speed and travel distance or maybe more. Not sure on Samus's, though. Maybe Pichu and Pikachu. Smash 4 Yoshi's dash attack looks like it traveled further and faster than in Ultimate, but that might be me remembering things wrong. Ike and Link's dash attacks probably have about the same reach in comparison to the distance Wolf's travels, but probably not in speed, especially Link's where jump slash is actually a good move, especially in that it also acts as an anti-air, but it's frame 20 making as slow as slower Smashes. The recovery on it isn't anything special either at 34 frames from its 4 active frames, last active frame on frame 23, and 56 total frames.

Adding onto Shaya's post with numbers. Wolf's dash attack is frame 11 on startup, so it's not actually fast on startup, but what it does as Shaya highlighted is that is covers a lot of distance and quickly. In those 11 frames of startup and for the rest of the move, Wolf is leaping forward to punt you. The move is active for a total of 8 frames; 4 frames for its clean hit that does 11% with knockback values of 40/40/45 base and 92/91/85 growth, and 4 frames for its late hit that does 8% with knockback values of 60 base and 60 growth. Both the clean and late hits have hit angles of 80/50/361. Like most of Wolf's moves, they have low recovery where for his dash attack, it has 20 recovery frames from its 37 total frames and and 8 active frames. A frame 11 move with 37 total frames is kind of like an average tilt's startup and commitment. If you're only aiming to hit with the first active frame of his dash attack and ignoring everything else, so frame 11 startup, 1 active frame, and 37 total frames, then you're still looking at a move with low recovery as it would have 27 recovery frames.

Compare this to Fox's dash attack which had its total frames lowered in Ultimate from Smash 4, from 35 total frames to 31. Fox's dash attack is frame 4 on startup with 12 total active frames, 4 for its clean hit and 8 for its late hit. If you consider its active frames, so from its last active frame, frame 15, to its 31 total frames, Fox's dash attack has 17 recovery frames which is lower than Wolf's. If you consider only its first active frame to its total frames as a gauge for how long you have to commit to his dash attack, then Fox's dash attack would have 28 recovery frames. 1 frame slower than Wolf's, but in Fox's case, his dash attack is basically his Nair if it flew forward above the ground rather than falling and moving horizontally in the air. Fox doesn't really propel himself forward like Wolf or other characters and his dash attack certainly does not do a lot of damage or knockback. This not to say Fox's dash attack isn't good. It's always been good and you can't really go wrong with a dash attack that's frame 4 on startup. It's just that in Ultimate where you can use ground normals out of dashes and runs, Fox's dash attack as good as it is does end up with the problem most dash attacks have in Ultimate where they're not that special.

Using this post to continue on with this.

Great analysis Shaya.

Is it just me, or do dash attacks feel better in general this game?

As Shaya already said and others have noted before when looking at the frame data of this game, dash attacks are in general better in Ultimate compared to the previous games. With the introduction of being able to use jabs, tilts, and Smashes out of dash and run now, the developers definitely noticed dash attacks as they were in the previous game wouldn't be that good or worthwhile compared to their expanded options now of being able to basically do anything out of dash. For some characters, especially faster characters, their tilts can kill as well or even better than their dash attack while being faster and/or safer and most characters are likely to be able to setup or combo from a tilt unlike with their dash attack. They might not have the momentum from using dash attack, but they're likely to not need to commit as much or could gain more from using something else than dash attack.

The problem is that the developers didn't go hard enough on making dash attacks better. There were lowered total frames, increased damage, increased knockback, changes to hit angles, whatever else, but not enough to say something like "Wow! Ike's dash attack is even better than it was in Smash 4 and his dash attack was already buffed in that game." Wolf's dash attack ends up being an outlier as his dash attack in Ultimate is a completely different move compared to his Brawl one. The only similarities his Ultimate dash attack shares with his Brawl dash attack is startup frame, total frames, and hit angles. Animation, active frames, damage, and knockback are all different. It went from being a backflip where Wolf stopped to do it to a flying punt kick and it used to only have 2 total active frames instead of the 8 it has now and split between its clean and late hits, doing 9% instead of 11% clean and 8% late, and having knockback values of 50 base and 80 growth instead of 40/40/45 base and 92/91/85 growth for the clean hit and 60 base and 60 growth for the late hit.

Anyway, there might be an emphasis on "didn't" as if you look at the 2.0.0 patch notes, you might notice something about dash attacks. Specifically, Charizard's where the damage and knockback were increased. Knockback values I don't know, but damage is listed -- I'm using the Japanese spreadsheets and whatever else that's listing base damage changes instead of the x1.2, 1v1, no items multiplier -- as going from 11.0% (clean) and 8.0% (late) to 13.0% (clean) and 10% (late). I think there was a video floating around someone saying it was about as strong as Wolf's dash attack now in terms of kill power. Additionally, Kirby's dash attack damage was increased from 10.0% to 12.0% (clean), 7.0% to 9.0% (late), and 4.0% to 6.0% (latest), but they adjusted its knockback values so that it's more or less the same as it was before, Rosalina & Luma's dash attack was changed to link better, and honestly with the state that most dash attacks are in, Mewtwo could have kept that weirdly high x1.875 shield damage multiplier it had instead of it being dropped down to x1.3. The hit angle changes to Mario's dash attack I'm not sure how substantial of an effect it would have for him. Patch 2.0.0 was modest in what it changed, but part of me feels that they might have recognized that they didn't make dash attacks strong enough and this might have been the start of them trying to test how far they can go with dash attacks and watching the other strong dash attacks currently in the game.

But the main thing that Wolf has that Ryu doesn't, the thing that makes his neutral feel overbearing and allows him dominance of mid-range (should be obvious now) is his burst option of DASH ATTACK.
Why does a character who should be forcing you to approach with blaster and beats just about everyone in reach, power and safety in close range normals once you do get close also dictate and win in the area similar characters are weak in (not just Ryu, but fox/falco "lose" to being baited in mid range)?

Also, you just reminded me something about Ken and that is he doesn't have his Forward Step Kick or his Thunder Kick in this game. Granted, those moves debuted in Street Fighter III while Ken in Ultimate seems largely based on his Super Street Fighter II Turbo self according to the wiki.

Spoiler: Ken Kicks

SFIII Forward Step Kick animation.

SFIII Thunder Kick animation.

SFIII Thunder Kick feint.

Either one would have to have been his heavy, held Ftilt since they're not special moves, but command normals or unique attacks. Thunder Kick in particular would be nasty since if it were true to its mechanics in its home games, you'd be able to feint it if you kept holding the attack button. This means that not only Ken would have the ability to quickly move on you with a relatively slow attack since it's an overhead in Street Fighter and most overheads aren't fast, he'd also be able to fake it as well.

Obviously, these are not miraculous moves that if Ken had them in Ultimate that they would fix all his problems or whatever. It was something I just realized upon reading Shaya's post.

 

[ZephyrZ]

I think we need to quit lumping all swordies together and look at them indivually. Everyone picking up Lucina doesn't make Corrin a popular character pick. Ike winning majors doesn't make Ridley a contender for top tier.

It is kind of fair to compare similar archetypes. I compare Charizard to DK, Bowser and even Ridley all the time. But calling for universal nerfs to balance every character within a single archetype is kind of silly.

 

[Y2Kay]

This is objectively false. Sword characters are on average good, but there's plenty of other characters that are at their level or better. If you go back the last few weeks in the SSBU Tournament Results topic, Lucina is the only swordie to ever occasionally crack the Top 8 in results, and none of them are ever Top 4. If you want to look at just the recent Supermajor, out of the Top 128, there were approximately 15 people who used a sword character. The swordies have been buffed due to the engine but they still have most of the inherent weaknesses they did in previous games except for Lucina who is the perfect character

Are they good? Yes. Dominating? No. Using pure results/number as a metric isn't perfect, but I trust it more than twitter overreactions, people's experiences on laggy online, and Ike Nair memes.

Man you put a lot of effort into misquoting me. Please read the post again.

 

[KamikazePotato]

Man you put a lot of effort into misquoting me. Please read the post again.

It's not a misquote. Your post boils down to 'if your character can't handle swordies, then they won't do well' which is not true because swordies as a group aren't a monolithic force, nor do they have strengths that are particularly oppressive - they have strengths, weaknesses, and varying matchups like every other character. Let me put it this way: if your character can't handle Lucina, it's not because Lucina's archetype as a swordsman makes her your character's kryptonite. It's because Lucina is really good. There's plenty of characters that, to make up an example, lose to Lucina but beat Roy.

tl;dr - Lumping all the swordies together and asking for stuff like across the board nerfs for them does not match up with competitive data, and is damaging to proper discussion of character strength in competitive.

 

[ILOVESMASH]

Yeah, I feel lumping the swords together is kinda pointless since a lot of them have flaws exclusive to them. Roy and Chrom have weak recoveries and are easy to combo, Marth has quite a bit of trouble killing at later percents if he can't land a tipper, Link and Ike have poor movement and pretty weak frame data relative to the cast, etc. Not saying there aren't groups of characters who can struggle with the archetype as a whole, because there certainly are, but the archetype as a whole really isn't oppressive because of the fundamental flaws in each character's kit. The only exception I find is Lucina, who's buttons, though not quite on the level of Chrom, are powerful relative to the cast and doesn't possess most of the flaws other swordies have, like weak recovery or frame data.

I do believe that having a sword does make a character stronger than if they didn't have one, but I don't think Swordies in general need a nerf due to the flaws already present in most of their kits to counterbalance their strengths.

 

[Rizen]

I'm going to say the same thing as yesterday: Mario does fine despite swords so does Wario, Wolf, blah blah blah IDC anymore.


I may have been underestimating . His neutral makes Wolf's look weak by comparison. Although he kills at 140%ish he also has great confirms and builds damage like there's no tomorrow. He's better than PT and a solid high tier. YL needs more representation.

 

[Sean²]

I'm going to say the same thing as yesterday: Mario does fine despite swords so does Wario, Wolf, blah blah blah IDC anymore.


I may have been underestimating . His neutral makes Wolf's look weak by comparison. Although he kills at 140%ish he also has great confirms and builds damage like there's no tomorrow. He's better than PT and a solid high tier. YL needs more representation.

I'm already kind of predicting he's going to be the next FOTM. Have fun with the bandwagoners.

He's kind of a jack of all trades, who's also crazy fast. He can do traps with bombs, zone with boomerang and arrows, and fight up close better than a lot of non zoners...he just suffocates you way better than any zoner in the game IMO. It can be tilting to deal with if they're good at it.

 

[Krysco]

I'm not sure why people feel the need to even keep mentioning the term 'swordies' when it comes to characters being oppressive. The only names I see pop up over and over that belong to sword characters are Lucina and Ike and I'm pretty sure the latter is mostly due to MKLeo. Just seems so much easier to pinpoint it down to those 2. Not to say other sword users like Marth, Chrom, Roy, Cloud and Shulk aren't good but they don't seem to be the ones constantly on people's mind when the discussion of 'swordies' comes up. Palutena isn't a swordie but still has disjoints thanks to her staff and intangibility thanks to her shield and while she's good, I also don't hear people calling her oppressive.

Then you get to the characters with swords where people never complain about them and a number of them are hardly brought up at all. I see Link and Young Link brought up a lot but after that, there's almost never discussion on Corrin, Toon Link, Meta Knight, Mii Swordfighter, the Pits or Robin. There's also sword-esque characters who either have other weapons like Dedede, Ice Climbers, Ridley and the Belmonts or those with numerous attacks that make their limbs intangible like DK and Bowser.

I guess 'swordies' is fewer characters to type out than 'Lucina and Ike' and maybe there are other sword users who people find oppressive but one of them just got a slight nerf along with having a bad recovery and the others seem to have weaknesses like more bad recoveries or trouble killing or a high learning curve that keep them from being called oppressive.

Anyway, I asked this before but no one answered and I guess this could still be an appropriate time to ask but what are people's thoughts on Sonic? If the meta is truly over run with sword users then I imagine he'd do okay at the very least due to his high dash and run speeds allowing for easier whiff punishing though of course that being counter-balanced by his poor range.

 

[Emblem Lord]

I think all sword chars should get a universal nerf to nairs and fairs. Extra 2 frames of recovery.-salty *** kid

wolf feels fine personally, he isn't op you just have to approach correctly and adapt to his blaster, his recovery is so terrible though I just always gimp wolf players.

First off get it right.

Salty grown ass man who has contributed to more discussions and metagames than the majority of those in this community. And has certainly earned the right to be annoyed at poor combat engine decisions.

Some stuff in the game is just silly design.

The reason this is so annoying is because this is what smash has always been. Massive hitboxes that you throw out with reckless abandon because the counter play to it requires much more thought and much more skill. And ****ing up that counter play means you could die.

But in Ultimate due to the landing recovery reductions, it's just so much harder. No swordsman are not the best, but they gatekeep alot of the cast and if you want to get out of pools with less stress then you need to pocket Cloud or FE.

If you look at top tiers in this game right now, they are all characters that DO NOT need to rely on PURELY whiff punishing and juking. They all have a tool or two that is reliable and let's them play around other dominant neutral tools.

 

[Browny]

It's the best dash attack in the game bar none, and by far ("revenge stacked incineroar though!!!" - Browny).

Well by your criteria, considered in a vacuum, I'm not wrong lol. Faster, more powerful, actually frame positive on block (rendering the whole crossup advantage of wolf's inferior).

Wolf's might just be the best in terms of how it compliments the rest of his moveset and makes up for a relative lack of ease in hitting his KO moves.

 

[Frihetsanka]

I'm not sure why people feel the need to even keep mentioning the term 'swordies' when it comes to characters being oppressive.

I don't even think Lucina and Ike are all that oppressive. Lucina strikes me as a character that's very well-rounded, she has a lot of +1 MUs but not that many +2 MUs, and a lot of Even MUs as well, so most relevant characters should be able to deal with her without too much problem. Anyway:

Lucina, Marth, Cloud, Chrom, Ike, Corrin are the most "traditional" swordies. You could make a case for Roy too, although his sourspot "tippers" make him pretty different from other swordies. You could also make a case for Shulk, I suppose, although he's a fairly unique character. Link, Young Link, Toon Link, Pit, and Dark Pit are generally not considered swordies, despite using swords. Robin is a borderline case, personally I wouldn't include her. Mii Swordfighter technically has a sword but the playstyle is different, so I probably wouldn't call Swordfighter that. From my understanding, in Melee "swordies" referred to Marth and Roy, not Young Link or Link.

So, right now, I'd say swordies primarily refers to Lucina, Marth, Cloud, Chrom, Ike, and Corrin. Corrin is a bit on the weaker side right now but her kit and playstyle still fits the "swordies" type.

 

[Krysco]

I don't even think Lucina and Ike are all that oppressive. Lucina strikes me as a character that's very well-rounded, she has a lot of +1 MUs but not that many +2 MUs, and a lot of Even MUs as well, so most relevant characters should be able to deal with her without too much problem. Anyway:

Lucina, Marth, Cloud, Chrom, Ike, Corrin are the most "traditional" swordies. You could make a case for Roy too, although his sourspot "tippers" make him pretty different from other swordies. You could also make a case for Shulk, I suppose, although he's a fairly unique character. Link, Young Link, Toon Link, Pit, and Dark Pit are generally not considered swordies, despite using swords. Robin is a borderline case, personally I wouldn't include her. Mii Swordfighter technically has a sword but the playstyle is different, so I probably wouldn't call Swordfighter that. From my understanding, in Melee "swordies" referred to Marth and Roy, not Young Link or Link.

So, right now, I'd say swordies primarily refers to Lucina, Marth, Cloud, Chrom, Ike, and Corrin. Corrin is a bit on the weaker side right now but her kit and playstyle still fits the "swordies" type.

That is true that for whatever reason 'swordie' doesn't mean anyone with a sword but rather a specific playstyle, mainly making use of a sword. Robin and the Links for example, still want to space their moves (as does nearly any character) but because they don't just space, they're not considered 'swordies' despite having swords.

Even with that in mind, to make the generic statement that swordies are oppressive or over running the meta is disingenuous when you have all of these characters doing well and I'm sure I could add more to that list like if people actually used them. Meanwhile, of the traditional swordies, you still mostly just have Lucina and Ike taking all the highest spots at tournaments and yet somehow all swordies are oppressive and not just good? Save for Corrin of course. I will admit that Ultimate has the most amount of viable sword users compared to any other Smash game but that's partially due to there just being more of them in the game and the better balance meaning more characters overall are viable.

 

[fozzy fosbourne]

Zero Suit Samus seems really great but really challenged by shorties. More so than other meta characters. Interested in what Shaya thinks of her these days. I’ve been having fun with her and Greninja, patiently dancing around and waiting for openings.

 

[Emblem Lord]

We not gonna talk about how Wolf can create SF shotoish jump traps with Blaster and Wolf Flash?

No? We aren't there yet in his meta where it has become a thing?

Ok, cool.

 

[KakuCP9]

Zero Suit Samus seems really great but really challenged by shorties. More so than other meta characters. Interested in what Shaya thinks of her these days. I’ve been having fun with her and Greninja, patiently dancing around and waiting for openings.

I don't think shorties have any real leg up in the MU by virtue of being short anymore. ZSS (as well as Falcon) can easliy keep short characters in check during the mid range with angled f-tilts out of a run or space them out with Z-air in ZSS case or plow thorugh them with side-b in Falcon's case due to the start-up/endlag buffs.

 

[bc1910]

RE Wolf Flash I’m just waiting for people to actually take the opportunities to nail opponents landing on Battlefield’s side platforms with it. Looks to be an extremely effective and surprisingly safe kill option.

Anyway, Sheik stuff. Sheik’s issues can honestly be boiled down to the fact that she straight up sucks against opponents who are at high percent. After the (increasingly narrow) window where her remaining kill confirms stop working she is left furiously swatting at the opponent with weak aerials and throws which offer no KO threat until obscene percents but knock the opponent much too far to combo off as well. Thus she can’t kill, but her damage racking grinds to a halt as well. Her moves also tend to knock the opponent at annoyingly high angles which allows them to recover easily and removes the threat of Sheik’s otherwise strong edgeguarding. This is a crippling weakness of her throws, which send at particularly bad angles and stop her from effectively setting up edgeguards thus making her potentially the worst character in the game at killing shielding opponents at high percent. She has a bad case of “Marthritis” for you Melee fans out there.

Sheik would need rebalancing to fix this issue completely, involving base KB/KBG and maybe damage tweaks. In terms of band-aid fixes allowing her Uthrow to kill at semi-reasonable percents would at least give opponents a reason not to shield against her at high percent. Nothing crazy, even 190ish would probably do the job, bearing in mind how hard it is for Sheik to tack on damage after around 140%. At least her furious swatting would have a point to it.

A more fun solution could be to adjust the angle/endlag on her Bthrow to allow it to combo into aerials when the opponent DIs in, and adjust Fthrow to have slightly less knockback growth so that DI in or no DI at high percent allows it to combo into aerials for longer. This would give her a cool DI mixup which is interactive, where she has to choose the right throw for the opponent’s DI but gets an aerial out of it if she’s right. She can already kind of do this but it’s not reliable and no DI tends to get you out of both options.

 

[Rizen]

We not gonna talk about how Wolf can create SF shotoish jump traps with Blaster and Wolf Flash?

No? We aren't there yet in his meta where it has become a thing?

Ok, cool.

It's more of a hard read because flash's sweet spot requires specific spacing far enough that blaster's easy to shield. I can see flash being used as a landing punish like bc1910 said.

 

[Heracr055]

I don't think shorties have any real leg up in the MU by virtue of being short anymore. ZSS (as well as Falcon) can easliy keep short characters in check during the mid range with angled f-tilts out of a run or space them out with Z-air in ZSS case or plow thorugh them with side-b in Falcon's case due to the start-up/endlag buffs.

ZSS also has the benefit of the jumpsquat reduction and changes to her forward air to where she can actually hit short characters with it. The Chus are still problematic for other reasons but not being able to hit them isn't one of them.

 

[fozzy fosbourne]

Amazing list of all the autocancels in the game except miis
https://twitter.com/decentlymace/status/1094669855452614657?s=21

 

[MrGameguycolor]

Amazing list of all the autocancels in the game except miis
https://twitter.com/decentlymace/status/1094669855452614657?s=21

The Miis are there.
They're at the very bottom labeled under "MIIB, MIIS & MIIG"

 

[Diddy Kong]

Sheik can still land KOs with her U Smash, if it managed to hit. And it's more likely to hit from beneath a platform, so I think Sheik players would really prefer Battlefield stages. U Air can also kill, but only around 170% or so.

It's kind of ironic how polarizing Sheik has been in all the Smash games. She's either Top Tier (Melee and Smash 4) or utter trash (Brawl and Ultimate).

Now for something interessting; who is actually better between Zelda and Sheik? I think Zelda might be a little better for the first time since ever.

 

[Omnos]

We not gonna talk about how Wolf can create SF shotoish jump traps with Blaster and Wolf Flash?

No? We aren't there yet in his meta where it has become a thing?

Ok, cool.

No one is interested in having a conversation with you.
Fix your attitude.

 

[Frihetsanka]

She's either Top Tier (Melee and Smash 4) or utter trash (Brawl and Ultimate).

She was a mid tier in Brawl, and she's likely a mid tier in this game as well, which is hardly "utter trash".

Now for something interessting; who is actually better between Zelda and Sheik? I think Zelda might be a little better for the first time since ever.

Probably Sheik, Zelda still seems to be one of the weaker characters in the game. She's better than in 4 but she got some nerfs (such as her down-tilt, apparently) and she still has many of her old flaws.

 

[Diddy Kong]

She was a mid tier in Brawl, and she's likely a mid tier in this game as well, which is hardly "utter trash".
Probably Sheik, Zelda still seems to be one of the weaker characters in the game. She's better than in 4 but she got some nerfs (such as her down-tilt, apparently) and she still has many of her old flaws.

Mid Tier in Brawl? I remember her being on the lower end of the tier lists. Around Yoshi's level of viability or so.

Yeah I noticed Zelda not being too great in this game either. Seems she's stuck in Low Tier forever. Not too sure about Ganondorf and Jigglypuff this time however. HBox seems to preform fine with Jigglypuff in Ultimate. And both characters seem fastly improved from Smash 4.

 

[MG_3989]

That is true that for whatever reason 'swordie' doesn't mean anyone with a sword but rather a specific playstyle, mainly making use of a sword. Robin and the Links for example, still want to space their moves (as does nearly any character) but because they don't just space, they're not considered 'swordies' despite having swords.

Even with that in mind, to make the generic statement that swordies are oppressive or over running the meta is disingenuous when you have all of these characters doing well and I'm sure I could add more to that list like if people actually used them. Meanwhile, of the traditional swordies, you still mostly just have Lucina and Ike taking all the highest spots at tournaments and yet somehow all swordies are oppressive and not just good? Save for Corrin of course. I will admit that Ultimate has the most amount of viable sword users compared to any other Smash game but that's partially due to there just being more of them in the game and the better balance meaning more characters overall are viable.

After this I’m just gonna stop pointing out when people forget Ness and put characters who have less results than him. Time to just accept that he’s always gonna be underrated in Ultimate

Also I said the same thing about swordies a couple pages ago but I wouldn’t have even quoted this if Ness was represented

Mid Tier in Brawl? I remember her being on the lower end of the tier lists. Around Yoshi's level of viability or so.

Yeah I noticed Zelda not being too great in this game either. Seems she's stuck in Low Tier forever. Not too sure about Ganondorf and Jigglypuff this time however. HBox seems to preform fine with Jigglypuff in Ultimate. And both characters seem fastly improved from Smash 4.

Yeah she was around 25 or 26 and I think D tier on most tier lists

 

[Diddy Kong]

After this I’m just gonna stop pointing out when people forget Ness and put characters who have less results than him. Time to just accept that he’s always gonna be underrated in Ultimate

Also I said the same thing about swordies a couple pages ago but I wouldn’t have even quoted this if Ness was represented

People are just really conservative about Ness I guess. And a lot has to do with his preformance in Smash 4, where he also got many results early on and people called him a lower Top Tier back then.

Ness is really lucky that Rosalina has been nerfed hard, and fallen from grace. Because that character basically invalidated Ness in Smash 4 because of Gravitational Pull.

 

[Nobie]

The funny thing about Wolf is that he actually got buffed in the release-day patch.

They were afraid he might be undertuned, but perhaps went a little overboard.

When I think about Wolf, I think about dash attack, I think about up smash, but more generally, I think about how the character feels deceptively fast. "How did he even get to me???"

 

[MG_3989]

People are just really conservative about Ness I guess. And a lot has to do with his preformance in Smash 4, where he also got many results early on and people called him a lower Top Tier back then.

Ness is really lucky that Rosalina has been nerfed hard, and fallen from grace. Because that character basically invalidated Ness in Smash 4 because of Gravitational Pull.

Yeah but it’s not Smash 4, Rosalina is nerfed (and he doesn’t have to recover with PK Thunder as much anymore, directional air dodging might’ve done more for Ness than any other character), and his results speak for themselves. I’m tired of hearing the Smash 4 argument. It’s a different game and from what I’ve heard he’s obviously a stronger character in a more favorable meta

I mean it is what it is but any other character getting Ness’s results right now would be considered top tier/high high tier. Not to mention his kit backs it up. We’re not playing Smash 4 anymore

Yes we all know he’s exploitable. So is Pichu. So is Wolf. So are most of the top tiers in some ways. His strengths greatly overshadow his weaknesses. This argument is honestly useless because certain people have had their minds made up about Ness since before the game came out

 

[zblaqk]

Zero Suit Samus seems really great but really challenged by shorties. More so than other meta characters. Interested in what Shaya thinks of her these days. I’ve been having fun with her and Greninja, patiently dancing around and waiting for openings.

Her down tilt is overlooked alot, it sets up into easy forward Air and RAR Bair. Sure it doesn't solve her issue completely but she does have some effective tools.

 

[Today's Tom Sawyer]

I have said it before and I will say it again—why is Sora Namco afraid to give C. Falcon a combo tilt? It is really difficult to play bait and punish characters in this game, where a) micro spacing is not that good (C. Falcon's dash dance/initial dash especially not being close to as good as his run speed) and b) grabs are mostly booty. ZSS gets down-tilt, Lucario gets up-tilt, Bayonetta even still kind of has down-tilt. Not to mention the calvacade of carnage-inducing options that the pure rushdown characters contain.

Show the man some love!

 

[Emblem Lord]

No one is interested in having a conversation with you.
Fix your attitude.

lol. Sorry, but this is a lie. Lurk more if you truly think no one in this forum cares to converse with me. Not that it truly matters but you brought it up.

Don't like my posts? Hit that ignore button.

Actually nevermind.

I got you.

 

[MG_3989]

I see ZSS as a character that’s being hugely slept on right now and is going to explode into the meta. She’s just got too many combos, kill confirms at every percent, good frame data, and a fantastic air game and edgeguarding tools

She’s different than Smash 4 which turned her off to a lot of people but I still think she’s really really good

 

[zblaqk]

RE Wolf Flash I’m just waiting for people to actually take the opportunities to nail opponents landing on Battlefield’s side platforms with it. Looks to be an extremely effective and surprisingly safe kill option.

Anyway, Sheik stuff. Sheik’s issues can honestly be boiled down to the fact that she straight up sucks against opponents who are at high percent. After the (increasingly narrow) window where her remaining kill confirms stop working she is left furiously swatting at the opponent with weak aerials and throws which offer no KO threat until obscene percents but knock the opponent much too far to combo off as well. Thus she can’t kill, but her damage racking grinds to a halt as well. Her moves also tend to knock the opponent at annoyingly high angles which allows them to recover easily and removes the threat of Sheik’s otherwise strong edgeguarding. This is a crippling weakness of her throws, which send at particularly bad angles and stop her from effectively setting up edgeguards thus making her potentially the worst character in the game at killing shielding opponents at high percent. She has a bad case of “Marthritis” for you Melee fans out there.

Sheik would need rebalancing to fix this issue completely, involving base KB/KBG and maybe damage tweaks. In terms of band-aid fixes allowing her Uthrow to kill at semi-reasonable percents would at least give opponents a reason not to shield against her at high percent. Nothing crazy, even 190ish would probably do the job, bearing in mind how hard it is for Sheik to tack on damage after around 140%. At least her furious swatting would have a point to it.

A more fun solution could be to adjust the angle/endlag on her Bthrow to allow it to combo into aerials when the opponent DIs in, and adjust Fthrow to have slightly less knockback growth so that DI in or no DI at high percent allows it to combo into aerials for longer. This would give her a cool DI mixup which is interactive, where she has to choose the right throw for the opponent’s DI but gets an aerial out of it if she’s right. She can already kind of do this but it’s not reliable and no DI tends to get you out of both options.

Sheik has a few consistent kill confirms with tipper dtilt into buffered dash up smash until around 110%, soft Nair to BF up to 150%, FF up air drag down into down smash or forward smash (works at ANY percent) and because people tend to jump out of shield to escape her pressure, you can read this often enough. At very high percents, grounded needles force a tech that can be read with her mobility. Tipper back air kills around 130% at ledge on medium weight characters and is impossible to punish due to her landing lag. Burst grenade on a platform does good shield damage and allows you to shield poke with up smash.

Sheik has stuff.

 

[Emblem Lord]

She (ZSS) was different from Brawl as well.

People get terrified once a character changes. Mostly because people want results fast and having to relearn a character is another roadblock with that goal in mind.

As far as Sheik is concerned she is still super oppressive. But the damage just is not there and then she gets killed before she can seal the deal. There is nothing "wrong" with her however. She is certainly functional. Just no longer this really abusive 50/50 monster.

 

[boysilver400]

So what do you guys think about the street fighters? Has Ryu fallen off, or is he still good? And who's better?

And about Zelda and Sheik, I think they're both mid tiers, but I don't know who's better between the 2.

 

[MG_3989]

Sheik has a few consistent kill confirms with tipper dtilt into buffered dash up smash until around 110%, soft Nair to BF up to 150%, FF up air drag down into down smash or forward smash (works at ANY percent) and because people tend to jump out of shield to escape her pressure, you can read this often enough. At very high percents, grounded needles force a tech that can be read with her mobility. Tipper back air kills around 130% at ledge on medium weight characters and is impossible to punish due to her landing lag. Burst grenade on a platform does good shield damage and allows you to shield poke with up smash.

Sheik has stuff.

Doesn’t almost everyone have a FF first hit up air confirm? Not saying it’s not good for Shiek, it’s great for Shiek, but it seems to be an almost universal kill confirm

 

[The_Bookworm]

So what do you guys think about the street fighters? Has Ryu fallen off, or is he still good? And who's better?

And about Zelda and Sheik, I think they're both mid tiers, but I don't know who's better between the 2.

Ryu is a very weird character in this game to put a finger on. At one hand, he has gained some new tools to play with, but in the other hand his mobility got no changes in a game where everyone else got a mobility buff and some of previous tools are much less abusable. I would say fallen off.

It doesn't help that Ryu is currently suffering a syndrome that is affecting Marth for the most part, he is pretty much outclassed by his echo fighter, so his reps are pretty rare. Ken is mainly better, thanks to his faster grounded mobility, additional and flexible combo routes, and his generally longer reach thanks to using mainly kicking attacks. His power, while overall weaker than Ryu's, is still powerful (it also helps that his entire Shory is a powerful instead of just the start of the move like Ryu's).

Personally think Zelda is better (we live in that timeline now). It is mainly because Sheik is not really good right now. She is still frame data spam and has a good recovery, but her combos deal very little damage and she struggles to kill. In SSB4, she can pretty much play a different game from everyone else because no one else has her mobility and frame data mixed into two. In this game, almost everyone else has close or even about the same fast buttons, while each hit has much more oomph. Doesn't help that Needles got nerfed again and that Sheik herself is made out of paper.

 

[Shaya]

Ultimate ZSS =
Traditional S4 ZSS + All the Zany Crap I'd do that People Went "Why Would You Do That Instead of Just Trying to Ladder Me, Wait I Died Anyway"

Or slightly expanded
Ultimate ZSS = S4 ZSS - CrutchingOnDownThrowFollowUps + Forward Air is the GOAT + You Aren't Gonna Punish Side-B On Block and it Will Kill + You Aren't Gonna Fall Out Of Up-B I Just Need To Be Real Close - BrainDeadZairing + BigBrainZairing

That's still pretty ambiguous and not the entire picture.
But it's amazing what this character is capable of in terms of neutral/cqc and pressure when one option (traditionally landing nair) becomes two.
Two is underselling it, forward air is a rising, slow falling and a fast falling aerial option (3 options), it's more like two options (landing nair/bair) to five.
Big implications.

The engine / blanket changes really work in her favour, no longer does she fear getting grabbed or people "waiting safely" to grab, and if they did whiff grab wouldn't be punished heavily for it. Nairo infamously being capable of punishing this Knife's Edge/1-3f difference of reaction/speed/balls in destructive ways that would ultimately be what differentiated top-level ZSS and essentially the rest of the zero suit player base. But in Ultimate we get 10 more frames to destroy people, that's great for tired folk like myself.

I don't think she inherently has any losing match ups (excepting maybe like, Pacman, who's actually more broken than ZSS and Wolf and release-impression Inklings COMBINED). Small chars are generally only difficult if they get stock-leads (otherwise ZSS is still killing earlier and is probably better than you at mid-range).
So she's probably top tier.
And she's probably easier to play (once proficient with her, skill floor for her is still pretty high) than in S4 by a fair margin.