Official Competitive Character Impressions 2.0

[Nekoo]

I honestly find the disparity funny between West and East again-

USA: Sora's lame and not that good, he don't win a single game in top 8!!!!!

Japan: Have more and more people playing Sora, and having more and more Sora in top 8 or winning events

I just think that, we don't have anyone, top level wise, who really stuck a long time with Sora to really have a real grasp on how good he is.
We have Maister and Dabuz, who shyly bring him out, but it's not to the level of let's say Kememe, Komo or Zackray who'd use him more regularly over there.

 

[Arthur97]

Legitimate question: how stacked are said Japanese events or is it really good players curb stomping locals with whatever fighter they want to?

 

[Linkmain-maybe]

Legitimate question: how stacked are said Japanese events or is it really good players curb stomping locals with whatever fighter they want to?

I’m pretty sure it is the former.

 

[Eremurus]

Legitimate question: how stacked are said Japanese events or is it really good players curb stomping locals with whatever fighter they want to?

The average player in Japan is much stronger than those in the west. Probably less "curb-stomping" that goes on as a result.

 

[Rizen]

The average median player in Japan is much stronger than those in the west.

What are you basing that on?

 

[Dan Quixote]

The average median player in Japan is much stronger than those in the west. Probably less "curb-stomping" that goes on as a result.

lol wait by average median do you mean average or median? those are definitely two very different things

 

[Eremurus]

lol wait by average median do you mean average or median? those are definitely two very different things

Well.. this is awkward. I didn't mean to put median in, just average. Brain turned off.

What are you basing that on?

The fact that mid level players upset top level players on a regular basis? Well, as "regular" as one would expect upsets to be. At every Japanese major, or regional, there are countless lower seeds that upset the top seeds. This is commonplace for Japan.

Edit

Because I don't feel like posting again, I'll just add this: I am not talking about top level talent. I am talking about mid/high level talent. I do not think it is a preposterous thing to say, that Japan has way more "hidden bosses" as a result. Players that are deceptively good, but who do not enter, or travel, as much as someone of that calibre would tend to do.

 

[Rizen]

Well.. this is awkward. I didn't mean to put median in, just average. Brain turned off.



The fact that mid level players upset top level players on a regular basis? Well, as "regular" as one would expect upsets to be. At every Japanese major, or regional, there are countless lower seeds that upset the top seeds. This is commonplace for Japan.

Edit

Because I don't feel like posting again, I'll just add this: I am not talking about top level talent. I am talking about mid/high level talent. I do not think it is a preposterous thing to say, that Japan has way more "hidden bosses" as a result. Players that are deceptively good, but who do not enter, or travel, as much as someone of that calibre would tend to do.

A: the West has a lot of upsets too and B: this doesn't prove anything about west vs eastern players. It just shows Eastern players have a lot of upsets vs Eastern players.

 

[Eremurus]

A: the West has a lot of upsets too and B: this doesn't prove anything about west vs eastern players. It just shows Eastern players have a lot of upsets vs Eastern players.

I guess this speculation will have to wait. Let's see how Acola, and Asimo do. I do not think either has travelled to the west for Smash before.

 

[Arthur97]

I think I'd need more than pure speculation to definitely say Japan is on average significantly stronger. Especially to suggest their locals are that much better.

I’m pretty sure it is the former.

Okay...so what are they? I don't recall seeing many posted results with Sora taking a major. He had a strong result early on, but ever since, even with the good players, I don't recall seeing anything really break out. Seems questionable that he'd be a top tier certainly. High tier, maybe, it's really hard to say, but he's got stiff competition.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Xerzal posted his Min Min matchup chart

Min Min Mu Chart pic.twitter.com/HAUNT1dTJG

— Xerzal (@Xerzal) May 20, 2022

DDee posted his tier list

Opinions changed so tier list
Roughly ordered pic.twitter.com/jDQKmgOX7s

— SS | DDee! (@ddee_ssbu) May 20, 2022

 

[blackghost]

Not exactly a controversial opinion.

Sora is LOW TIER ‼️ ⁉️ https://t.co/NkydnCAyK4 pic.twitter.com/ydKujjlEd2

— Dusty_Carpet (@Dusty_Carpet_) April 29, 2022

yeah, i think we are doing the song and dance for sora people did for banjo. People really WANT him to be good. but he isnt.

 

[TCT~Phantom]

yeah, i think we are doing the song and dance for sora people did for banjo. People really WANT him to be good. but he isnt.

Except unlike Banjo Sora is actually getting g consistent results. Sure, his results in America are not what they are in Japan. But consistently in Japan Sora has been doing well. Banjo has never had the same amount of consistent results Sora has now.

If anything, the results are probably only going to keep improving. Kameme is making a very dedicated effort to using sora as at worst a co main alongside Mega Man. Komorikiri is coming out of retirement basically using Sora. In the west, we do have Maister and Dabuz making a concentrated effort to using the character.

I would take twitter’s thoughts as a grain of salt. Most people tend to over inflate their mains mu chart. Combine that with Sora being a rarer character in NA and I think it’s only natural in a selective Twitter poll people underrate Sora.

The character is a solid high tier at the end of the day with a lot of potential to grow.

 

[Sucumbio]

I'd have said he compares more to Byleth. Like in MKleo's hands Byleth is a beast and in Zachray's hands Sora won a major (albeit awhile ago now) but both are just that talented. I'm willing to wait for more results tho and I definitely put stock in Japan's meta for fleshing out Sora since as pointed out his rep in NA is lackluster by comparison.

 

[NairWizard]

Sora's OK, just misunderstood. At release, people were saying that he had the best edgeguarding and recovery in the game. It turns out that his recovery is actually pretty average, and his edgeguarding is good but not outrageous. It's onstage traps, confirms and whiff punishing where Sora excels. A very different kind of focus area from how most people want to play him.

If I had to rate him compared to other sword characters I’d say he’s

way worse than Cloud, Aegis, and Roy (all S tier),
worse than Lucina and Shulk (A tier)
and slightly worse than Corrin and Byleth (B tier).

Likely better than Sephiroth, Ike, and Robin (C tier).

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Kola made a post where he discusses Roy and Chrom (swearing and slurs warning)

 

[Arthur97]

Wow, ahem, but at least he doesn't think Chrom deserves to be so much lower. He certainly should be closer than Marth is to Lucina you'd think.

 

[Aaron1997]

Out of nowhere Abadango's Meta Knight is back and beat Shuton's Aegis.

 

[Rizen]

Out of nowhere Abadango's Meta Knight is back and beat Shuton's Aegis.

I played a really good recently. It's a very volitile MU and even more so for characters with bad recoveries like Aegis. MK is an unremarkable mid tier on stage. He has pretty good frame data and can air camp you with multiple jumps but there's nothing too threatening about him. Offstage however he can absolutely destroy most of the cast. He walls you hard and has several amazing recovery options to come back from deep offstage. The MU often boils down to "can I kill this lightweight MK before he gimps me?" With both sides potentially dying early.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Sora's OK, just misunderstood. At release, people were saying that he had the best edgeguarding and recovery in the game. It turns out that his recovery is actually pretty average, and his edgeguarding is good but not outrageous. It's onstage traps, confirms and whiff punishing where Sora excels. A very different kind of focus area from how most people want to play him.

If I had to rate him compared to other sword characters I’d say he’s

way worse than Cloud, Aegis, and Roy (all S tier),
worse than Lucina and Shulk (A tier)
and slightly worse than Corrin and Byleth (B tier).

Likely better than Sephiroth, Ike, and Robin (C tier).

Sora kind of feels like a Brawl character in Ultimate. He's weird and floaty and kind of slow. I wouldn't call him better than Sephiroth yet, but he's likely about as good as Ike and Robin yeah.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Shinosuma HEROES #1 placements

1. Shuton
2. ProtoBanham
3. KEN
4. Abadango
5. Tarakotori
5. takera
7. Nata
7. Mikimatsu
9. Ryuoh
9. Choco
9. Nietono
9. Rinkururu
13. yuzu
13. zuya
13. Muramura
13. Lax

 

[F4lcoMain]

I played a really good recently. It's a very volitile MU and even more so for characters with bad recoveries like Aegis. MK is an unremarkable mid tier on stage. He has pretty good frame data and can air camp you with multiple jumps but there's nothing too threatening about him. Offstage however he can absolutely destroy most of the cast. He walls you hard and has several amazing recovery options to come back from deep offstage. The MU often boils down to "can I kill this lightweight MK before he gimps me?" With both sides potentially dying early.

Saying that there's nothing threatening about him is a bit of an overstatement. He does also have the early% death combo on multiple characters such as Bowser, which is something that players should be mindful of when facing him. It is somewhat situation since it is mainly threatening at lower percents, but it is a tech that I have seen players land multiple times in matches and secure quite early stocks with.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Honestly Meta Knight is a character I'd love to see more often, and kind of find it a shame he has fallen from grace so much. Much like other former top tiers as Mewtwo and Falco. I mean, they where good once what's stopping the developers to not at least make them high tier? Just a rant, pay it no mind. Abadango did good with MK, but it wasn't a solid win, more a lucky one. I honestly thought he was gonna lose if I didn't read the post that told Abadango won.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Seeding for The New York Smashdown
https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/uv01fl Seeding for Combo Breaker 2022
https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/uv2cvf

 

[Cheryl~]

NYC Smashdown results

1st: Tilde
2nd: Quidd
3rd: Marss
4th: WaDi
5th: Zomba
5th: Suarez
7th: Gen
7th: Dabuz (did not attend cause sick)

It was just a charity event, so a lot of players didn't take it suuuper seriously (as evidenced by Zomba literally going all random in his games lol) but there was some cool sets between Quidd and Tilde, who are both up-and-coming legends of the Northeast. Marss also tried to use his secondary Joker again, and it didn't work well but you can tell he's at least trying. Also big ups to WaDi pulling out Ice Climbers and actually doing really well with them, especially for someone who's known for not being a labber at all.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

The last two weeks of character data have now been updated: Palutena rapidly approaches Roy and takes #3, Min Min returns to the Top 30, Seph returns to the Top 20, and both Roy/ROB break 400 points! pic.twitter.com/sOaBG10e5R

— Barnard's Loop (@LoopBarnard) May 23, 2022

Same top 6 as last year in the exact same order.

 

[Frihetsanka]

Sephiroth in top 20 is very interesting considering how many people seem to be putting him around top 35-40 or so these days. I'm not really sure what to think of him, but then again, Olimar is #14 on the list and Ness is #11 and most don't really put those characters higher than Sephiroth either.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Sephiroth in top 20 is very interesting considering how many people seem to be putting him around top 35-40 or so these days. I'm not really sure what to think of him, but then again, Olimar is #14 on the list and Ness is #11 and most don't really put those characters higher than Sephiroth either.

Tweek, Pink, Hazmatt and Charles have made some mentions that Olimar is rising up again in the meta on Tweek Talks and all believe he's better then Sephiroth.

BTW seeding for Momocon
https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/uw3gmg

 

[PK Gaming]

I honestly find it incredibly disheartening that eSAM's tier list is that egregious and nobody really challenges it because critical thinking is just dead for Smash Ultimate it seems

The same guy conned people into thinking his favorite character is God tier 3 games in a row and it finally stuck

 

[NairWizard]

I honestly find it incredibly disheartening that eSAM's tier list is that egregious and nobody really challenges it because critical thinking is just dead for Smash Ultimate it seems

The same guy conned people into thinking his favorite character is God tier 3 games in a row and it finally stuck

huh, what's wrong with it? Looks pretty reasonable to me, given that some of his opinions in the past have been very wild/out there.

It follows closely with a lot of the latest meta trends

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

I honestly find it incredibly disheartening that eSAM's tier list is that egregious and nobody really challenges it because critical thinking is just dead for Smash Ultimate it seems

The same guy conned people into thinking his favorite character is God tier 3 games in a row and it finally stuck

Alright, I think you're heavily overexaggerating here and taking this in a rather aggressive matter. Obviously I think it's good to be critical towards #ESAMOpinions where he always overplaces any character he plays by at least 10 spots (look at his placing for Mii Brawler wtf), but the players on Tweek Talks are also starting to doubt characters he's doubting like Greninja and also are putting Incineroar in high tier. If anything outside of the Mii Brawler placement and maybe the Greninja placement, it's a pretty standard tier list.

Just because a lot of us disagree on Pikachu being the best in the game doesn't mean ESAM is a con man.
BTW here's the list so others know what we're talking about

13.0.1 tier list

order in mid/low tier doesn't really matter pic.twitter.com/W0ZH0fX0sD

— ESAM (Stride Esports) (@imESAM) May 24, 2022

 

[The_Bookworm]

Alright, I think you're heavily overexaggerating here and taking this in a rather aggressive matter. Obviously I think it's good to be critical towards #ESAMOpinions where he always overplaces any character he plays by at least 10 spots (look at his placing for Mii Brawler wtf), but the players on Tweek Talks are also starting to doubt characters he's doubting like Greninja and also are putting Incineroar in high tier. If anything outside of the Mii Brawler placement and maybe the Greninja placement, it's a pretty standard tier list.

Just because a lot of us disagree on Pikachu being the best in the game doesn't mean ESAM is a con man.
BTW here's the list so others know what we're talking about

13.0.1 tier list

order in mid/low tier doesn't really matter pic.twitter.com/W0ZH0fX0sD

— ESAM (Stride Esports) (@imESAM) May 24, 2022

This list honestly looks pretty solid.
Obviously, Brawler and Sora are by far the biggest two outliers, and there is still the whole Pika is #1 thing that he still clings on (which I don't agree with), but otherwise has most of the placements you would come to expect with the current meta.

 

[Arthur97]

While, overall, it may be solid, but there is a point there in that...people in the Smash community do seem to like to parrot opinion without much thought. Pikachu being the prime example. He has just somehow manage to push a narrative that Pikachu is best in the game with hardly any evidence yet for some reason people believe him. Other things can be annoyingly difficult to squash. Leaving aside the Aegis sisters specifically for now, like the pay to win thing which looking at most if not all the DLC simply isn't true in Ultimate (not to mention the cognitive dissonance of saying that and then saying that Pikachu is best in the game). Or trying to convince people Ridley isn't low tier garbage.

 

[PK Gaming]

Alright, I think you're heavily overexaggerating here and taking this in a rather aggressive matter. Obviously I think it's good to be critical towards #ESAMOpinions where he always overplaces any character he plays by at least 10 spots (look at his placing for Mii Brawler wtf), but the players on Tweek Talks are also starting to doubt characters he's doubting like Greninja and also are putting Incineroar in high tier. If anything outside of the Mii Brawler placement and maybe the Greninja placement, it's a pretty standard tier list.

Just because a lot of us disagree on Pikachu being the best in the game doesn't mean ESAM is a con man.
BTW here's the list so others know what we're talking about

13.0.1 tier list

order in mid/low tier doesn't really matter pic.twitter.com/W0ZH0fX0sD

— ESAM (Stride Esports) (@imESAM) May 24, 2022

Sorry, his list is pretty poor in overt and subtle ways. It blatantly ignores modern tournament results to adhere to some version of the metagame that doesn't exist. Ignoring Gluto's incredible run and not placing Wario in top 10 AND having the gall to rank Mario higher than him (a character who's been floundering for quite some time now) is the perfect example of what I mean. It's not 2019... the metagame has changed significantly since characters like Peach, Wolf and Mario dominated. You don't have to see Byleth as top tier, but sticking him way below characters he consistently outranks in high level performance is untenable. Sorry "Mkleo effect" plays him is such a copout. We'll grant that Pikachu is the best character in the game because one guy plays him with middling results, but Byleth isn't a meta threat despite being played by the best player in the world? In any other fighting game that would be grounds for people to recognize a character's potential but in Smash Ultimate that's thrown away because of the "Mkleo effect".

Mii Brawler being top 10 is just pure go. What's the point of a tier list from someone who "overplaces the character he plays by10 spots" when it signals to me that the person making the list refuses to approach things from a measured perspective. Why is ROB not top 10 material...anyone who's been barely paying attention knows how monstrous that character is in terms of tournament results (at local and high level play). His whole list is viewed through his personal levels and no empirical data to back it up. Tournaments results aren't everything, but they should count for something.

And yeah Pikachu being #1 obviously tanks the list. The guys who's had the pattern of pushing Pikachu as a God tier character 3 games in a row finally pulled it off with Ultimate and yeah that's pretty disheartening to see.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Sorry, his list is pretty poor in overt and subtle ways. It blatantly ignores modern tournament results to adhere to some version of the metagame that doesn't exist. Ignoring Gluto's incredible run and not placing Wario in top 10 AND having the gall to rank Mario higher than him (a character who's been floundering for quite some time now) is the perfect example of what I mean. It's not 2019... the metagame has changed significantly since characters like Peach, Wolf and Mario dominated. You don't have to see Byleth as top tier, but sticking him way below characters he consistently outranks in high level performance is untenable. Sorry "Mkleo effect" plays him is such a copout. We'll grant that Pikachu is the best character in the game because one guy plays him with middling results, but Byleth isn't a meta threat despite being played by the best player in the world? In any other fighting game that would be grounds for people to recognize a character's potential but in Smash Ultimate that's thrown away because of the "Mkleo effect".

Mii Brawler being top 10 is just pure go. What's the point of a tier list from someone who "overplaces the character he plays by10 spots" when it signals to me that the person making the list refuses to approach things from a measured perspective. Why is ROB not top 10 material...anyone who's been barely paying attention knows how monstrous that character is in terms of tournament results (at local and high level play). His whole list is viewed through his personal levels and no empirical data to back it up. Tournaments results aren't everything, but they should count for something.

And yeah Pikachu being #1 obviously tanks the list. The guys who's had the pattern of pushing Pikachu as a God tier character 3 games in a row finally pulled it off with Ultimate and yeah that's pretty disheartening to see.

Results are great and all, but not everyone in the Smash community uses results as a way of what they think the meta is like, and ESAM is one of them.
For instance, MockRock actually talks about some of the flaws of results, and believes matchup charts, something Wario and Byleth are considered to struggle with, are far more important. In fact MockRock also thinks theorycrafting and observing how the character works and how the players used them to be more important as well.

The tier list for Brawl was decided by one major thing and it was not entirely results. If that was the case, Snake would've been the #2 over Ice Climbers because Snake players had the 2nd best prize pool payout of any character behind Meta Knight. What did decide it was matchup charts, Meta Knight was the best character in the game by a massive margin, and this was due to his matchup spread. How viable every character was, was essentially determined by how viable they did against Meta Knight. It's obviously an exaggerated example because Brawl Meta Knight was the most broken Smash character ever, but it shows why results aren't everything and we shouldn't entirely stick to results at every tier list.

 

[PK Gaming]

While, overall, it may be solid, but there is a point there in that...people in the Smash community do seem to like to parrot opinion without much thought. Pikachu being the prime example. He has just somehow manage to push a narrative that Pikachu is best in the game with hardly any evidence yet for some reason people believe him. Other things can be annoyingly difficult to squash. Leaving aside the Aegis sisters specifically for now, like the pay to win thing which looking at most if not all the DLC simply isn't true in Ultimate (not to mention the cognitive dissonance of saying that and then saying that Pikachu is best in the game). Or trying to convince people Ridley isn't low tier garbage.

Right

It's just weird how Smash fans bought into this wholesale without really thinking about it. Disagree with me if you want, but we don't even have discussions anymore. Just tons of people on Reddit and Twitter uncritically regurgitating talking points from other people. And yeah eSAM's ego is just... wow. Instead of taking pride in the fact that hes' doing well (well not so much these days) with a character nobody else is really using, he insists that character is the best and most broken character in the game to a degree that borders on delusion.

Results are great and all, but not everyone in the Smash community uses results as a way of what they think the meta is like, and ESAM is one of them.
For instance, MockRock actually talks about some of the flaws of results, and believes matchup charts, something Wario and Byleth are considered to struggle with, are far more important. In fact MockRock also thinks theorycrafting and observing how the character works and how the players used them to be more important as well.

I don't want to be mean. You seem like a nice and passionate guy. But the fact that you think matchup charts, something that is entirely subjective AND really unwieldly in this game due to the sheer scope of the roster (forcing a lot of people to half-ass matchups) is somehow more valid than tournament results, hard empirical data is extremely worrying.

"Wario" struggles with matchup charts because literally everyone thinks their character beats Wario, lmao.

And yeah MockRock makes fun videos but he's pretty much the stereotype for armchair theorycraft smash player.

 

[The_Bookworm]

The tier list for Brawl was decided by one major thing and it was not entirely results. If that was the case, Snake would've been the #2 over Ice Climbers because Snake players had the 2nd best prize pool payout of any character behind Meta Knight.

Well to be fair in this context, Snake WAS considered to be #2 for the first 3 years of Brawl's lifespan, but the character fell off eventually when more powerful characters were discovered and Snake's weaknesses began to be much more readily exploited. Characters like ICs and Diddy began to become more prominent and commonplace in tournaments than him since then.

 

[Arthur97]

It is true that matchup charts are especially hard to do well in this game due to sheer size, let alone bias. How many players know how their main actually does against Meta Knight, Yoshi, Lucario, or Lucas? You can make some assumptions, but people assumed Wario lost to swordies, and while none have really replicated Gluto's results, it's possible that with a gameplay change that he actually beats several of them. Also, should theorycrafting, something that is inherently unproven, be the basis of tiers? Theory crafting is all well and good, but to use it as the basis of your tier lists? And, I get it, data is lacking in a lot of areas. We don't have top players playing every fighter, nor do most people have substantial experience with every matchup. Neither system is perfect, but at the end of the day, when the real world data so heavily conflicts with an assumption such as Pikachu being the best, maybe Pikachu should stop being considered top three. Lack of data is perhaps the biggest real issue in making a tier list.

Also, MKleo is amazing, it's true, but it does show what the Byleths are capable of. If we're going off theory, that should be enough, shouldn't it? Which brings up another issue with theory is that pretty much no one plays perfect all the time. Take Kazuya. In theory, he might be one of the best, but it's probably not very controversial to say he has the most technical execution to achieve that level. Doing that game after game with the stress of a tournament? Some might can do it, but it may take its toll. So when does practicality come into play? Either way, it is a point that the unproven Pikachu is often placed higher based on "theory" than the proven Byleths or Wario because the theory crafters don't go their way. Perhaps people should require more of the theory to be proven correct before believing it.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Would like to point out that I'm not even a Pikachu shill. Currently I think Pikachu is overrated and is just outside of top 5 rather then top 3 like everyone says. I also think Wario is fairly strong, but some top players such as Tweek do not believe in the character atm and actually place him much lower then what ESAM does and Dabuz also didn't put him in top tier recently despite historically having very strong opinions on Wario which means ESAM is actually more on the optimistic side here. If anything, a complaint about ESAM's list should be a complaint about tier lists in general and opinions on top players overall.

It's less #ESAMOpinions and more every player having takes that don't entirely agree with how the meta is going nowadays. Also ESAM says in the Twitch VOD that his opinions on results are that "Results do matter somewhat but the game is really well balanced so almost every character in the game has or can have good results".

 

[superjm]

"Theory crafting" isn't really the problem, it's not very hard at all to formulate a list of strengths and weaknesses for a character and contemplate how their various traits can help or hinder them in a match setting based on most commonly used tournament rulesets. Discussion on that front happens all the time in every competitive game and it's very helpful on knowing what options to concentrate on optimizing when put into practice, among other things. Where it gets dicey is drawing conclusions based on that theory, at least in the context of a tier list. Even establishing a universal methodology for translating theory into tier placement is an extremely tall order, especially since the most classical method of quantifying this type of comparison for fighting games, the matchup chart, is at best a constantly fluid and amorphous construct whose establishment is made even more daunting by the fact that this game has something like ~3500 matchups to consider.

In the end, regardless of how much "theory" you use when comparing characters, especially those of similar competitive viability, there's going to be a lot of fuzziness and a hefty amount of "gut feeling" involved. Melee's gone through 20+ years of this type of tier list discussion and the best we've got in terms of a group consensus is "Fox is almost certainly the best character, except on FD where Marth is probably better and maybe Dream Land where Puff might be better."