Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[SapphSabre777]

I've got nothing better to do, so I'm typing up thoughts after GOML and such. Thank goodness we are slowly (very, but surely) going back to more relevant post-COVID times. A new time of Smash indeed~

with Tweek definitely showed just how much potential this character has for him going into the future, and he is a doozy. Diddy's buffs have fallen under that category of "alone they are QoL, when combined they are amazing". His D-Tilt leads into his new combo extender/starter in Dash Attack, which also leads to another follow-up, or he can go with D-Tilt into his improved F-Air or U-Smash, and his improved F-Air massively improves his already great neutral to ridiculous lengths. What changed about Diddy to 8.0 is that he now is rewarded handsomely with winning with his very sturdy neutral game, which is a 1-2 combination that very little characters, even at top tier, have the privilege to have, and all of that was best displayed during his 2-0 vs ESAM. I'll need more info on how he does further on, and his weakness to more sturdy projectiles, an effective but exploitable recovery, lack of landing options, et cetera does exist, but Diddy is terrifying at a glance: a character with a top-tier neutral and an excellent advantage state and reward given from easy-winning in that neutral. Keep an eye out for this character.

I think the best way to describe Min Min is volatile, but she's designed with that volatility in mind so that she can concentrate on her high highs much more than her low lows. She's going to do very well competitively thanks to just how insanely high her advantages and benefits are in play, from her aggressive and unique zoning with the best range in the game (disjointed hitboxes rather than traditional projectiles), her absolutely insane advantage and edge/ledge game, and her hurtboxes being rather difficult to hit normally and with her intangibility on moves. Lack of landing options bar D-Air, a weak disadvantage state, and her slow movement speed (though camping/keepaway against her is simply futile) will hinder her a bit when put into disadvantageous positions, but her toolkit makes that hard at times to exploit. ESAM CPing Min Min versus Riddles shows the potential this character has, as Ryu was effectively walled out and punished for attempting to get in haphazardly, leading to an easy edgeguard KO. Her added complexity will only help boost her hopes starting her first moments in offline play. She'll be fun to watch in the meta.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

I love that Ike tech, but whenever I see new out of shield options my immediate thought is like... I dunno, man, attack recovery is so low, and it's so easy to make things safe vs most of the cast that OOS options need to be extremely braindead and reliable. In Brawl that would have been an incredible find because you got sooo much advantage out of shield that there were cases where you could powershield and then like walk up and nair or whatever, but in Ultimate you barely have time to "hitconfirm" the enemy position before you attempt your OOS option.

I guess the nice thing about this one is that it's a jump, and jump OOS is a good option anyway, so if the footstool doesn't work out you won't necessarily be in a terrible position. But it seems like a thing you'll just have to like, go for and hope they're in the right place.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

Also I think doctor mario is the worst character since like brawl ganondorf, and I think anyone who thinks he's at all decent at this point is completely out of their mind.

In my opinion doc has 0 winning matchups, most of his matchups with anyone above B tier is 4-6 at best and probably worse. It's so easy to zone him out and he has no exploitable strengths. Down-b is a great special move and pills are good, they aren't enough to save his horrible raw movement stats and terrible range. Doc only gets damage on reads, he has no spammable neutral tools outside of pills. Even on reads he sucks though, like when you hard read someone's back roll and you run SLOWER THAN THEIR BACK ROLL and can't get to them in time to dash grab it.

Like half of his move set is unsafe on HIT at low percents, up air as an anti-air at 0 literally gets you punished, up tilt has a really bad AA hitbox and up smash is good but a pretty large commitment.

His moves mostly have horrible knockback angles that both don't give him any real follow-ups at low % (not even combos, just like, he's never in a good position to go for reads or anything after) and reset to neutral at higher %s. Doc isn't rewarded for getting hits except with the damage of the hits themselves, he never gets good positioning.

Recovery, obviously. In theory I don't have a problem with his recovery being bad if he's good at enough other things but he currently isn't. Also at some very low %s DK cargo throw is a guaranteed kill, ike back throw->fair is guaranteed (not a combo but no good way to avoid it), etc. Lots of dumb stuff like this

What makes it even worse is that there are characters within his archetype that are not only better, but easier to play and less cerebral. Mario yes, but also the harder-hitting brawler archetype has a lot of choices that literally do *everything* better.

I could go on like this for days but essays aren't cute and I know you're probably already tired of reading this so I'll leave some things that I think could help:

1. Dash attack gets more range, lower recovery, lower KB at low %s and better KB growth (kill move)
2. Up air recovery reduced so you can fast fall in time to avoid getting a retaliation hit when you anti air, might get a few more combo options, but it's doc so who cares
3. Pill travel speed reduced, duration increased (same distance travelled) so he can follow them in a little better
4. Slight air speed increase so he can put himself in better potisions after combo/string finishers, also might help his recovery a little

 

[KirbySquad101]

It's not simply that G&W is bad at swords because he has short range. Rather, G&W's kit specializes in thwarting a certain competitively popular archetype: short-ranged combo-oriented characters who are generally safe hitting buttons against shields. Think about who G&W beats: Peach, Pikachu, Captain Falcon, etc. His attacks have just enough disjoint to mess when aerial approaches, and his Up-B is fast and invincible, which means Mario or whoever can't get away scot-free throwing out nairs.

However, as soon as you outrange his disjoints and Up B, and without using projectiles for him to reflect/absorb, the dynamic changes dramatically. Shulk doesn't care about Up-B because it's not going to reach him if spaced effectively. Nor does Ike. Palutena has literal invincible attacks to battering ram through G&W's defenses. On Maister's last matchup chart, a pre-patch Corrin was listed as even.

That ability to bully fast, safe moves isn't the only matchup factor for G&W (edgeguarding, for instance), but it's a big one.

Huh, how did I not see this comment? lol

You are certainly right that swords are really good against G&W’s defenses, and that spacing is a key counterplay against his Up B in particular. The thing is, though, G&W is more often than not, going to be playing the aggressive game. He can protect himself where it matters, but he doesn’t actually have ways of getting the opponent to play into his defenses beyond throwing hitboxes in front of his opponent like a madman. Maister describes his playstyle as “very aggressive” and we’ve seen how often he can get in against most characters with G&W’s tools.

That’s where I feel like some swordies - particularly slow ones - start fumbling a bit. It isn’t just a matter of outspacing his reactions but also a matter of whether or not you can keep the little bugger off of you in the first place.

Palu, Cloud, Sonic, ZSS, and in some instances, Shulk can give G&W such a hard time not just because they can completely ignore his shield, but because they can play so hard to get that even when G&W tries to go the aggressive approach, it’s a major struggle to catch them, ESPECIALLY ZSS and Sonic who WILL spend most of the match spinning circles around G&W while he’s still wondering which way to go.

Corrin just doesn’t have the same level of slipperiness that I can see the MU being in her favor, buffs or not.

 

[Frihetsanka]

Corrin is significantly better now, but I also legitimately think she's also better than her Smash 4 incarnation as well. Cosmos does too

I'm warming up to the idea. The main thing that was nerfed was pin kick range and endlag, and she can jump cancel instead, and she got a lot of other buffs. She might be better than in 4.

Corrin just doesn’t have the same level of slipperiness that I can see the MU being in her favor, buffs or not.

Do you think it was even in Smash 4 as well? If not, why not?

 

[The_Bookworm]

Here is something completely miscellaneous that I noticed.

The Garreg Mach Monastery stage, 's home stage, had a notorious issue where it's Battlefield and FD variants would have a lower ceiling than the other Battlefield and FD variants.

After some testing and some confirmation, it seems that patch 8.0 has fixed this.
This means that now every single Battlefield and FD variant is now consistent with eachother.

Just want to lay that out there, since I don't see much people even outside this thread talk about this.

 

[Game7a1]

Do you think it was even in Smash 4 as well? If not, why not?

Just my own thoughts on the MU (and as someone who plays both characters in both games), but certainly had an advantage over for a few reasons:

1. Dragon Lunge offered Corrin more distance when kicking, and G&W struggled in trying to keep up the increased distance Corrin made when kicking. This made Corrin's keep-away game much stronger in the MU, and made it hard to G&W to corner and approach Corrin.
2. Corrin had kill throws that made G&W uncomfortable to shield at higher percents.
3. Obviously the disjoints, but Corrin's Up-Air was potent in dealing with a G&W trying to land. Had (and still has) great range, traded or beat G&W's D-air, and was powerful. B-air was also great at beating G&W's F-air and pushed Corrin backed, so that limited how G&W could approach.
4. More consistent KO'ing options. G&W had to fish for moves or set up for D-Throw into Up-Air or edgeguarding. Corrin could just smack G&W and ledgetrap (Pin was good for 2-framing Fire) him without much set-up. Even still, tipper Pin was strong.
5. G&W dealt a lot of damage but struggled to seal stocks. Corrin enjoyed the rage given to him and was able to punish G&W harder.
6. Corrin didn't really care about G&W's Up-Smash.

Now, a good amount of that carries over (points 2, 3, 4, and 6 come to mind) to Ultimate, but has more answers and less to deal with than .

1. Dragon Lunge covers less distance, and combined with increased movement speeds, G&W can keep up with Corrin easier than before. While G&W's F-air got changed, the reduced landing lag on N-air and B-air help his approach game in the MU.
2. G&W's Fire now covers shield cross-up very effectively, removing a struggle he had in Smash 4 against Corrin's Dash Attack and Pin.
3. The increased blastzones means that G&W will live longer to Corrin's throws (the Up-Air buff just resetted the KO potential of that move back to how it was in Smash 4), but G&W's moves got stronger, his combo tree lasts longer, and his confirms are easier to pull off (no more relying on a certain percent window and fishing for grabs).
4. G&W's increased shield pressure and better edgeguarding (in the form of Chef) make it harder for Corrin to come out of disadvantage from shield. G&W also gained a (very high percent) KO throw, something he lacked in Smash 4.
5. Ledge trumping isn't as effective as before, so ledge trump B-air isn't as potent as before. Sure, ledge trump Up-Air is now a thing, but it's not guaranteed.
6. The increased air speed, along with better D-air drifting and directional airdodging, help G&W more at getting down than it does for Corrin, who now has to deal with a new Up-Air to keeps him in disadvantage, beating out his own D-air, while dealing damage.

What the buffs did to Corrin made him more potent in dealing damage and sealing stocks, but that doesn't really make a noticeable impact on a lightweight like G&W. The buffs make him keep up in damage output and stock sealing, but it doesn't help him in neutral or disadvantage. G&W was already going to die early, but that doesn't change his ability to weave in and out of G&W's comfort zone like he could in Smash 4, (much like how KirbySquad pointed out ZSS and Sonic could and still can). I believe G&W got enough and Corrin lost a enough for the MU to be less in Corrin's favor and moreso even.

 

[Thinkaman]

Pre-patch Doc wasn't even bottom 15 in usage nor results in Ultimate. That's in spite of the character having a considerable subsitution effect holding down both, one of the game's biggest.


Who's the worst? There was a cluster of 8 poor characters in the long-term data.

have historically terrible usage and results. But it's hard to read into the stigma surrounding them. THIS is a prime case where it's appropriate to apply theory over hard data--we have a clear hypothesis as to why our data is invalid, and common sense arguments can be applied to compare tools and look at matches to see that these characters, while not exactly great, are surely not that bad.

is similar. Terrible numbers, very clear hypothesis as to why this data doesn't lead to normal conclusions. Substitution effects are very real.

and are also in our pre-8.0.0 data, but even at that time also showed signs of a potent substitution effect similar to Marth. Namely, pre-8.0.0 Corrin and Mewtwo had extremely high lifetime win-rates. As I've talked about, this almost-useless data point tells us more about the self-selection of the player pool than the character themselves. Corrin and Mewtwo experts tend to be disproprotionately strong competitive players, who are disproportionately willing to switch to a superior character. Is this data-suggested conclusion not consistent with every pro and local Corrin/Mewtwo player you have ever known? (Note that Falco, while a much higher performing case than either of these two, also exhibited the exact same pattern.)

So, like Marth, I don't think Corrin nor Mewtwo were nearly as low as the data suggested before 8.0.0, and obviously now they are way better regardless.



That leaves and . Both performed as consistent mid-tiers for the first 12 months, but slowly suffered a constant decline. So did Falco. But Falco got huge, life-changing buffs, and was already outperforming them considerably. MK meanwhile got barely more than QoL buffs, and Lucario got nothing. (And by nothing I mean "15 characters now kill sooner or more reliably.")

But MK was already ahead of Lucario, and he did get a small tune-up while Lucario got a tune-down. So it's hard for me not to see him as the current biggest loser.


Other contenders?

had pre-8.0.0 numerical evidence clearly arguing for her as one of the bottom 10, maybe even bottom 5 characters before 8.0.0. I was somewhat bullishing on Isabelle; I think she has been (and is) one of the least optimized and most underrated characters in this game. I think her buffs were quite meaningful and underrated/overlooked, so I remain more optimistic on Isabelle than most. But even if you don't share my Isabelle attitudes, it was a stretch to deem her worse than all of the above before the latest patch, and even more so now.

is hard to judge. I'm not sure if you can call them "in decline", but they aren't doing great. Almost no one plays them, and scattered results + Big D are not on par with the performance of other niche characters like Sheik, Duck Hunt, Rosalina, or Olimar. Olimar barely competes with Ryu, who suffers from a huge substitution effect. But I doubt you could call them "worst" with an honest face. I'm not sure of any coherent definition of "worst" you could apply that puts ICs there, even if they are closer to the cluster of worst character than most.

and (and maaaybe + prepatch ) had dubious claims to worst characters, if you believe a narrative that all their players are idiots and all their usage is Falcon-levels of inflated. But even then you have to do some mental gymnastics to explain away why their win-rates aren't in the toliet if all their players are just eating glue.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

Results are results, people play doc more than the other characters because he's a QT

 

[The_Bookworm]

Pre-patch Doc wasn't even bottom 15 in usage nor results in Ultimate. That's in spite of the character having a considerable subsitution effect holding down both, one of the game's biggest.


Who's the worst? There was a cluster of 8 poor characters in the long-term data.

have historically terrible usage and results. But it's hard to read into the stigma surrounding them. THIS is a prime case where it's appropriate to apply theory over hard data--we have a clear hypothesis as to why our data is invalid, and common sense arguments can be applied to compare tools and look at matches to see that these characters, while not exactly great, are surely not that bad.

is similar. Terrible numbers, very clear hypothesis as to why this data doesn't lead to normal conclusions. Substitution effects are very real.

and are also in our pre-8.0.0 data, but even at that time also showed signs of a potent substitution effect similar to Marth. Namely, pre-8.0.0 Corrin and Mewtwo had extremely high lifetime win-rates. As I've talked about, this almost-useless data point tells us more about the self-selection of the player pool than the character themselves. Corrin and Mewtwo experts tend to be disproprotionately strong competitive players, who are disproportionately willing to switch to a superior character. Is this data-suggested conclusion not consistent with every pro and local Corrin/Mewtwo player you have ever known? (Note that Falco, while a much higher performing case than either of these two, also exhibited the exact same pattern.)

So, like Marth, I don't think Corrin nor Mewtwo were nearly as low as the data suggested before 8.0.0, and obviously now they are way better regardless.



That leaves and . Both performed as consistent mid-tiers for the first 12 months, but slowly suffered a constant decline. So did Falco. But Falco got huge, life-changing buffs, and was already outperforming them considerably. MK meanwhile got barely more than QoL buffs, and Lucario got nothing. (And by nothing I mean "15 characters now kill sooner or more reliably.")

But MK was already ahead of Lucario, and he did get a small tune-up while Lucario got a tune-down. So it's hard for me not to see him as the current biggest loser.


Other contenders?

had pre-8.0.0 numerical evidence clearly arguing for her as one of the bottom 10, maybe even bottom 5 characters before 8.0.0. I was somewhat bullishing on Isabelle; I think she has been (and is) one of the least optimized and most underrated characters in this game. I think her buffs were quite meaningful and underrated/overlooked, so I remain more optimistic on Isabelle than most. But even if you don't share my Isabelle attitudes, it was a stretch to deem her worse than all of the above before the latest patch, and even more so now.

is hard to judge. I'm not sure if you can call them "in decline", but they aren't doing great. Almost no one plays them, and scattered results + Big D are not on par with the performance of other niche characters like Sheik, Duck Hunt, Rosalina, or Olimar. Olimar barely competes with Ryu, who suffers from a huge substitution effect. But I doubt you could call them "worst" with an honest face. I'm not sure of any coherent definition of "worst" you could apply that puts ICs there, even if they are closer to the cluster of worst character than most.

and (and maaaybe + prepatch ) had dubious claims to worst characters, if you believe a narrative that all their players are idiots and all their usage is Falcon-levels of inflated. But even then you have to do some mental gymnastics to explain away why their win-rates aren't in the toliet if all their players are just eating glue.

It is not quite the best to refer to Q3 results alone, since we have only have ~2 months of actual relevant offline results prior to the switch to offline.

To do this, we must approach the data we have in another angle:
If you look at OrionStats' Q3 chart, which hasn't understandably updated since March 24th, the number value in terms of results only reaches 20 when we reach Meta Knight and Falco (which is the 20th/21st lowest ranking), and then it takes 7 spots higher to reach the 30 points. The gap of points between each character up until then is extremely low.

Due to the switch to online tourneys, cutting the results chart by less than 3 months (and only about 3-5 big name tourneys), the numbers on the lower half of the list doesn't have to time to develop and flesh out. It is like this is Q1 and Q2 as well, except we didn't have the sudden switch to online for those times.

So while numbers of the upper half of the list can be taken more into consideration, since they have development from the start, we must take the latter half in a grain of salt.

Now if we are talking about lifetime overall results, then it is easier to group these characters into that pile, but it is still a bit of an awkward pairing, especially since we haven't really seen too much on the impact of 8.0's buffs in tournaments just yet, at least out of all the characters you listed.
Ice Climbers, while I do think your assessment on them is accurate, is a notable outlier since they are 51st (with Incineroar) on the TTS, and was never (at least to my memory) too low in 2019 at all, so they are a bit of an outlier in your argument, especially when pertaining to Doc and the fact that he is not bottom 15 in results according to the TTS.

I am curious though: who do you think is the worst, or the group of worst characters, based off of your argument?

 

[Thinkaman]

It is not quite the best to refer to Q3 results alone, since we have only have ~2 months of actual relevant offline results prior to the switch to offline.

In each case, I looked at all 3 phases of OrionRank, and checked the wiki pages for the biggest mains of each of the listed characters to get an idea of how confounded the Phase 3 result limitations were.

I am primarily concerned with trends more so than transient Phase 3 data. I presented an "argument" best I could for ICs being bad/worst, because they are so close to the cluster of worst-performing characters, but I don't buy it for one second myself. (I said as much)

I keep thinking are bound to decline, but T3 DOM keeps stubbornly making the character look decent; they are declining, but slower than the other mentioned characters who got big 8.0.0 buffs. I think the real takeaway is that they are super polarizing, which the data supports.

I could believe the initial surprise of being better than first impressions fades, and Byleth going into a Banjo-like stagnation. The difference being that Banjo I think has more robust foundations (and is just cognatively taxing/hard to optimize), Byleth is more directly overshadowed by alternatives. (Including buffed Corrin?)

 

[The_Bookworm]

I could believe the initial surprise of being better than first impressions fades, and Byleth going into a Banjo-like stagnation. The difference being that Banjo I think has more robust foundations (and is just cognatively taxing/hard to optimize), Byleth is more directly overshadowed by alternatives. (Including buffed Corrin?)

I find to be an awkward character to rank, since he was out for less than 2 months after he was released. He didn't really get enough time to establish a sizeable playerbase. We all know how long it took for Joker to get the playerbase we all know today.

Interestingly, it seems that playerbase is also rather small on release, despite being one of the higher regarded DLC characters, although that isn't saying much since most of them are meh at best in the metagame rn. Now of course, she just came out, also at a poor timing for the Smash community, but I haven't really seen many already established notable players coming up, deciding to main her. ESAM's usage of her in GOML 2020 is our first taste of Min Min in sizeable tourneys. Although it was a delicious taste, he didn't use her that often, and I don't know how much longer he is going to use her before inevitably dropping her, like he does for most of his secondaries.

But then that is when I realized: pretty all of the DLC characters have below-average at best representation. The obvious outlier to this is Terry, as on top of being a high tiered character, his playerbase is mostly a carryover of the already established Shoto playerbase dating all the way back to SSB4. Even then, Terry's reps are not as big as say... Ness reps as an example.

Joker also has a very sizable playerbase, although it is mostly by virtue of being one of the best characters in the game, and the only one that somewhat resembles SSB4 DLC characters. However, even then, his playerbase (especially at the top level) is not as high as some of the other top tiered characters. The rest of the DLC characters have very small playerbases.

There are 3 big reasons why:

1. The remaining DLC characters, as mentioned before, are not really that great, having obvious glaring flaws. This is obvious drop off from SSB4 DLC, as the DLC characters from that game, aside from Lucas and Roy, have been upper-high tier at worst. Although I remain optimistic on Byleth, he is likely not breaking any records on the tier list whatsoever. Banjo's perception and presence in the meta has been dying down for a while now, but especially recently. Hero's presence in the metagame pretty much vanished after the first month of his release, with the occasional usage by Salem being the only source of any relevancy in tournaments. PPlant was bottom tier at release and low tier to this day.
2. Aside from the PPlant buffs throughout the update history, as well as the Joker nerfs a few patches back, the balancing team has also been relatively neglecting the DLC characters throughout the update history. Byleth got nothing. Banjo got barely anything. Hero got Kafrizz and Kaboom consistency changes that he doesn't need. Terry also got pretty much nothing, although he doesn't really need anything at the moment.
3. We exist in a game of over 70 characters, slowly approaching 80 characters. It is hard to switch over to the new characters several months after you got used to your main. Unless that said DLC character is breaking new grounds in the tier list like most of the SSB4 DLC, you are not really going to bothered with them too much at all unless you have a personal attachment to the character/moveset. I feel that Byleth and Min Min are probably the biggest losers of this, noting that these are the two most recently released characters, but pretty much everyone else aside from Terry has been affected by this. Joker gets the benefit of being both a top tier and one of the first DLC characters to be released, and even then, his playebase is not quite as big as you would expect of his position of power.

 

[Frihetsanka]

I don't agree with it 100% but overall it's pretty good. Do keep in mind that there are some matchups he said he really doesn't know about (like Ice Climbers) so he played it safe.

SHADIC, arguably the best Ultimate Corrin main (if we don't include Smash 4 mains like Cosmos and Zackray):

This is my Corrin MU Chart. If you disagree you're wrong🙃 Jk tell me what you think and I will try to answer questions :) pic.twitter.com/BlsoN2jWVg

— Stride | SHADIC (@SHADIC_) July 28, 2020

 

[DougEfresh]

But then that is when I realized: pretty all of the DLC characters have below-average at best representation. The obvious outlier to this is Terry, as on top of being a high tiered character, his playerbase is mostly a carryover of the already established Shoto playerbase dating all the way back to SSB4. Even then, Terry's reps are not as big as say... Ness reps as an example.

Joker also has a very sizable playerbase, although it is mostly by virtue of being one of the best characters in the game, and the only one that somewhat resembles SSB4 DLC characters. However, even then, his playerbase (especially at the top level) is not as high as some of the other top tiered characters. The rest of the DLC characters have very small playerbases.

There are 3 big reasons why:

1. The remaining DLC characters, as mentioned before, are not really that great, having obvious glaring flaws. This is obvious drop off from SSB4 DLC, as the DLC characters from that game, aside from Lucas and Roy, have been upper-high tier at worst. Although I remain optimistic on Byleth, he is likely not breaking any records on the tier list whatsoever. Banjo's perception and presence in the meta has been dying down for a while now, but especially recently. Hero's presence in the metagame pretty much vanished after the first month of his release, with the occasional usage by Salem being the only source of any relevancy in tournaments. PPlant was bottom tier at release and low tier to this day.
2. Aside from the PPlant buffs throughout the update history, as well as the Joker nerfs a few patches back, the balancing team has also been relatively neglecting the DLC characters throughout the update history. Byleth got nothing. Banjo got barely anything. Hero got Kafrizz and Kaboom consistency changes that he doesn't need. Terry also got pretty much nothing, although he doesn't really need anything at the moment.
3. We exist in a game of over 70 characters, slowly approaching 80 characters. It is hard to switch over to the new characters several months after you got used to your main. Unless that said DLC character is breaking new grounds in the tier list like most of the SSB4 DLC, you are not really going to bothered with them too much at all unless you have a personal attachment to the character/moveset. I feel that Byleth and Min Min are probably the biggest losers of this, noting that these are the two most recently released characters, but pretty much everyone else aside from Terry has been affected by this. Joker gets the benefit of being both a top tier and one of the first DLC characters to be released, and even then, his playebase is not quite as big as you would expect of his position of power.

You bring up several good points, though I think there are some other factors at play that are worth mentioning to more fully explain the disproportionate representation of Ultimate DLC characters in competitive play:

1) In addition to what you already said about and (and the obvious influence of Mkleo in establishing his meta and large playerbase), I think it helps immensely that these two are designed to be more aggressive and combo-heavy characters (Joker fits both criteria better than Terry, who lacks the sheer mobility of the phantom thief but just hits really hard and has some very good burst options to compensate). Especially in the US, competitive players are particularly drawn to, if not obsessed with, characters that fit within those archetype(s). It certainly helps that Ultimate's engine supports characters that fit those character designs, but it is a more general observation I've seemed to pick up on ever since the game's release when I've paid more attention to competitive smash.

2) In addition to the very high appeal of rushdown and combo-heavy characters in Ultimate as the meta of this game has developed, there's also a massive negative bias towards characters who rely primarily on zoning and defensive gameplay rather than aggression, long/high-damaging combos and multiple kill confirms. Now, you can attribute that to the game and its meta not lending itself as favorably to these other characters that require more time, patience, etc to use well and optimize, and you wouldn't be wrong.

However, I argue there's also a persistent negative perception of these "defensive/zoning/campy/lame" characters in the broader smash community as a result of this belief that anything short of aggression and flashy combos in games or sets is automatically boring and lame, especially from a spectator standpoint but also from a gameplay perspective as well to a lesser extent. I think this is an unfortunate view that has taken hold, as we all know in here that competitive play can be and often is more calculated and methodically paced, especially at higher levels of play and there's more to competition than just the flashy combos and kill set ups that we undeniably love to see.

Taking into consideration these other two points, I think is affected the most out the DLC characters so far by not being the rushdown/aggressive/combo-heavy type that the meta supports and being (unjustifiably, Imo) written off very early as "lame and campy" in conjuction with the fact that he is in a Smash game with 80+ characters and growing. Having played Banjo with a lot of dedication since release, I can tell you that I agree with what Thinkaman has said about him and that he's very sophisticated and requires significant time and character knowledge to even come close to making the most of his kit. If you rely on camping excessively with Banjo, believe me, he sucks. There's actually a fair bit of meta development going on behind the scenes as we continue to plod through this pandemic, so I'm very curious, and dare I say excited, to see where Banjo will be once this is all behind us.

To briefly touch on the others, I think is seen by many to just be an extremely gimmicky character with Ptooie (which is admittedly very good for him in a lot of scenarios), that once you know how he operates with it, he kinda just falls apart as a character. is just too damn slow, both in movement and frame data (but especially the former) to garner a lot of positive attention and develop a solid playerbase, I think. will probably fall victim to being a long ranged "zoner" character who is polarizing with her very strong advantage state but overall quite weak disadvantage state and again, being slow as hell (although she is still very new so we'll see and she does seem to have potential for fulfilling the niche that Byleth was intended to do). I think you already touched on as well as I could, so I'll leave that be.

For a final, closing remark, I have to say I wish the larger smash community would show more patience and give the benefit of time to, you know, actually allow certain characters' metas to develop and become optimized. Not everyone is going to be so straightforward in being able to gain clear insight into their optimal game plan(s) and how to work around flaws and weaknesses, and I don't especially care for the haste with which players generally will substantially lower their opinions of a character just because they're not constantly breaking top 8 or 16 at super majors or have some groundbreaking discoveries that take them up an entire tier or two in the meta in just a few short weeks or months after their release (though what's to be expected from Twitter and a very young fanbase that has highly unsophisticated views when it comes to competitive play). I will be interested to see what the next 5 patches bring for the rest of the roster though, and any potential patches that happen post DLC development could also give the existing DLC characters just the boost they need to gain widespread recognition and positivity to help boost their playerbase(s).

 

[Cheryl~]

There's a pretty simple reason as to why most of the DLCs have smaller playerbases than the characters at release.

You're a high level player and this new DLC comes out, seems interesting enough. But then you think "Hey, why would I drop my character that I've polished and used for months to over a year at this point for some new character?" This is further compounded by characters like Hero, Banjo, and Byleth being underwhelming or too complicated compared to other, easier characters that will get you more consistent results. It's a similar case in Smash 4 with characters like Lucas and Roy, but that game had Cloud, Bayonetta, and Corrin to a much lesser extent who still got a pretty solid playerbase despite being released late because they're broken as hell. Joker is the closest DLC in Ultimate to match this but even then his playerbase is mostly comprised of some mid to high level players picking him up because he's good and then at top level there's Leo and Zackray. That's it. Compared to the legion of top level Bayo mains/secondaries in Smash 4, it's not very much.

Terry and Smash 4 Ryu are the odd ones out here because while they are quite good, they're weird compared to normal characters and also have big flaws within their disadvantage which can make them stressful to play at high level. Thus, there are a decent amount of dedicated Ryu mains in Smash 4, and an okay amount of Terry mains in Ultimate. (Riddles, Tsu, Locus come to mind).

Min Min is more relatable to Terry in this sense because she's different than other characters, and the disadvantage state with her can also be stressful. Due to this and the reasons above about "Why am I gonna pick X character up over my character Y?", Min Min's playerbase is likely to remain smaller. I am optimistic though as ESAM really seems to vibe with the character and she seems like an actually good CP for him, and there's a whole ocean of hidden Min Min mains possibly in regions like Japan that could begin to pop off in the coming months, or when offline tourneys eventually come back. Min Min has a ton of potential, her BS is possibly some of the best in the game (like, almost on R.O.B. levels of stupidity) and while she may have some difficult matchups, the clutch factor within her crazy advantage state is sure to cause some upsets and high placings for her in the future. Again, similar to top tier R.O.B. whose mains have won sets in difficult matchups like Palu, Pikachu, and G&W off of his ridiculously dumb advantage state.

As for characters like Banjo, Plant, Byleth, and Hero, well, the few people that do main them still are likely to be dedicated due to liking the character's source material most likely. (Seriously what Banjo main hasn't played the N64 games?) So uh, at least you have them! And maybe more if they receive buffs in the future, as all 4 of these characters are pretty mediocre imo (Byleth is teetering on bottom 10 material) outside of Hero being a pretty cool zoner counterpick.



On one last note, Corrin is a pretty awesome character this patch and definitely the best job the patch team has done on making a previously mediocre, outclassed character into their own thing (maybe second to the shoto rework but those characters are big lame), and being pretty good at that! Seriously, landing against a good Corrin main is hellish now with all of the frame traps they can pull coupled with having actual kill power. I could go on but this thread has already harped on Corrin enough. She's good.

 

[StrangeKitten]

Who I think are legitimately the worst characters right now (ordered): /, , , , , ,

So, starting with the worst. has some moves that don't work as intended/have blind spots, gets very little reward for winning neutral, slow and large which makes him easy to keep in disadvantage, and has the worst recovery in the game. Most other bottom-tier characters have received buffs and QoL fixes, and most of them have gotten enough at this point to raise them out of bottom tier. Ganondorf has yet to receive any help.

is very similar to Ganondorf in being very slow and having a terrible recovery. His recovery is ever so slightly better than Ganondorf's, though. And cape and pills are tools Ganondorf wishes he had. Only got buffed once and it wasn't enough.

is a surprisingly potent character thanks to small size and loads of speed. Still, projectiles shut him down, as do high-knockback characters such as , , or since they'll be getting him offstage quickly, where they can then go for an edgeguard. He's deceptively tricky to edgeguard at times, because Jolt Haymaker is pretty good at helping him brute force his way back. Regardless, he still has a terrible recovery. Oh, and KO Punch is obviously a very good tool to have. If only it was a bit harder for him to lose it.

I just haven't seen ever really do much, competitively. I feel like laddering is all he really has at the moment, and it's too situational. He doesn't get a ton off of grab, so shielding vs Meta Knight shuts him down a lot of the time. I feel like he should be more like but he isn't quite there yet.

In theory, this character is a complete menace who will zero-to-death you via desynchs each stock. In practice, Icies are incredibly underwhelming. They just don't have strong neutral options - you have to pray your opponent messes up such that you can even get a desynch going, in a game where there is move safety in abundance. Neutral is a long, patient game a majority of the time, and Icies just don't seem like they can play that long game well. They're also not that hard to separate, and once you kill the secondary-Climber, the primary-Climber ends up having an even rougher neutral, in addition to the worst recovery in the game (but their recovery is good enough when both Climbers are around)

I'm just not so sure buffs can even make her a good character at this point. She has some good strengths: gnarly shield damage with Pound, wall of pain offstage, combos into Rest. But well, all of those are inconsistent, and I doubt buffs will make them consistent, because she would be broken. Shield got eaten by Pound? Okay, play some offense for a bit or perhaps run away a little and your shield will be back. Wall of pain requires that her aerials not be successfully dodged, and even then, some characters have insane recoveries and might make it back anyway. And stuff like dair into Rest is inconsistent; up air and Pound into Rest, there's just no guarantee you'll always be setup to get them at the fairly specific percents they work at. Still, having all of that makes her sound like a good character, right? Because you'll take stocks super early. Well, if she was your average character, yeah, she'd probably be good. But then you realize she's the second lightest character in the game, so she's going to die when most other characters would have survived. She's slow on the ground, which means she wants to come in with aerials most of the time. Said aerials don't have much range, so she'll also be trading a lot, which is bad due to her light weight. No projectile or means of countering projectiles. Her disadvantage state might just be one of the worst in the game. Since she's so floaty and lacks disjoint, how is she going to land? And, for as strong as her early % kill options are, if she doesn't pull them off, she struggles to take stocks because she doesn't have reliable kill moves at later percents.


have a great zoning game that is difficult to get around. But that's about all they have. Their whip hitboxes are very precise and don't cover much-needed areas. Their recovery is okay at times with tether, but they're dead if they're too far away to tether. But I think their biggest flaw is the fact that nothing kills. They have to hope to get Holy Water into a smash attack, or else their opponent is living to 150+. If I was going to buff them, the first thing I'd do would definitely be to up the raw kill power on a couple moves. Like Ganondorf, other characters have gotten buffs to pull them out the depths of bottom tier, while they've sat here and gotten nothing.

Characters I think are underrated:
is small and has loads of combos in conjuction with fast frame data. Has a lot of kill moves now, too.

is like a heavy with the combo and follow-up game of a fast combo character. Mewtwo is really good, probably the best character of any I'm gonna mention in this post. Shadow Ball is also excellent. It's just a shame that his disadvantage is so bad. I'm surprised they haven't addressed the tail issue again, as I've seen many examples of him getting hit even after they shrunk the hurtbox slightly. The problem really lies with his animations - he sticks his tail out really far where other tailed characters don't. But I doubt they'll change the animations themselves, so another reduction of the tail hurtbox needs to happen. Oh also, I know Disable is often thought of as a meme move, but I think it's good in Ultimate. It'll stun enough around 100 that Mewtwo gets a free smash attack, which will seal the stock.

is small and plays keepaway very well. It's a shame that most of her stuff lacks range, but thanks to Lloyd mine, Fishing Rod, and the slingshot, that's not as much of an issue as it otherwise could be. Has Lloyd to up air kill confirms. Being small and floaty means she doesn't get comboed much, too. Isabelle is one of the most underexplored characters in the game, and I'm of the opinion that she's better than people give her credit for.

is another woefully underexplored character. Plant is really good, imo. You have down throw to fair and up air to Ptooie at low percents. No combos outside of that? No problem! You just Ptooie and Poison Breath from there, being careful of reflectors, of course. Your opponent is approaching kill % after a few successful uses (seriously, Poison Breath is nuts). Fighting a fast character who can weave around your projectiles? You've got a great nair, fair is now fast, dash attack has armor on the pot, rapid jab deals tons of damage, gentleman jab sets up nicely into tech chases or sends the opponent offstage. Also, edgeguarding is risky in Ultimate outside of doing it against characters who have bottom-tier recoveries. But Ptooie? Ptooie don't care about that. Plant's smash attacks are notably pretty great. Down smash is very fast now, f-smash is pretty fast with great range, and up smash kills dummy early with a great scooping hitbox. Thinking about all this, maybe Plant is the best character mentioned here. It's a little hard to say, and I know I'm biased because this is the character out of all these bottom/low tier contenders I've put the most time into.

 

[Swamp Sensei]

In theory, this character is a complete menace who will zero-to-death you via desynchs each stock. In practice, Icies are incredibly underwhelming. They just don't have strong neutral options - you have to pray your opponent messes up such that you can even get a desynch going, in a game where there is move safety in abundance. Neutral is a long, patient game a majority of the time, and Icies just don't seem like they can play that long game well. They're also not that hard to separate, and once you kill the secondary-Climber, the primary-Climber ends up having an even rougher neutral, in addition to the worst recovery in the game (but their recovery is good enough when both Climbers are around)

Honestly, I don't even think the Ice Climbers's lacking neutral is all that bad.

What is bad is that Nana somehow has a worse AI than low level computers. Popo already has to babysit Nana to ensure they're both at full strength but in Ultimate, Nana's AI just stopped being effective. If Nana isn't literally taking orders from the player (either synced or desynced), she's probably going to get herself killed. There are all sorts of glitches where Nana gets stuck on platforms or just dies trying to get off of them. She does terrible options when trying to escape enemies and recovers in the worst possible way.

Frankly there's a lot wrong with the Ultimate version of Ice Climbers.

It feels like the balancing team is too scared to touch them.

 

[Firox]

I know Ultimate has a crap-ton of characters, but I think of all the characters I most often forget even exist, are the winners. Their usage is insanely low (at least in my own online experience of Quickplay Elite, Tourneys and Arenas) and I've never personally played a really good pair of them.

 

[Thinkaman]

When we did BBrawl, I literally did Ice Climbers last, only after every other character was more or less finalized. Giant pain, huge subproject. No idea if that's going on here, but I relate.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

Yeah, Icies are indeed a conundrum the developers have not fully figured out how to address yet. They are very clearly afraid of repeating mistakes made with their Melee and Brawl counter parts while at the same time trying to make them strong enough but not to the point no one enjoys playing against them.

You make Nana too intelligent and then it gets frustrating for the opponent trying to play against a CPU without human limitations (Just imagine Nana at the same ability as a level 9 CPU) but you also make her too unintelligent and you get the current Nana who is more of a detriment. You give the player too much freedom in using Nana then you get degenerate tactics like Brawl Icies. You take too much control away and the character loses its design.

It’s understandably a hard challenge trying to design a fighter who operates as two individual fighters at the same time. You have to account for the implications changing anyone of the moves or parameters has on the other when paired up in addition to when they are separated. So far the balance team seems to want to play it very safe in regards to them which has resulted in a rather subpar character overall, imo.

 

[StrangeKitten]

Yeah, I can't blame them for taking a careful approach with Icies when they were... a very unfun character to watch and play against in Melee and Brawl. Still though, it feels like they could buff them where needed and fix Nana without making them overpowered. Maybe just make it so Nana defaults to trying to synch up with Popo if she's far away? It's probably not that simple, but it feels like there's a balance that could be found to fix Nana. I practice against level 9 CPUs, and I agree you don't want her to be that smart. Frame-perfect dodging, jabbing conveniently as you were pressing jab, grabbing when they would have otherwise attacked because you pressed the shield button... It can be a nightmare at times, and we definitely don't want Nana to have that level of superhuman prediction

 

[The_Bookworm]

Yeah, Icies are indeed a conundrum the developers have not fully figured out how to address yet. They are very clearly afraid of repeating mistakes made with their Melee and Brawl counter parts while at the same time trying to make them strong enough but not to the point no one enjoys playing against them.

You make Nana too intelligent and then it gets frustrating for the opponent trying to play against a CPU without human limitations (Just imagine Nana at the same ability as a level 9 CPU) but you also make her too unintelligent and you get the current Nana who is more of a detriment. You give the player too much freedom in using Nana then you get degenerate tactics like Brawl Icies. You take too much control away and the character loses its design.

It’s understandably a hard challenge trying to design a fighter who operates as two individual fighters at the same time. You have to account for the implications changing anyone of the moves or parameters has on the other when paired up in addition to when they are separated. So far the balance team seems to want to play it very safe in regards to them which has resulted in a rather subpar character overall, imo.

I don't think it is much of an issue to balance them anymore.

The thing is that Nana's smarter AI in Melee and Brawl is not what made the character degenerate in those games, far from it. Nana's AI was relatively tame in those games: relatively easy to manage as the opponent, while still being relatively obedient and competent as a partner character. Maybe she has a few instances of technical hiccups in Melee, but it wasn't too bad, while most of those hiccups are fixed in Brawl.
If they left the Nana AI similar to her Brawl iteration, the character will not be nearly as unstable, while still being easy to manage as the opponent.

It was mainly the infinite chaingrabbing, and in Brawl ICs case, the ability to wall opponents out with Ice Shot and Blizzard, that was so degenerate about the character.
Now in Ultimate, this was fixed: chaingrabbing is gone thanks to the 1-second grab invincibility introduced in SSB4, reflected Ice Shots can now damage the ICs, and the outer edge of Blizzard no longer flinches opponents, as well as having more endlag.

However, in a similar vein to Bayonetta when she arrived in the game, they kinda doubled down on ICs other non-degenerate qualities just to make extra sure that they will not mirror Melee/Brawl ICs in anyway.

1. The fact that, unless desynced, Nana cheers when throwing, was an unnecessary added bandage to the chaingrabbing problem, when it was fixed by simply existing in Ultimate. While this is somewhat rectified with desyncing, this still limits their combo potential greatly, while also adding another big technical skill hurdle to an already unstable character.
2. They added a 1.05x damage and knockback multiplier to Nana. Combined with defensive options being worse in Ultimate than in Brawl, it makes it easier to dispose of Nana. This singlehandely makes matches involving ICs snowball very quickly.
3. What did they do to forward and up smash?
4. The vast majority of their moves have received a mix bag of buffs and nerfs. Most of them like jab, forward tilt, down tilt, neutral air, back air, and Squall Hammer, got nerfed overall.
5. Their range was respectable in Melee and Brawl, but thanks to the universal range increase from SSB4, their hammer range is actually kinda laughable now. It doesn't help that they still have one of the worst air speeds in the game.

Then there is, of course, Nana's AI being terrible, as well as some glitchy things occurring with her. There is, of course, the glaring issue with Belay where getting hit by Nana simply makes Popo die.
HOWEVER: I think the weaker Nana AI, as well as her glitchy interactions, is more of an engine/technical issue than it is done intentionally. That is an obvious statement for the glitchy aspects, but due to technical hurdles of Ultimate as a game, Nana's AI suffers from it as a result.

After all, we have seen the dev team TRY to fix Nana's AI from patches 2.0 and 3.0.
However, what watching Super Mario Maker 2 glitch levels taught me, is that Nintendo sometimes does the absolute bare minimum to fix an issue.

We have seen it first-hand when they try to fix the ICs desync combos, the Diddy infinite, and the Luigi 0-death: they didn't actually fix the problems and then left them there afterwards. There is also them trying to fix Falcon's jab at patch 7.0, but never actually fixed the problem regarding it, and left that unfixed when 8.0 came out. It also took them into 8.0 to finally fix Raptor Boost's consistency after they tried to do so at 3.1.

So yeah, they left ICs in the state they are right now, overexaggerating the character's nerfs when very little was needed to fix their degeneracy, and then leave them relatively untouched out of fear of creating Brawl ICs ver 2.

This is the main reason why they left alone for the longest time. She was viewed as a very degenerate character in SSB4, and the crowd reaction from the Ultimate Invitational was the final nail in the coffin for the character.
Unlike ICs, however, they did eventually touch upon her in 3.1 and 8.0, and while she is still very flawed, there is at least some special attention to her despite her history.

I am hoping that they will eventually meaningfully touch the ICs soon enough, as they currently need more than an AI fix (assuming they would do that) to fix the duo's slew of significant problems.

 

[Arthur97]

To be fair to the SMM2 devs, a lot of those glitches are so specific that they may simply be deemed not worth the effort to find the cause of and then fix. They did patch out the super jump which was generally much more accessible only requiring certain inputs, and, let's be honest, a lot of the community probably doesn't want those glitches removed.

That said, Smash is clearly a different team, and they pretty quickly fixed the Buster Wolf game shattering glitch (ironically also involving the ICs), but Min MIn still T poses so I'm not really sure about that. Maybe they are waiting to address the AI until after they have a gameplan as to how to work on them.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

Some of you have never lost to a top Brawl ICs player in tournament and it shows

ICs is bad. Why can't you guys just be happy?

 

[ZephyrZ]

Some of you have never lost to a top Brawl ICs player in tournament and it shows

ICs is bad. Why can't you guys just be happy?

This isn't Brawl, and I don't think anyone is asking for wobbles to come back.

We're just discussing why the character doesn't seem that good in practice in the character impressions thread. I see nothing wrong with this.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

This isn't Brawl, and I don't think anyone is asking for wobbles to come back.

We're just discussing why the character doesn't seem that good in practice in the character impressions thread. I see nothing wrong with this.

"We're just saying bloody mary 3 times in the mirror, nothing can go wrong"

 

[MrGameguycolor]

"We're just saying bloody mary 3 times in the mirror, nothing can go wrong"

Dude, will you just chill out and let them discuss.

 

[MrGameguycolor]

Who I think are legitimately the worst characters right now:

It's pretty frustrating honestly, he's so close to being a good character with his fast, hard-hitting moves, but is plagued with too many big and even little issues that hold him back.

-We all know is slow, but I'm not convinced many know by how much.

Spoiler: Slow Mobility

-Air Acceleration:
*Base: 0.007648
*Additional: 0.053536

*Max: 0.061184

(31st Slowest)

-Air Speed: 0.9238784 (11th Slowest)


-Run Speed: 1.397792 (7th Slowest)

-Initial Dash: 1.5375712 (The number 1 Slowest)

He's one of the slowest movers in the game, so trying to play approach, run away, or push advantage can be hell at times.
He doesn't have any fast and/or ambiguous approach options which only adds on to his problem of trying to escape pressure. Forcing him to rely on rolls and spot dodges.

has to alleviate this with Pills, which can work, but many characters can invalidate their use by hitting them, or just crouching under them as a shorter character.
He's simply not mobile enough to threaten on stage unless he goes all in, which he can't afford to mess up thanks to his horrible recovery.

-His recovery stinks, he doesn't drift far nor jump high enough. Air dodging only does so much. Up-B has smaller hitboxes, doesn't grant invincibility, and goes a shorter distance than Mario's while still containing the same 30 frames of landing lag.

While mashing Tornado can help, that function doesn't refresh if you get hit after the attack ends sort of like Side-B.
It's another, laggier, and more limited jump at the end of the day, so I don't get why the one uses limit at all. Air Tornado doesn't even grant armor at all unlike the grounded version. (Not that it would have mattered much since it's only a 10 HP threshold that lasts from frames 5-9 which hardly does much.)

This squeezes into his edge-guarding, while his options are powerful, he can't go far off-stage without the risk of SDing.


-Just like , his frame data is amazing but at the cost of reach.
While his hitboxes aren't bad, they just lack the range and priority to challenge head-on, especially since he can't drift around to cover space well enough with his aerial moment.
Doesn't help that his F-Smash, B-Air, and Cape have less reach then 's. (Although his Up-Smash has an extra active frame)

Spoiler: Hitboxes Visualized

In F-Smash case, he can't 2-Frame some recoveries and Cape is too small to challenge aerial approaches.

- has too many negative on hit moves at low percents, including his aerials unless you instantly land with some of them, which you obviously can't do when using them as a rising option out of shield.

Spoiler: Minus on hit moves

Up-Tilt:

Up-Smash:

Sour/Early N-Air:

Sweet N-Air

B-Air

Up-Air:

D-Air:

Granted, most spikes at low %'s have this problem since the devs don't want spikes to kill super early off-stage.

Up-B:
Starting at 0:03

Don't you love it when all your out-of-shield options on a slow and stubby character are punishable on hit... pic.twitter.com/VFqcZeK9Vk

— MGG (@MrGameguyC) November 19, 2019

Dark Wizzy: "Wow that was super negative on hit, I'm never doing that again."

Normally these wouldn't be a big deal. But with you need to make all your hits count.

It's especially bad on Up-Air since it's meant to be your main combo starter, yet it's better at starting combos for the opponent.
This results in Doc getting average damage off of simple BnB's and by the time it becomes positive on hit, the opponent can just DI away and they're launched too far to continue the combo. (Unless it's on a heavy)

At least he does have some strong combos like landing late N-Air > Sweet D-Tilt > Grab, or D-Air Spike > Up-Smash, though they're often more situational.

-He's a powerful character who can struggle to kill.
While many of his KO options like Up-Smash, F-Air (the half that don't sourspot), D-Air, B-Throw, Up-B, and Tornado are very strong.

His mobile burst options on the other hand like F-Tilt, Sweet N-Air, B-Air and Up-Air while quite strong for their frame data are often outclassed in KO Power by other, mobile glass canon-ish characters like , , , , , , and

-He's not even heavier than .

I've heard some argument saying this wouldn't help, and yeah while he would get combo'd harder, he does have faster escape options like a Frame 3 Air-Dodge, N-Air, Up-Air, & Up-B. (Even if they're minus on hit at low percents) And I believe those, combined with fewer chances of getting blastzone'd would do him more good in the long run.


-Most matchups usually involved the opponent taking advantage of his lack of approach options in order to win neutral, and at that point, many characters can play super lame if they gain a lead, and sometimes they can just straight-up camp/run away most of the fight, it's sadly a very viable strategy against him. Even if that's not the case, he still would have to win neutral multiple times, thus giving the opponent more chances to adapt and knock him off-stage and abuse his horrible recovery.
With all of this out of the way, this paints a clear picture of what kind of a character is.
It's a bummer since he's a very fun character with a surprisingly distinct design, but also a very flawed and unpopular one since not many people know about these problems. They clearly overdid it on his weakness and he suffers from it as he has few even matchups and even less winning ones, especially after 8.0.0.

Here's hoping he'll get significantly buffed in the next 5 patches.

 

[StrangeKitten]

Some of you have never lost to a top Brawl ICs player in tournament and it shows

ICs is bad. Why can't you guys just be happy?

The character is allowed to be pretty good without being broken like in Brawl. Icies are one of my least favorite characters in the game if I'm being honest, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't get some buffs and fixes to help them function. They'd probably only be upper mid with hitbox and some Nana fixes, so I don't see why that shouldn't happen. Wobbling isn't even possible in Ultimate.

And y'know, there are people who geniunely love Icies. They deserve a functional character

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

The character is allowed to be pretty good without being broken like in Brawl. Icies are one of my least favorite characters in the game if I'm being honest, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't get some buffs and fixes to help them function. They'd probably only be upper mid with hitbox and some Nana fixes, so I don't see why that shouldn't happen. Wobbling isn't even possible in Ultimate.

And y'know, there are people who geniunely love Icies. They deserve a functional character

No one loves ICs. They love chaingrabs and busted kill setups. Ice Climber is not a game with a legacy and the character was more or less added as an "lol so random" or "haha sakurai ur so wacky" entry in Melee.

Anyway my original posts were meant in humor but I definitely think Smash is in a better place when I don't have to worry about avoiding 100 silly desync and kill setups. Like oh oops you didn't know about the setup the ICs Discord labbed this week and you hit my shield at exactly 5.2% which allows me to activate my desync trap card and now it's blizzard blizzard ice cube throw blizzard fair spike. Outplayed.

Nah I'm good.

 

[Arthur97]

It's pretty frustrating honestly, he's so close to being a good character with his fast, hard-hitting moves, but is plagued with too many big and even little issues that hold him back.

-We all know is slow, but I'm not convinced many know by how much.

Spoiler: Slow Mobility

-Air Acceleration:
*Base: 0.007648
*Additional: 0.053536

*Max: 0.061184

(31st Slowest)

-Air Speed: 0.9238784 (11th Slowest)


-Run Speed: 1.397792 (7th Slowest)

-Initial Dash: 1.5375712 (The number 1 Slowest)

He's one of the slowest movers in the game, so trying to play approach, run away, or push advantage can be hell at times.
He doesn't have any fast and/or ambiguous approach options which only adds on to his problem of trying to escape pressure. Forcing him to rely on rolls and spot dodges.

has to alleviate this with Pills, which can work, but many characters can invalidate their use by hitting them, or just crouching under them as a shorter character.
He's simply not mobile enough to threaten on stage unless he goes all in, which he can't afford to mess up thanks to his horrible recovery.

-His recovery stinks, he doesn't drift far nor jump high enough. Air dodging only does so much. Up-B has smaller hitboxes, doesn't grant invincibility, and goes a shorter distance than Mario's while still containing the same 30 frames of landing lag.

While mashing Tornado can help, that function doesn't refresh if you get hit after the attack ends sort of like Side-B.
It's another, laggier, and more limited jump at the end of the day, so I don't get why the one uses limit at all. Air Tornado doesn't even grant armor at all unlike the grounded version. (Not that it would have mattered much since it's only a 10 HP threshold that lasts from frames 5-9 which hardly does much.)


-Just like , his frame data is amazing but at the cost of reach.
While his hitboxes aren't bad, they just lack the range and priority to challenge head-on, especially since he can't drift around to cover space well enough with his aerial moment.
Doesn't help that his F-Smash, B-Air, and Cape have less reach then 's. (Although his Up-Smash has an extra active frame)

Spoiler: Hitboxes Visualized

In F-Smash case, he can't 2-Frame some recoveries and Cape is too small to challenge aerial approaches.

- has too many negative on hit moves at low percents, including his aerials unless you instantly land with some of them, which you obviously can't do when using them as a rising option out of shield.

Spoiler: Minus on hit moves

Up-Tilt:

Up-Smash:

Sour/Early N-Air:

Sweet N-Air

B-Air

Up-Air:

D-Air:

Granted, most spikes at low %'s have this problem since the devs don't want spikes to kill super early off-stage.

Up-B:
Starting at 0:03

Don't you love it when all your out-of-shield options on a slow and stubby character are punishable on hit... pic.twitter.com/VFqcZeK9Vk

— MGG (@MrGameguyC) November 19, 2019

Dark Wizzy: "Wow that was super negative on hit, I'm never doing that again."

Normally these wouldn't be a big deal. But with you need to make all your hits count.

It's especially bad on Up-Air since it's meant to be your main combo starter, yet it's better at starting combos for the opponent.
This results in Doc getting average damage off of simple BnB's and by the time it becomes positive on hit, the opponent can just DI away and the opponent is launched too far to continue the combo. (Unless it's on a heavy)

At least he does have some strong combos like landing late N-Air > Sweet D-Tilt > Grab, or D-Air Spike > Up-Smash, though they're often more situational.

-He's a powerful character who can struggle to kill.
While many of his KO options like Up-Smash, F-Air (the half that don't sourspot), D-Air, B-Throw, Up-B, and Tornado are very strong.

His mobile burst options on the other hand like F-Tilt, Sweet N-Air, B-Air and Up-Air while quite strong for their frame data are often outclassed in KO Power by other, mobile glass canon-ish characters like , , , , , , and


-He's not even heavier than .
I've heard some argument saying this wouldn't help, and yeah while he would get combo'd harder, he does have faster escape options like a Frame 3 Air-Dodge, N-Air, Up-Air, & Up-B. (Even if they're minus on hit at low percents) And I believe those, combined with fewer chances of getting blastzone'd would do him more good in the long run.

Most matchups usually involved the opponent taking advantage of his lack of approach options in order to win neutral, and at that point, many characters can play super lame if they gain a lead, and sometimes they can just straight-up camp/run away most of the fight, it's sadly a very viable strategy against him. Even if that's not the case, he still would have to win neutral multiple times, thus giving the opponent more chances to adapt and knock him off-stage and abuse his horrible recovery.

With all of this out of the way, this paints a clear picture of what kind of a character is.
It's pretty sucky since he's a very fun character with a surprisingly distinct design, but also a very flawed and unpopular one since not many people know about these problems. They clearly overdid it on his weakness and he suffers from it as he has few even matchups and even less winning ones, especially after 8.0.0.

Here's hoping he'll get significantly buffed in the next 5 patches.

Okay, but on the Cape/Sheet, they seem to very intentionally be going for different directions in the hitboxes. Now, you can argue the usefulness of the vertical range of the Sheet over the horizontal range of the Cape of course.

I also wonder how Doc is balanced since, for whatever reason, Doc is not considered an echo. Is Doc actually balanced normally, or is it still in comparison to regular Mario?

 

[MrGameguycolor]

Okay, but on the Cape/Sheet, they seem to very intentionally be going for different directions in the hitboxes. Now, you can argue the usefulness of the vertical range of the Sheet over the horizontal range of the Cape of course.

True, Doc's cape is more effective at 2-Framing Cape Pulling by the ledge.
But the point was is that does little to help him contest other attacks due to its poor range and iffy frame data when Doc is already so slow.
Now if it had more horizontal range on-top of the vertical, that'd be amazing.

I also wonder how Doc is balanced since, for whatever reason, Doc is not considered an echo. Is Doc actually balanced normally, or is it still in comparison to regular Mario?

Sakurai confirmed they balanced Doc by pitting him against Mario in Sm4sh. (Safe to assume the same for Ultimate)

It clearly wasn't the way to go since Mario has to get in Doc's range which Doc obviously does fine against.
Doesn't help that they coded most of Doc's attribute and damage with that equipment system from Sm4sh.

Doc was clearly rushed in some areas.

 

[Arthur97]

True, Doc's cape is more effective at 2-Framing Cape Pulling by the ledge.
But the point was is that does little to help him contest other attacks due to its poor range and iffy frame data when Doc is already so slow.
Now if it had more horizontal range on-top of the vertical, that'd be amazing.


Sakurai confirmed they balanced Doc by pitting him against Mario in Sm4sh. (Safe to assume the same for Ultimate)

It clearly wasn't the way to go since Mario has to get in Doc's range which Doc obviously does fine against.
Doesn't help that they coded most of Doc's attribute and damage with that equipment system from Sm4sh.

Doc was clearly rushed in some areas.

I know that was the case in 4, but in 4 Doc was in the clone corner, but in Ultimate Doc is, somehow, considered not an echo. So, it could have changed. That said, as inconsistent as it is, Doc could very well have been treated like an echo without the label. Again, for some reason.

 

[Guynamednelson]

I know that was the case in 4, but in 4 Doc was in the clone corner, but in Ultimate Doc is, somehow, considered not an echo. So, it could have changed. That said, as inconsistent as it is, Doc could very well have been treated like an echo without the label. Again, for some reason.

Even with equipment removed, Doc being stronger but slower is still handled with equipment that gives him those attributes. They'll have to get rid of that equipment and make him stronger but slower the hard way if he is to not be garbage.

 

[Krysco]

Echo is just a label the devs use for some of the clone characters and doesn't actually seem to have much to do with how patches affect them. Ryu got Hadoken changes that Ken never got, Lucina got nerfs that Marth never got while Marth got buffs that Lucina never got. Both Chrom and Roy got changes to their up specials (which to be fair, are completely different moves) and other clone characters have gotten changes individual of who they're based on. Falco, Wolf, Luigi, Pichu, Young Link, Toon Link, Jigglypuff for examples. The only echoes that seem to get 1 for 1 the same changes as their base character are the ones the devs want to essentially just be skins. Dark Samus, Daisy and Richter, especially noteworthy with Daisy as they changed her turnips to be just like Peach's.

Doc will probably always have his weaknesses of poor mobility and poor range as the only time I can think of a patch changing a weakness like that to any noteworthy degree was Smash 4 Mewtwo getting a huge buff to his ground movement. I can see Doc's negative on hit moves getting changed for the better and I can see him getting even more power as that seems to be how the patches have been for this game, just buff strengths rather than weaknesses. Doc's recovery difference compared to Mario is rather odd to me since it's already been mentioned, his weight isn't any different. His doctor uniform doesn't make him weigh any more or less than his overalls yet they somehow make him jump lower and move slower in the air? Of course, that's trying to apply logic to a change made for balance purposes and is along the same lines as 'why are Ridley and Mewtwo so light' but it's still strange. My understanding of Doc is they want him to hit as hard as a heavy and be slow as a heavy but have better frame data and less weight. Problem there is many heavies have better mobility than him and better recoveries and while they lack his frame data, they get to live longer due to added weight and recovery.

As for Ice Climbers, one thing I'm curious about is if Namco's involvement has anything to do with how buggy Nana is. ICies missed out on 4 so this would be the first Smash game to have the ICies and have Namco involved in development. Namco had nothing to do with Melee or Brawl and both games were rushed and yet still had better AI on Nana and that's completely disregarding the broken stuff the duo could do in those games. You could remove wobbling and Brawl chaingrabs from ICies and they still wouldn't have things like Nana getting stuck on a platform or killing herself or teleporting after getting hit in those games. I'm not sure if any other Namco fighting game has a character like ICies in it but I'm also pretty sure Smash is the only platform fighter they've worked on so there would be differences to get used to even if they have another character that's 2 in 1.

 

[Thinkaman]

ICs could be described as "horrific" in Melee and Brawl without hyperbole. Truly a failed experiment that made the game less fun.

All the structural ICs "fixes" in Ultimate that serve to make them firmly non-denegerate are warranted and appropriate.

However, no one is arguing in favor of chaingrabs. People just want Belay to work right and certain Nana AI glitches to be fixed. By all means.

This shouldn't be a controversial, difficult, or mysterious topic. Everyone actually agrees.

 

[meleebrawler]

Echo is just a label the devs use for some of the clone characters and doesn't actually seem to have much to do with how patches affect them. Ryu got Hadoken changes that Ken never got, Lucina got nerfs that Marth never got while Marth got buffs that Lucina never got. Both Chrom and Roy got changes to their up specials (which to be fair, are completely different moves) and other clone characters have gotten changes individual of who they're based on. Falco, Wolf, Luigi, Pichu, Young Link, Toon Link, Jigglypuff for examples. The only echoes that seem to get 1 for 1 the same changes as their base character are the ones the devs want to essentially just be skins. Dark Samus, Daisy and Richter, especially noteworthy with Daisy as they changed her turnips to be just like Peach's.

Doc will probably always have his weaknesses of poor mobility and poor range as the only time I can think of a patch changing a weakness like that to any noteworthy degree was Smash 4 Mewtwo getting a huge buff to his ground movement. I can see Doc's negative on hit moves getting changed for the better and I can see him getting even more power as that seems to be how the patches have been for this game, just buff strengths rather than weaknesses. Doc's recovery difference compared to Mario is rather odd to me since it's already been mentioned, his weight isn't any different. His doctor uniform doesn't make him weigh any more or less than his overalls yet they somehow make him jump lower and move slower in the air? Of course, that's trying to apply logic to a change made for balance purposes and is along the same lines as 'why are Ridley and Mewtwo so light' but it's still strange. My understanding of Doc is they want him to hit as hard as a heavy and be slow as a heavy but have better frame data and less weight. Problem there is many heavies have better mobility than him and better recoveries and while they lack his frame data, they get to live longer due to added weight and recovery.

As for Ice Climbers, one thing I'm curious about is if Namco's involvement has anything to do with how buggy Nana is. ICies missed out on 4 so this would be the first Smash game to have the ICies and have Namco involved in development. Namco had nothing to do with Melee or Brawl and both games were rushed and yet still had better AI on Nana and that's completely disregarding the broken stuff the duo could do in those games. You could remove wobbling and Brawl chaingrabs from ICies and they still wouldn't have things like Nana getting stuck on a platform or killing herself or teleporting after getting hit in those games. I'm not sure if any other Namco fighting game has a character like ICies in it but I'm also pretty sure Smash is the only platform fighter they've worked on so there would be differences to get used to even if they have another character that's 2 in 1.

Doc also has a smallish body, said frame data breaking overzealous strings and more consistent zoning option in his pills coupled with a reflector that has less commitment and can be used in an advance, compared to his heavyweight peers. Maybe his weak recovery is a bit overkill, but he otherwise possesses many unique traits for his archetype that can't be overlooked when considering how to tweak him.

His slowness seems more attributed to his more sedentary lifestyle in a doctor's office leaving him relatively out of shape (he hits harder because of precision, not strength) instead of equipment weighing him down. Normal Mario has a water pump backpack that doesn't slow him down in the slightest, after all.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Wolf matchup chart from Tweek

Wolf match up chart from my stream

yes wolf is very good pic.twitter.com/TpCRfNP5GX

— LG Tweek (@TweekSsb) July 29, 2020

 

[The_Bookworm]

Here is another odd, but game changing quirk with that involves his SSB4 iteration.
This quirk offers insight on how much Doc has it rough on the mobility department, but also offer a solution that helps make this polarizing weakness of the Doc not as glaring.

-----------------------------------------

We all know that is slower than , but how much exactly?

Dash Speed
Mario had a value of 1.6, the 29th-30th fastest (tied with Ryu).
Dr. Mario had a value of 1.3312, the 52nd fastest.

Initial Dash
Mario had a value of 1.6, the 18th-19th fastest (tied with Ryu).
Dr. Mario had a value of 1.3312, the 47th fastest.

Walk Speed
Mario had a value of 1.1, the 30th-32nd fastest (tied with Cloud and Shulk).
Dr. Mario had a value of 0.913, the 44th fastest.

Air Speed
Mario had a value of 1.15, the 9th-11th fastest (tied with DK and Sonic).
Dr. Mario had a value of 0.9292, the 46th fastest.

Max Air Acceleration
Mario had a value of 0.08, the 22nd-31st fastest (tied with so many characters lol).
Dr. Mario had a value of 0.0674, the 41st fastest.

Jump Height
Mario had values of 36.33 (full hop), 17.54 (short hop), 36.33 (air jump). 13th highest full hop.
Dr. Mario had values of 36.33 (full hop), 13.83 (short hop), 28.65 (air jump). 13th highest full hop.

The way they calculated Dr. Mario's mobility stats in SSB4 is that his values are stored in-game as the same as Mario's, then added a multiplier of 0.832 for dash speed and initial dash, 0.83 for walk speed, 0.808 for air speed, and 0.82 for air acceleration.

The SmashWiki didn't gave out the specific multiplier number for the jump height, which is also the case for the Ultimate multipliers. I already have the Ultimate multipliers intact, as I did the calculations a long time ago on my personal balance change wishlist (it has been almost a year since I touched that document), but I am too lazy to find the specific multiplier on jump height.

Fun fact: Dr. Mario actually has the same base air acceleration as Mario at 0.01. The 0.82 multiplier to air acceleration actually gets applied to the additional air acceleration.

-----------------------------------------

Now you might be asking me: what is the point of relaying this information?
Well, to put it simply: the developers forgot their own universal changes when programming Dr. Mario's mobility stats into Ultimate.

To begin, lets compare the mobility stats of to .
Dash Speed: 1.3312 -> 1.397792
Initial Dash: 1.3312 -> 1.5375712
Walk Speed: 0.913 -> 0.917301
Air Speed: 0.9292 -> 0.9238784
Air Acceleration: 0.0674 -> 0.061184 (they added to the multiplier to base air acceleration in Ultimate)
Jump Height (Full Hop): 36.33 -> 30.88 (direct nerf from SSB4)
Jump Height (Short Hop): 13.83 (same value)
Jump Height (Air Jump): 28.65 (same value)

As you can see here, the values for Dr. Mario's mobility is relatively identical to the ones in SSB4.
Ground mobility stats got a small upgrade. Air mobility stats got a small downgrade. His jumps have been straight up nerfed.

However, that is the thing: Smash Ultimate had almost everyone's ground and air mobility be increased from SSB4 at a relatively consistent percent.

With his mobility stats identical to SSB4, that means that none of his mobility stats got the universal mobility increase,
We now compare the mobility stats for and .

Dash Speed
Mario has a value of 1.76, the 35th-38th fastest (tied with Ken, Squirtle, and Bayonetta).
Dr. Mario has a value of 1.397792, the 78th fastest.

Initial Dash
Mario has a value of 1.936, the 38th-42nd fastest (tied with Ken, Squirtle, Bayonetta, and King K. Rool).
Dr. Mario has a value of 1.5375712, the worst initial dash in the entire game.

Walk Speed
Mario has a value of 1.155, the 34th-36th fastest (tied with Cloud and Shulk).
Dr. Mario has a value of 0.917301, the 65th fastest.

Air Speed
Mario has a value of 1.208, the 12th-16th fastest (tied with DK, Sonic, Little Mac, and Inkling).
Dr. Mario has a value of 0.9238784, the 73rd fastest.

Max Air Acceleration
Mario has a value of 0.08, the 31st-41st fastest (tied with so many characters).
Dr. Mario has a value of 0.061184, the 54th fastest.

Jump Height
Mario had values of 36.33 (full hop), 17.54 (short hop), 36.33 (air jump). 16th highest full hop.
Dr. Mario had values of 30.8805 (full hop), 13.83 (short hop), 28.65 (air jump). 61st highest full hop.

Mario's mobility is relatively identical relative to his peers in the transition to Ultimate. However, since Dr. Mario's mobility values remains relatively the same, he is actually slower relative to the rest of the cast than in SSB4.

The multipliers applied to Doc this time around is roughly a consistent 0.794 for grounded mobility and 0.7645 for air mobility.
These multipliers are lower than in SSB4, probably emphasizing the polarizing aspect of Dr. Mario.
The only reason why his stats are relatively identical to that of SSB4, is that Mario's own mobility buffs is counteracting the lower multipliers.

This is a huge blow to Dr. Mario, and a reason why the character is arguably more polarizing in Ultimate than in SSB4.
We can now see that Doc's mobility situation is even more dire than it seems than on face value.
Now Dr. Mario has an actual legitimate advantage state in Ultimate, but multiplying his inherent, already polarizing, weaknesses even further was not the way to go by this.

I have no idea why Nintendo wants to make inherently inconsistent characters more polarizing from each entry to the series.
They did it with both SSB4 Lucario and Dr. Mario, and both cases didn't really have much desirable results. Now they seem to have made both characters even more polarizing in Ultimate, which is... why?! Granted that Dr. Mario is technically better in Ultimate, but that is a very low bar to clear.

-----------------------------------------

However, there is a light to the end of the tunnel. From the statistical data I provided, we can now give out a specific buffs to his mobility than just randomly: "let's just make him only slightly slower than Mario and see what happens".

As such, I am going to refer to my old, very outdated, wishlist on character changes, because my points on Dr. Mario's mobility still applies today.
I am going to share my own solution to Doc's mobility problems to give an example or outlier, on how discussions on buffing Doc's mobility could go.

Grounded mobility multiplier: ~0.794 -> 0.885
--------- + Walk: 0.917301 -> 1.022175 -------------------------- 65th -> 54th
--------- + Initial Dash: 1.5375712 -> 1.71336 ------------------- 84th -> 77th
--------- + Dash: 1.397792 -> 1.5576 ---------------------------- 78th -> 67th
Air mobility multiplier: ~0.7645 -> 0.845
--------- + Air Speed: 0.9238784 -> 1.02076 --------------------- 73rd -> 49th
--------- + Air Acceleration: 0.007648/0.053536/0.061184 -> ~0.00845/0.05915/0.0676 (Base/Additional/Max) ---------- 54th -> 52nd
+ Full hop height reverted to be identical to Mario's: 30.8805 -> 36.331814

I know that air acceleration barely increased, but that is one mobility value from Doc that actually isn't too much different from the SSB4 one relative to the cast, so I am fine with it.

You guys, of course, have all the power to change this to any value you wish. I just want to share my personal changes as an outline.

Sorry that this is a long read, but Dr. Mario's mobility issues is actually a very fascinating technical aspects of both SSB4 and Ultimate. I had a big interest back then, and the recent talk of Dr. Mario needing help (which I most definitely agree with) has ignited my fire of researching into this. I also want to show that a mobility buff to the doctor is very logical, and the ways of doing this as well.

Spoiler: Additional Notes

• I am actually not quite sure if Doc's full hop height is actually nerfed from SSB4. According to the SSB4 jump height table from SmashWiki, Doc's full hop is listed as 28.649233938816, the same as his air jump. His full hop being identical to his air jump applies to Mario as well. This would mean that his full hop actually buffed to Ultimate's new value of 30.8805. However, according to SmashWiki's changelog on SSB4 -> Ultimate Dr. Mario, they say his full hop height was identical to Mario's in SSB4 and that it is now nerfed to 30.8805 that it is today. So either their full hop value in SSB4 is incorrect, or that their claim that his full hop is identical to Mario is SSB4 is incorrect. I went with the changelog claim because it is the most recent, as well as me roughly remembering someone back in the SSB4 Competitive Discussion Thread saying something about his jump height being identical to Mario. I may be remembering things wrong, but I went with my instincts. I sadly cannot look this up, as the SSB4 jump height values are not documented elsewhere from what I can find. Jump heights in general are not well documented throughout any Smash game. Can someone in this thread please fact check this for me please?
• Here is a little fun fact that I learned today: there is a glitch where if Ultimate Dr. Mario holds a shooting item, his walk speed value multiplier will be removed. As long as he holds a shooting item, he will have the same walk speed as Mario.

 

[PK Gaming]

Re:

It's not good to hold past incarnations against a current one in Smash, but i'm sympathetic to the people who feel profound hate for the character, because as Thinkaman put, they were "horrific"

Re:

Nowhere near the worst character. He's got Mario tier frame data with absurd damage and insane KO potential, with some ridiculous tools like Tornado (which is straight up a solid reversal). The last buffs he got only served to make him even more lopsided. And yet for all his strengths, edgeguarding him is still pitifully easy, so he's the definition of a high risk, high reward character (which in a game like Smash where consistency is King, that's bad)

Re:

She's finally, finally in a good spot. Conveying her combo potential from her source games without being ridiculously overturned, having decent buttons in neutral now (thank you up tilt), a decent kill confirm (again, up tilt) and just, better more rounded moveset in general with smashes that are appropriately powerful for their risk. All in all, i'm quite satisfied with where she ended up. I don't know about tiering, but i'm comfortable in describing her as a threat