Work In Progress Competitive Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage Character Rankings (Outdated)

[Nobie]

It might be good to just come up with general descriptions of what a 3-star advantage is, or a 4-star disadvantage is, and move on from there. I know some have tried already, and it's a good starting point, but there is always the possibility that no character in the game truly has a 1-star advantage state, for example.

 

[M15t3R E]

I'll give input on two characters I use pertaining to the advantage state. I'd discuss ZSS as well but I fail to see what more needs to be said about her. She is ★★★★★. is known for his superb advantage state. If it was merely average he'd likely be a lower higher tier character at best. Getting the grab launches him into his advantage state every time. Watching a wild Luigi, one can observe this mustached predator grabbing his prey at 0% and not letting them go until around 50%. Luigi's advantage state gameplay is so versatile that someone who has no idea how to play him but just knows that a lot of pain can come off his down throw can easily pull off 0-30% combos blindfolded. That was me when I began using him. He can also do a DA string against most of the cast across the whole stage starting at 0%. Later on, he can kill with down throw -> cyclone as a true kill confirm. After about 60%ish, he starts losing his combo ability but down throw -> up air strings can still catch opponents off-guard because Luigi is still advantaged when his down throw sends them well above his head. He can even extend aerials like fair or weak nair to sweetspot up+b and kill many characters at this point. He has good aerial frame data that causes some people to ask about his moves' 'priority' as if that's a thing. Luigi has options to go for the kill. Weak nair -> u-smash/f-smash come to mind. At close to the edge of the stage, f-smash can kill early due to high knockback scaling. A simple nair kill lightweights around 100% as it has surprisingly high knockback. When it comes to the advantage state, he is only not stellar in edgeguarding, which is why I do not recommend giving him full marks in this sub-category. It is, however, decent. Each of his aerials come out fast but because he does not want to venture out too far off-stage and play to his own unreliable recovery, his aerial edgeguarding game is stunted despite possessing great aerials for the job. I see every reason to award him with a ranking of ★★★★☆.
Moving onto ...
This yellow wonder seems to have it all as far as the advantage state is concerned, with the exception of one glaring and notorious flaw. More on that later. Anybody who doubts Pikachu's combo potential can watch the SSC tournament match back in August of ESAM vs ZeRo, when ESAM took ZeRo to game 5. FF fair to grab to d-throw to uair to FF fair and thus the cycle of pain continues. Like Luigi, there is always some way for Pikachu to follow up after d-throw. You can also uair then bair or string multiple fairs at early percents. Blessed with phenomenal frame data, the combos are fun, fast, and fluid. Pikachu also has the privilege of needing just one quick move to enter his advantage state besides d-throw: u-tilt. Pikachu laughs as he juggles fast-fallers from 0% to about 40% such as Fox, and even Sheik to only a slightly lesser extent. Edgeguarding is a breeze as Pikachu takes no issue with kissing the side or bottom blastzones to prevent the return of his enemy. Don't be complacent and lazily recover low or a drop-off bair will hit you faster than you can react. Better buffer your stage tech! Equipped with speedy aerials that may or may not kill but are often enough to nudge the opponent past the point of no return, Pikachu is an annoying force to be reckoned with off-stage. The reason this cute killer cannot be awarded a perfect score in the advantage state is due to his well-known struggle to get the kill. With no true kill confirms, Pikachu is forced every time to get a good read or a quick punish with (usually) u-smash or f-smash. That, or he can use u-throw -> thunder and hope the opponent fails to DI in time, or that he can read the DI in time.
In light of this, I would award Pokemon #25 with ★★★★☆ for advantage state.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

[...] there is always the possibility that no character in the game truly has a 1-star advantage state, for example.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's actually the case.

 

[Sykkamorre]

I would do gunner, but I already covered that in a previous post and san pretty much covered everything in a better way than I did... so i'll get to work on the dark lord.

GANONDORF: 4.

Ganon's advantage is probably the reason he's terrifying to face. On the surface, he's got sheer power and slow moves.

Scratch the surface layer and you become privy to one of he most dangerous jugglers, tech chasers and edgeguarders in the game. I'm not kidding when I say that only PIKACHU is better at edgeguarding than us.

So to start off, low percent strings. Dthrow to DA/uair to uair comes to mind as a standard thing you'll see netting an instant 30 percent or so in about 2 seconds. You've got Dtilt to uair or Nair too at low percent's and probably scariest of all: Stomp to usmash is a guaranteed combo at certain percent's AND IS UNTECHABLE ON THE GROUND. But combo's aren't the king of thieve's speciality, loose strings and juggles are.
Uair. Uair for days. You got hit by anything? You're probably going to get a uair immediately after. It's quick, it hurts, it kills AND set's up stuff like the tip'n'slide. For those that haven't heard of this, go find blobfaces thread in the ganon boards.
The late hit of DA is almost always a free uair as well.
I've barely even covered this with any form of justice, so if another dorf would elaborate on this i'd be appreciative.

Now onto edgeguarding, if you're offstage againt a good ganon, you probably shouldn't be Making it back. Nair is a great move for covering a large area since it hits twice, lingers and has a large hitbox. Fair again covers massive areas when falling and if hit, only a few characters can survive it. Bair is fast and extremely powerful too, and is guaranteed off of ledgetrumps. Dair is also powerful and the best spike ever, easily got of ledgetrumps or airdodge reads. Aerial wizkick is a powerful spike as well, even if it's a lot more situational.

And then we have the infamous tipman! this move instills fear into anyone who has encountered it. It beats most attacks, and sends you diagonally downward away from the stage. The reverse tipman (i believe that's the Name for it) is just as scary, but more difficult to pull off and always has the desired angle of KB. Think you can bash through it? Guess again! The legs are invincible during the move too! Ganon's uair really is the Swiss army knife of attacks.

Now on the ledge there's utilt...but it's rare that someone gets te 1 frame vulnerability timing on it.

Now onto choke! I'm sure you all know about this so i'll leave it be.

Actually, since typing this all up on a broken tablet is incredibly frustrating, i'll leave it here and add more stuff later.

 

[ぱみゅ]

So yeah, to this advantage thing I guess we could also consider the ability to juggle/trap, setup for kills, and Pressure.

I think Yoshi has a pretty good advantaged state because he constantly chases you and leaves you with no room to breathe, and if he gets you offstage, even if the move is not to outprioritize others, the risk of getting spiked is always present. Not sure how to rate it just yet considering people are still deciding which ones are the most powerful ones, but yeah Yoshi is pretty high in the list.

 

[Gawain]

Geez. Everyone is rating their characters way too high. There is no way in hell Ganondorf has a high tier advantage.

 

[Jamurai]

I agree. If 5 star means "can reliably kill you off one conversion" there's no way Ganon has 4 star, putting him half a star below the likes of Ryu and Luigi. He has some low % strings (like a lot of characters do) and his moves hurt like hell but... that's it. I can see 3 stars, possibly, which isn't bad for a low tier character.

Also, @ Sykkamorre , edgeguarding second only to Pikachu? For real? What about Sheik, and all characters with multiple jumps, for a start? I know Ganon isn't terrible (there aren't many terrible characters in this game) but overestimating/overselling your character like this isn't going to help any of us in the long run. It's possible I'm underestimating Ganon but you must see that your claims seem a bit wacky.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Geez. Everyone is rating their characters way too high. There is no way in hell Ganondorf has a high tier advantage.

While you have point I find it quite ironic to see you of all people post that. I think you're quite guilty of this yourself with regards to Roy after all. You suggested 4 stars for both Roy's neutral and advantaged state which are high tier stats comparable to somebody like Yoshi. Roy is nowhere near that good.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Ganon can kill easy off single blows, but thats not advantage. That's neutral. Confusing right? Ganon's actual advantage state is his trap game relying on airdodge baits, Gerudo Dragon mix-ups and edgeguarding. He is a read heavy killer on stage. He is not conversion. His juggle traps can be deadly as can his edgeguarding however. Ganon is probably a 3.5 which is solid. What holds him back is not his advantage state however. It's his neutral.

Roy is 3.5 in neutral at worst. Mobility is a HUGE part of neutral because it means you can position yourself better and you have greater influence over spacing. Fighting games = Spacing. His advantage I can't comment on because frankly it does not impress me.

Then again I play Ryu so no one impresses me except MK and ZSS.

 

[Gawain]

While you have point I find it quite ironic to see you of all people post that. I think you're quite guilty of this yourself with regards to Roy after all. You suggested 4 stars for both Roy's neutral and advantaged state which are high tier stats comparable to somebody like Yoshi. Roy is nowhere near that good.

I gave good, lengthy reasons for why I believe what I believe. It is nowhere near the tiny one paragraph posts that say someone has a 4 or 4.5 star in something. I know you know better than that, don't be disingenuous. I stand by what I said, but I am fully willing to change my position if I saw a good, real reason to do so. One that doesn't involve "in my experience" or such a reason.

 

[BSP]

Geez. Everyone is rating their characters way too high.

I thought my ratings for Pac-Man were pretty modest. The only thing I give him an above average rating in is disadvantage. Advantage and Neutral are average for him because of time constraints + awful grab.

 

[Sykkamorre]

I agree. If 5 star means "can reliably kill you off one conversion" there's no way Ganon has 4 star, putting him half a star below the likes of Ryu and Luigi. He has some low % strings (like a lot of characters do) and his moves hurt like hell but... that's it. I can see 3 stars, possibly, which isn't bad for a low tier character.

Also, @ Sykkamorre , edgeguarding second only to Pikachu? For real? What about Sheik, and all characters with multiple jumps, for a start? I know Ganon isn't terrible (there aren't many terrible characters in this game) but overestimating/overselling your character like this isn't going to help any of us in the long run. It's possible I'm underestimating Ganon but you must see that your claims seem a bit wacky.

I'm aware of how daft it seems, but perhaps it'd be better to say that Ganon has a more 'powerful' edgeguard than those characters. I realise that I misconstrued what I was attempting to say. To condense it, you can survive an offstage hit against most characters when recovering, but the chances of recovering from a successful attack from dorf is extremely slim unless you have a very good recovery. I'll admit it lacks the versatility of some other offstage games however.

I'm not the best at writeups, so forgive my cackhandedness and ****ups xD

In regards to his rating, I believe psychology plays a huge part in ganon's advantage. His moveset and damage would give 3 star but I feel the pressure the opponent feels once he's landed a good hit pushes him higher. Not to mention choke. Not many characters are safe even if they tech, with follow ups ranging from string starters to flat out kill moves at incredibly low percent's.

TL;dr choke and mental pressure are huge boons to ganon's rating in advantage.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Apologies for the wait, but here is the current results on the ADVANTAGE state!

Spoiler: Advantage Rankings (Part 1)

( ✪ = )

★★★★★ =
★★★★☆ =
★★★★ =
★★★☆ =
★★★ =
★★☆ =
★★ =
★☆ =
★ =
☆ =

Not on the list:

(Short) Explanations~

Most people agree that she has probably the best Advantage state in the game, so here she is: The Queen of Advantage. However, unlike The Queen of Neutral (), she has a little bit of competition in her rank...

Likewise, most people agree that MK is the only other character that can TRULY compete with ZSS in the Advantage state, though he still doesn't perform as well as her. Rosalina was also mentioned for Rank ★★★★★ a couple of times, though there were also some mentions of her being in Rank ★★★★☆ instead. For now, I'll wait for more opinions on her to see if she'll drop or not.

The Rank ★★★★☆ Crew. Some had rankings in neighboring tiers (like Ryu in Rank 5 or Luigi in Rank 4), though they evened out here. And I mostly agree with all of them being right about here.

There was a lot of talk on his Advantage state being really good...though there wasn't a lot of "votes" on it surprisingly. Rage Bthrow is certainly a game-changer, though. And so is the rare but devastating PKT2. He sits in Rank ★★★★☆ for now, but unlike the other five, his position is a little bit more shaky. But not as much as the next character.

Was only truly mentioned once, basically due to how he has both Rage and Aura combined when he is at higher percents. For now, he is in Rank ★★★★☆, but I want a lot more opinions about him to help solidify his position. It is very loose right now, more-so than Ness.

Although FullMoon feels as though his Advantage is ★★★★☆, there was a little bit of debate about him being that high. For now, I will keep him in Rank ★★★★ until there is a more solid consensus on his position.

The Rank ★★★★ Crew. Although DK and Shulk were both mentioned to be in Rank ★★★★☆, I felt as though that was a bit too high for them, and there were others who felt the same way. So I bumped them down a bit. DK does have Kargo Kombos and shieldbreaking shenanigans, and Shulk does have his Monado Arts (such as Smash Monado), so they could shift in the rankings depending on further opinions about them. Of the bunch, Mario seems to be the most solid in his position. Thanks to his mobility, grabs, frame data, crisp combos, and edgeguarding options in the Cape and FLUDD.



Too tired/lazy to write for the rest atm, though I will say that Rank ★★★★ is looking a bit bloated currently~



Oh, and one thing I would like to mention: Don't worry about there not being any characters in the lowest ranks. If it so happens that no characters are truly that low in any particular Rank, then it doesn't really matter. It just means that no character is truly that low, and I will just keep the there unless there are warranted reasons to place characters in that said Rank. This is because the Ranks will eventually be converted to a "point based" system to be used in a graph later. But in order to smoothly translate into that, the number of Ranks needs to stay consistent across the board for the Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage states.


Anyways, since this is the first ranking list for the Advantage state, it is undoubtedly going to look a little sloppy. So, feel free to tear it up with your opinions, and hopefully we can smooth it out a little bit~

 

[Gawain]

What? There is no way we've even come to any kind of consensus on advantage yet. Marth at 4 stars? That's ridiculous. You're gonna tell me he can get kills as easily as DK, DIDDY KONG, and Mario? And Robin in that same category too?

You keep pushin this way too fast. I'm sorry, but I'm not bothering with this thread anymore, this is just completely random noise at this point.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Shulk seems super suspect. Unless shulk can do combos and setups that leave me at +30% or a edge guard game of D3 or sheik, I don't think he deserves that spot.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

What? There is no way we've even come to any kind of consensus on advantage yet. Marth at 4 stars? That's ridiculous. You're gonna tell me he can get kills as easily as DK, DIDDY KONG, and Mario? And Robin in that same category too?

You keep pushin this way too fast. I'm sorry, but I'm not bothering with this thread anymore, this is just completely random noise at this point.

Other than Rank 5 and 4.5, I don't really feel too highly about the other ranks for the Advantage state atm. For the most part, I am merely posting what other people have been saying, while I myself am remaining as neutral as possible~

This is one reason why I feel as though the Competitive Viability topics really haven't really been making an exceptional amount of progress, especially with the speed that they have been going at. The game has been out for nearly a year now, and aside from some consensuses on a few characters (Sheik being top/Zelda being bottom), there are still huge question marks when it comes to the middle part of the cast. In particular, the lines that people perceive as what is "good" and what is "bad" is still very blurred atm. Again though, I don't really blame anyone, since we are dealing with 55+ characters right now.

Because of the way this topic works, I was hoping to shed some light on how people feel when compared to what it actually translates into visibly. And thus, this has led to the current results of the Advantage state that you see above. By making people's opinions visible in the form of a Ranking system, it becomes far easier to see what is actually going on. It helps provide more conveyance. What the topics/opinions/discussions on characters thus far has led to, and as you can clearly see, it is still a mess even after all of this time.

However, because these opinions are more readily visible now, it becomes easier to decipher them and find out what's "right", and what's "wrong". It helps people re-evaluate their opinions, and/or reaffirm their believes now that there are clear visible comparisons to be made. To me, I feel as though showing people everyone's collective opinions in a more visible manner would be better in the long run, as not only can it help us keep track of things, but also because it allows us to have a more solid footing in regards to our thoughts on the characters.

Granted, this topic is still in its infancy, at only about 2 weeks old. And it is still in the initial phase, where we lay down the foundation for the Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage states. We have only just passed one, but we haven't truly completed that one yet either (since the topic shifted and I want to keep the pace of this topic moving steadily). So, I have no doubt that there are still going to be a number of road-bumps ahead. But I also have no doubt that if we keep going (and once the initial phase is complete), this topic can lead to far more precise opinions and discussions on the characters as a whole. And potentially allow us a deeper view on how the characters function at a competitive level.


Of course, I am not forcing anybody to stay either, lol. It is people's free will on if they post in this topic or not. As for me, I still firmly believe in my idea, which is why I presented it to everybody. It is up to others on whether they believe in it or not, too.

I sincerely apologize for the trouble, though I still appreciate the posts you have made in this topic.

 

[Emblem Lord]

@ Gawain

Calm the **** doooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooowwn

 

[Shaya]

Pacing may be faster than average, but I don't think anything is being "left behind" set in stone by this. It's a conversation where everyone wants to get their opinion out there ASAP, so amidst that chaos having some structure even if rushed is beneficial; handing out warnings for people talking about some things early isn't of much benefit.

I'm going to start ignoring opinions/posts if I read that word "easy" being thrown around liberally. Ease means stuff you're going to see in tournament often... I don't respect such words being used by people who don't have solid offline tournament experience. I can forward smash tipper easily from an air dodge read, I can forward smash tipper easily from all the various mini-confirms that are easy to hit people with, easily.

Do you know what's hard? Playing against opponents skillful enough to know your bread and butter combos and set ups and are using smart DI, shuffling (SDI, it impacts) and smart positioning to negate/avoid it. There's a reason Sheik's/ZSS neutral/advantage are seen as so strong and are well understood... they're consistently able to act out as such. There's a reason we aren't seeing nair to flip jump kick happening 6 times a set between Nairo/Dabuz like we did early on. Get your wifi shenanigans out of here and start thinking your advantage state is probably based around 2 to 2.5 stars and you better be a pretty amazing character to have much higher when real demons like ZSS, Rosalina, Mario, Luigi, Sheik, Fox, Ness/etc are pumping out damage and stocks like it's nobodies business constantly and consistently and are most definitely better than a majority while a lot of differentiation between them is already comprehensible.

 

[⑨ball]

Could I get some explanation for Ryu's ★★★★☆ advantage @warionumbah2 and @ Emblem Lord ?

 

[NegaNixx]

Monado Boy needs to be dropped a bit. Advantage includes Juggling Situations, Combo Conversions, Kill Conversions, and Ledge Guarding in my mind and Shulk, besides some Combo Conversions with Smash Art, is sort of underwhelming, I've never felt threatened by a Shulk when I'm off stage as Marth, definitely not as ZSS, I just feel as though I can recover low even if Shulk is in Jump Art. Both N-Air, and F-Air are slow. D-Air isn't going to come out unless I mess up hardcore.

A high tier advantage means that they can do all four of the aforementioned states of play well, Shulk is generally lacking in OffStage play in my mind. As well as only being average in Juggling.

3 maybe 3.5 to me. But that's from someone who plays against Shulks, not as someone who knows the nuances of the character.

 

[Nobie]

Mewtwo's Advantage I would put somewhere between a 3.5 and a 4, but because 4 doesn't quite seem right, 3.5 it is. I think the big thing about Mewtwo's Advantaged state is that while little is guaranteed, he has such a wide plethora of follow-ups and the possibility of killing out of advantage that I don't htink it could ever be called average. One thing I've noticed is that up smash is just a sex kick slayer. Obviously it's punishable if you miss, but I think it says something that one of the most reliable defensive tools in the game across multiple characters gets stopped by Mewtwo's strongest kill move. What keeps it from being a 4 I think is how easily Mewtwo failing to follow up properly can result in a reversal of fortune where Mewtwo now is at risk of dying.

Speaking of good/bad traits, what I find is that a lot of Smash players are used to the idea that a good neutral or a good advantage state is an oppressive one. This is why characters like Marth and Ryu are seen by some as having poor neutrals, because it's not enough to have answers for everything, you have to have an answer for many, many things. Just the fact that people are afraid that their forward smash might miss making them vulnerable (and would instead rather be able to Sheik fair repeatedly) says a lot. I mean, I don't blame them, but the idea of not having an edge on the multiple choice exam is strange territory.

 

[TMNTSSB4]

Can someone explain Pit's advantages and disadvantages against the rest of the Smash cast?

 

[Emblem Lord]

Could I get some explanation for Ryu's ★★★★☆ advantage @warionumbah2 and @ Emblem Lord ?

Is Ryu's opponent at 80% or more? Well sheesh. Now you can switch gears completely. Feel free to walk around while occasionally pressing utilt and/or d-tilt. Make sure your ears don't suck. Listen carefully to the sounds made vs hitting your opponent, whiffing and blocking. If it hits hey TSRK for a kill.

Such skill, much wow.

If it whiffs you risked VIRTUALLY NOTHING. Why you so pro?

If it's blocked, thats fine. You get a 5 way mix-up that favors you. You can do another light tilt. Roll/spotdodge away. Go for collarbone breaker. Even if they drop shield you get free damage due to it's frame data. One light tilt then a collarbone breaker is enough to break alot of the shields in this game. Certainly all the shields of the relevant characters. You also can go for a fairly safe pressure string. light utilt, hard utilt xx light tatsu away or FADC backdash or pretty risk free ways to attack a shield. Last option is grab. Super underrated and very good basic mix-up option. Against chars that lack a good up b out of shield, these pressure tactics are basically free. Ryu's opponent is FORCED to play the guessing game. Yes, that includes Sheik.

The other thing is consistency. Even at higher percents the KB light jab and light dtilt is virtually non-existent. This is also true for rage. Even at 999% Ryus light dtilt for example sends his opponent, pretty much no where. This means whether his opponent is at 80% or 130%, Ryu does NOT need to take a risk for a kill. He just has to fish around a bit with moves that are pretty darn safe. He has also can more or less just spam SH bair to fish for kills past 130%. Safe on block.

Vs fast fallers he has the infamous utilt lock. It can be SDI but as stated if his opponent lacks good "get off me" moves, then he can just walk up to them and restart it. Captain Falcon comes to mind. He can even do it to ZSS. Her Flip Jump is intangible on frame 3. Light utilt is frame 2. LOOLOLOLOLLOL GET REKT BIRD BROAD!!!!!

Being able to do a highly damaging punish vs the more relevant chars in the game is definitely a big deal for his metagame and pretty much assures he has a place in the games meta itself.

Other basic things like extremely easy trap game with hadouken and uair that resets into other traps/ mix-ups and kill confirm opportunities. Not as free as ZSS traps mind you, but forward through short hop hadouken is definitely not rocket science.

He has also has solid combos that do minimum 20% but up to 50% or more and many are practical. His craziest stuff requires footstools though. This is very char dependent though as DI can really screw him up on these and they are dependent on percent as well. But even something as basic as FA lvl3, SH Dair, TSRK does close to 50%. Add in some light tilts and you can break 50%. Vs a fast faller thats an instant lock scenario.

He also has situational 0 to deaths. But these are character dependent, stage dependent, positioning dependent etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mGldZVZLMY - featuring 9B

This combo isn't even optimized btw. Better to end with jab xx TSRK because it lets the enemy fall into the uppercut. Utilt kinda knocks them upward and you have to time the TSRK a little bit after which can be awkward.

Fair and Dair after a footstool are a bit more consistent since the timing is less strict as is the spacing. With Fair you get a follow-up no matter how it hits and the hitbox is basically Ryu's back, his entire lower area and in front as well as slightly above his foot. Yeah its pretty real. Cross up fair into footstool can be chained a few times before he has to combo into something else.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V47c-nkaQE - Featuring False

His most basic BnB is just fair chains though and thats 30% easy. He has Nair chains as well which can lead into other things. Timing is more strict but can lead to much greater positional advantage.

His edgeguarding is a standard affair. He has a spike so opponents need to be weary but his best bet is honestly a stage spike with Fair or Bair. Due to his increased hitlag on his attacks its easy for an opponent to attempt a tech too early then hit the stage and die. I'm sure those of you who have faced me can attest to this from personal experience. He has other stuff too like run off Nair which is really solid vs chars with average to below average vertical recovery. He is not Marth or MK. He can't cover all these different angles, but if he calls your recovery and hits you thats usually the stock. Nothing spectacular, but not bad either.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

I think people naturally tend to overrate their character's advantaged states because an advantage is something inherently positive. So unless a character has an advantaged state that's just plain and obviously poor then there's a chance that people will overrate it. Kind of the opposite for disadvantaged state, where people inherently think it's only 1 or 2 stars unless they play a character that has an obviously strong disadvantaged state.

I'm not seeing where the 4.5 for Lucario is coming from. He depends too much on aura for that - not something that's gonna affect most of his crucial matchups imo. Sure, it might give him decent matchups against Sheik or Pikachu but a lot of characters [basically the entire 4.5 crew] can end his stocks a bit too early and too reliably to really be affected by it. I honestly think Lucario's advantaged state can't be ranked accurately just because of how much it depends on his aura. It's too inconsistent.

What? There is no way we've even come to any kind of consensus on advantage yet. Marth at 4 stars? That's ridiculous. You're gonna tell me he can get kills as easily as DK, DIDDY KONG, and Mario? And Robin in that same category too?

You keep pushin this way too fast. I'm sorry, but I'm not bothering with this thread anymore, this is just completely random noise at this point.

Why you so mad though?

Gravy has literally just posted his initial impressions and one single post afterwards you act like this? Nobody has said that anything was set in stone, Gravy had literally just opened discussion by suggesting numbers. No need to get mad over it. I'm sure if you take it a little easier more people will be inclined to actually look at what you say.

Like your points regarding Marth. I can definitely see myself convinced that 3.5 is enough at some point.

Shulk seems super suspect. Unless shulk can do combos and setups that leave me at +30% or a edge guard game of D3 or sheik, I don't think he deserves that spot.

That sounds a bit like what Shulk actually does in advantage though. Catching an opponent's landing with Buster!Nair -> jab is a solid 30% right there and all his Monado Arts except shield make him quite a threat. Scary offstage game, kills early, landing traps, ledge traps ... I think 4 stars is OK for him. It's more that I think DK and Diddy are too low at 4 and should be higher.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Oh for Ryus neutral is def a 3 imo. It would be 2.5 but he can technically beat anyone in neutral as long as he chooses the right option. It's just difficult.

Nothing is free. He doesn't have Sheik fair, MK dash attack, Luigi fireballs, Pika QA, etc. He is not a mindless char in neutral. No disrespect, but let's face it. The best chars in this series with the best neutral historically are those with that can just do "stuff". That's not Ryu. His neutral involves counter play and alot of movement. He can out neutral anyone as his toolset lets him do that but everything is earned. Either through baiting with FADC movement, mid range pressure with hadoukens or counter poking. His dash grab is really good. Prolly the only borderline nonsense thing about him in neutral. But overall Ryus neutral is more reliant on risk vs reward and the fact that any hit will either do REAL damage and/or set-up for a trap/combo.

 

[Jamurai]

Apologies for the wait, but here is the current results on the ADVANTAGE state! [...]

My input towards this current summary.

: Simply put I don't think she is on the same level of advantage as ZSS and MK. She's not a conversion-based character who kills opponents at whim, her primary strength is in her neutral where there are basically two of her on the field. That said she has good edgeguarding and juggling, and amazing stage control when the opponent is in disadvantage. I'm not sure whether to attribute her strength to advantage or neutral, but I'd say she probably has at least 4.5 stars in both.

: Although PKT2 and Bthrow are scary, I think I'm correct in saying that they don't really contribute to his advantage because they're just single, powerful moves. Like we talked about Ganon earlier, and how his moves hurt like hell but that contributes to his neutral because advantage is the state after someone gets hit. The combination of Bthrow and his ridiculous low % strings makes him dangerous though. I feel like he could be bumped down to 4, but definitely no lower.

: Either leave him out of this or move him down to a more average spot for now since it's very difficult to come to a conclusion. His advantage being extremely %-dependent makes this a mess.

: His grab combos are Luigi-esque in terms of damage so he should be treated similarly. Also Ding Dong is such a good and reliable kill setup when you know the %s and rage effects. I'd bump him up to 4.5.

: Same level as Mario and Diddy? Not sure about that. I would bump them down a bit, but am happy to be convinced otherwise.

As for characters not on the list which I would like to contribute a score for (up for discussion of course):

★★★★ =
★★★☆ =
★★★ =
★★☆ =

Kirby and Lucas are up there because they both have really good grab combos which rack up tons of damage. Their problems lie in their neutral/disadvantage, eg. Kirby has trouble getting in. Mii Brawler is in a similar position but because they have a horrible time finishing stocks because they lack any kill setups, they are further down. *Assuming this is 1111, default.

This leaves:

I agree that there is basically no character with 0.5 or 1 stars in advantage. In order to have that it would have to be a character who can only do single hits and is unable to exert much pressure on the opponent resetting back to neutral afterwards. 0.5 stars would also lack kill setups and be bad at edgeguarding. No one is THAT terrible... I don't think.

 

[Browny]

Oh for Ryus neutral is def a 3 imo. It would be 2.5 but he can technically beat anyone in neutral as long as he chooses the right option. It's just difficult.

Nothing is free. He doesn't have Sheik fair, MK dash attack, Luigi fireballs, Pika QA, etc. He is not a mindless char in neutral. No disrespect, but let's face it. The best chars in this series with the best neutral historically are those with that can just do "stuff". That's not Ryu. His neutral involves counter play and alot of movement. He can out neutral anyone as his toolset lets him do that but everything is earned. Either through baiting with FADC movement, mid range pressure with hadoukens or counter poking. His dash grab is really good. Prolly the only borderline nonsense thing about him in neutral. But overall Ryus neutral is more reliant on risk vs reward and the fact that any hit will either do REAL damage and/or set-up for a trap/combo.

After seeing Mr.Rs Ryu vs Allys Mario... Ryus neutral seemed 6 stars.

The second stock in games 3 and 4, he just waited and waited until Mario messed up and kill him at like 70%. It felt like Mario had nothing he could do, making either Ryus neutral seem top tier, or Marios bottom tier.

IDK its just one matchup but the contrast was ridiculous in how one character just walks around freely while the other is terrified of doing anything, and dies twice at mid % for actually doing anything.

 

[kenniky]

I'll try my input on Mii Brawler (I use 1111 default, though, so keep that in mind)

also don't worry about my switching between male and neutral gender

Neutral: 2-2.5/5
So Mii Brawler's main tools in neutral are grab and nair, both can lead into a lot of stuff, weak nair leading into a dash grab or dash attack. So falling nair and dash grab are really his only approach options, dash attack could be used but it has quite a bit of endlag. Shotput is an unreliable projectile that should be used to edgeguard more, and is pretty easily avoided if the opponent knows it's there. Fair and bair could potentially be used but neither are terribly good for use in neutral (bair is slightly better due to its power). Dtilt is an option but is a little too short to be used reliably.

Brawler's worst trait in neutral is his range. Brawler probably has the least range out of any character when reliable projectiles are taken into account (bringing the Mario Bros. into a respectable place), and if not is definitely bottom 3 among the likes of Kirby and Jigglypuff. While not a terribly great analogy, from what I've played of Melee (which is very little), Pichu also has this problem. Both get shut down by characters with solid range and disjoints such as Shulk or Marth.

A key trait in Brawler's neutral is his speed. Even at default height and weight, Brawler has above average mobility, a trait that seems to be prevalent among high tiers such as Sheik, ZSS, Pikachu, Falcon, Diddy, Fox, Yoshi, and the Mario Bros. In this regard Ness and Rosalina are kind of outliers, but that's not the point really. Brawler is able to dance around his opponent fairly well, baiting them into using a move and then capitalizing with a dash grab or Onslaught.

Brawler also has few safe and reliable options at high percents on shield, similarly to Fox.

Overall Brawler's neutral is okay, but severely hampered by his lack of range.

Advantage: 3.5-4/5
Mii Brawler has quite a few moves that are able to string into one another. Just off of a grab he is able to set up a combo with down throw into several aerials, uair being the easiest to followup with at higher percents. Shotput is a fairly good option for edgeguarding, being a hard-hitting projectile with a good arc that can force an opponent to recover fairly low or fairly high. Onslaught is an incredibly useful landing trap and tech chase option, can also be used to cover edge options, and kills at around 100% which is pretty good.

Brawler however is not particularly good at converting options into kills. His best kill options are his smashes which all suffer from something (fsmash having a lot of endlag, dsmash being short ranged and usmash only being reliable directly in front of Brawler, much like Fox's), Onslaught, which has a lot of startup, and dair spike which is hard to hit. Additionally, other than Shotput Brawler is not very good at edgeguarding due to his abysmal vertical recovery, his best option being an Ike-esque up-down attack. Without Flip Jump Brawler's horizontal recovery is also fairly lacking, his best option being Onslaught which travels about a quarter of Final Destination or less. This makes it so that Brawler cannot really go offstage, so a knowledgeable opponent is able to retreat offstage in order to avoid Brawler's followups.

Brawler has good strings and followups and cover options well but is lacking offstage, an essential part of the metagame in Smash 4.

Disadvantage: 3.5/5
Brawler's disadvantage state is not bad. Being a CQC type of fighter, Brawler has a myriad of fast moves that can be used to break out of combos. Frame 3 nair and frame 2 jab come to mind. Not only that, Brawler can use his good mobility to potentially escape strings or combos. Soaring Axe Kick and Head-On Assault are also options for if an opponent gets too greedy and chases Brawler too high, quickly turning the tides by meteor smashing them into oblivion while Brawler grabs the ledge.

However, Brawler has some flaws. As mentioned before, his recovery is linear and lacking, making him fairly easy to edgeguard. Short range on his attacks make his combo breakers less likely to actually hit the opponent, especially ones with disjoint such as Roy.

Overall Brawler has good disadvantage tools but lacks recovery and range.

hopefully that was somewhat useful

 

[Emblem Lord]

After seeing Mr.Rs Ryu vs Allys Mario... Ryus neutral seemed 6 stars.

The second stock in games 3 and 4, he just waited and waited until Mario messed up and kill him at like 70%. It felt like Mario had nothing he could do, making either Ryus neutral seem top tier, or Marios bottom tier.

IDK its just one matchup but the contrast was ridiculous in how one character just walks around freely while the other is terrified of doing anything, and dies twice at mid % for actually doing anything.

Purely psychology but I won't lie.

Ryu as scary as ****.

Once you hit 80% vs him its like a realization kicks in. This man can end me at anytime.

Did you know that when you enter the ocean a shark can smell you many miles away? So that means the only reason a human could swim freely is because the shark(s) allows it.

That's Ryu. Only reason you aren't dead is because he lets you live.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Pacing may be faster than average

Pacing is a bit fast (though it only seems moderate to me) because I want to get as much done as possible before I have to go back North later this year, since I won't be able to post anything for about a month. That, and I don't want this topic to stagnate over time. Strike the iron while it is hot, as they say~

Shulk seems super suspect. Unless shulk can do combos and setups that leave me at +30% or a edge guard game of D3 or sheik, I don't think he deserves that spot.

Monado Boy needs to be dropped a bit. Advantage includes Juggling Situations, Combo Conversions, Kill Conversions, and Ledge Guarding in my mind and Shulk, besides some Combo Conversions with Smash Art, is sort of underwhelming, I've never felt threatened by a Shulk when I'm off stage as Marth, definitely not as ZSS, I just feel as though I can recover low even if Shulk is in Jump Art. Both N-Air, and F-Air are slow. D-Air isn't going to come out unless I mess up hardcore.

A high tier advantage means that they can do all four of the aforementioned states of play well, Shulk is generally lacking in OffStage play in my mind. As well as only being average in Juggling.

3 maybe 3.5 to me. But that's from someone who plays against Shulks, not as someone who knows the nuances of the character.

Yeah. Shulk is still a bit too high. He'll definitely drop in the future. Not sure by how much just yet...Rank 3-3.5 seems like a fair estimate for now though. Prolly Rank ★★★.

Mewtwo's Advantage I would put somewhere between a 3.5 and a 4, but because 4 doesn't quite seem right, 3.5 it is. I think the big thing about Mewtwo's Advantaged state is that while little is guaranteed, he has such a wide plethora of follow-ups and the possibility of killing out of advantage that I don't think it could ever be called average. One thing I've noticed is that up smash is just a sex kick slayer. Obviously it's punishable if you miss, but I think it says something that one of the most reliable defensive tools in the game across multiple characters gets stopped by Mewtwo's strongest kill move. What keeps it from being a 4 I think is how easily Mewtwo failing to follow up properly can result in a reversal of fortune where Mewtwo now is at risk of dying.

Speaking of good/bad traits, what I find is that a lot of Smash players are used to the idea that a good neutral or a good advantage state is an oppressive one. This is why characters like Marth and Ryu are seen by some as having poor neutrals, because it's not enough to have answers for everything, you have to have an answer for many, many things. Just the fact that people are afraid that their forward smash might miss making them vulnerable (and would instead rather be able to Sheik fair repeatedly) says a lot. I mean, I don't blame them, but the idea of not having an edge on the multiple choice exam is strange territory.

Very good points on both Mewtwo and the states. Mewtwo definitely has power when he can employ it, though it is like the equivalent of an unarmed guy with a rocket launcher vs a tank that just has machine guns. Sure, the unarmed guy might have more firepower, but he only gets one shot, and if he misses he is dead for sure. While the tank can still potentially survive. (Horrible example but w/e lol)

Rank ★★★☆ seems reasonable for him atm.

I think people naturally tend to overrate their character's advantaged states because an advantage is something inherently positive. So unless a character has an advantaged state that's just plain and obviously poor then there's a chance that people will overrate it. Kind of the opposite for disadvantaged state, where people inherently think it's only 1 or 2 stars unless they play a character that has an obviously strong disadvantaged state.

I'm not seeing where the 4.5 for Lucario is coming from. He depends too much on aura for that - not something that's gonna affect most of his crucial matchups imo. Sure, it might give him decent matchups against Sheik or Pikachu but a lot of characters [basically the entire 4.5 crew] can end his stocks a bit too early and too reliably to really be affected by it. I honestly think Lucario's advantaged state can't be ranked accurately just because of how much it depends on his aura. It's too inconsistent.


Why you so mad though?

Gravy has literally just posted his initial impressions and one single post afterwards you act like this? Nobody has said that anything was set in stone, Gravy had literally just opened discussion by suggesting numbers. No need to get mad over it. I'm sure if you take it a little easier more people will be inclined to actually look at what you say.


Like your points regarding Marth. I can definitely see myself convinced that 3.5 is enough at some point.

That sounds a bit like what Shulk actually does in advantage though. Catching an opponent's landing with Buster!Nair -> jab is a solid 30% right there and all his Monado Arts except shield make him quite a threat. Scary offstage game, kills early, landing traps, ledge traps ... I think 4 stars is OK for him. It's more that I think DK and Diddy are too low at 4 and should be higher.

Indeed. Unlike the Neutral, we're probably going to see a bit more accidental bias when it comes to the Advantage and Disadvantage states. Though like you said, that's just natural human responses to those things.

As for Lucario, I agree. He's just far too inconsistent to judge when it comes to his Advantage state due to his Aura mechanic. One of the biggest reasons why he is my most disliked character. Nothing really feels guaranteed, when you are constantly factoring in your own percents throughout the entirety of the match, on top of the opponent's. He needs some sort of Rank eventually, though for now I will probably remove him during the next results~



And yeah. Nothing is set in stone in regards to the rankings, as they are meant to be debated. Essentially, I am just acting as a "messenger" of sorts, and my self-proclaimed job is to send everyone the results of their discussions and opinions. My goals are to make these things more visually apparent, and to help provide a level of conveyance that not only helps keep the topic on track...but also actually progressing. As I have mentioned before, I don't really have any major opinions too often, since I feel as though I lack the tournament experience to post such things. If anything, I am gradually learning via what other people say in the competitive impressions forum. But I've played the games since their infancy during the 64-era, so I do feel as though that some of my opinions are valid, though I am definitely not saying that all of them are. That is why I wish to act like a "neutral party" of sorts in this topic, since I don't care what characters are placed higher or lower, as I just want the topic to progress smoothly. So, hopefully this clears some things up for other people in regards to my stance and how the Rankings function.



Hmm, interesting about Shulk. As for DK/Diddy, I could raise them, too~

Oh for Ryus neutral is def a 3 imo. It would be 2.5 but he can technically beat anyone in neutral as long as he chooses the right option. It's just difficult.

Nothing is free. He doesn't have Sheik fair, MK dash attack, Luigi fireballs, Pika QA, etc. He is not a mindless char in neutral. No disrespect, but let's face it. The best chars in this series with the best neutral historically are those with that can just do "stuff". That's not Ryu. His neutral involves counter play and alot of movement. He can out neutral anyone as his toolset lets him do that but everything is earned. Either through baiting with FADC movement, mid range pressure with hadoukens or counter poking. His dash grab is really good. Prolly the only borderline nonsense thing about him in neutral. But overall Ryus neutral is more reliant on risk vs reward and the fact that any hit will either do REAL damage and/or set-up for a trap/combo.

Rank ★★★ seems fair for Ryu's Neutral. I'll probably place him there once we get back to that.

My input towards this current summary.

: Simply put I don't think she is on the same level of advantage as ZSS and MK. She's not a conversion-based character who kills opponents at whim, her primary strength is in her neutral where there are basically two of her on the field. That said she has good edgeguarding and juggling, and amazing stage control when the opponent is in disadvantage. I'm not sure whether to attribute her strength to advantage or neutral, but I'd say she probably has at least 4.5 stars in both.

: Although PKT2 and Bthrow are scary, I think I'm correct in saying that they don't really contribute to his advantage because they're just single, powerful moves. Like we talked about Ganon earlier, and how his moves hurt like hell but that contributes to his neutral because advantage is the state after someone gets hit. The combination of Bthrow and his ridiculous low % strings makes him dangerous though. I feel like he could be bumped down to 4, but definitely no lower.

: Either leave him out of this or move him down to a more average spot for now since it's very difficult to come to a conclusion. His advantage being extremely %-dependent makes this a mess.

: His grab combos are Luigi-esque in terms of damage so he should be treated similarly. Also Ding Dong is such a good and reliable kill setup when you know the %s and rage effects. I'd bump him up to 4.5.

: Same level as Mario and Diddy? Not sure about that. I would bump them down a bit, but am happy to be convinced otherwise.

As for characters not on the list which I would like to contribute a score for (up for discussion of course):

★★★★ =
★★★☆ =
★★★ =
★★☆ =

Kirby and Lucas are up there because they both have really good grab combos which rack up tons of damage. Their problems lie in their neutral/disadvantage, eg. Kirby has trouble getting in. Mii Brawler is in a similar position but because they have a horrible time finishing stocks because they lack any kill setups, they are further down. *Assuming this is 1111, default.

This leaves:

I agree that there is basically no character with 0.5 or 1 stars in advantage. In order to have that it would have to be a character who can only do single hits and is unable to exert much pressure on the opponent resetting back to neutral afterwards. 0.5 stars would also lack kill setups and be bad at edgeguarding. No one is THAT terrible... I don't think.

Good opinions on the characters! And yeah, will probably be removed during the next set of results.

Yeah, Ranks ☆ and ★ are kind of just...placeholders for the Advantage Rankings, really. This is to make sure that the graph, eventually going to be made by @SmashCapps, works smoothly. So...useless, but still necessary at the same time. If that makes any sense, lol

All that really matters in regards to the Rankings is that they start at the top of the list, and that there are an even amount of ranks between the states (Neutral/Advantage/Disadvantage). The amount of ranks in use/not being used in a particular state doesn't really matter, however. It's just a placeholder to help convert the rankings into "points" to be used in a future graph, is all~

The important thing is that the rankings themselves look logical to most people, as opposed to their determined size by how many ranks that they have.

 

[Sykkamorre]

Talked to a few ganon players, like A2 and the like; they seem to feel that 4 star is indeed the correct rating for ganon's advantage.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Which is fine because his neutral is probably a 2 and his disadvantage is a probably a 1. 1.5 at best imo.

 

[M15t3R E]

4 for Ganon is about right. All the super heavyweights are all about the advantage state.

 

[Trifroze]

Advantage is literally the only reason DK is considered anything other than bottom 10 in the game, and some consider him top half now. Is an advantaged state of 4 really enough to make a push like this? One grab is literally 40% if you go for up b or two back airs at low percents, and he kills you at 70-80%. He didn't have a bad advantage before the cargo buff either, possessing high damage output, a lot of kill power and good edgeguarding tools in bair and up b. DK should definitely be at least 4.5, and much rather 5.

I really don't see why people aren't putting him in the same crew as ZSS and MK; the difficulty of getting a grab has nothing to do with it, it's what happens once he gets the grab. How can anyone argue DK isn't the scariest thing in the game when that happens? Even ZSS and MK need a few conversions before their setups start working (and they aren't foolproof), DK needs 1-2 grabs and 1-2 stray hits and then he has a guaranteed kill out of one more grab. The only reason you could consider less than 5 for him is that high rage can negate his most lethal setup, but even then he has back throw to take care of you 30% later.

There's absolutely no reason to have Luigi, a character with the same type of advantage but a less lethal one, above DK, especially when the tools he has outside of his grab game are weaker aside from up smash. Even in terms of hard punishes 10 wind punch is stronger than Luigi's up b. Most of the current 4.5s deserve that score but not while DK is under them.

Lucario shouldn't have 4.5, he only has 4.5 when he's well past 120%.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Lucario is a 3 averaged. He's a 5 with aura and rage. A 1 without it.

 

[Shaya]

His neutral (aurasphere, side-b to some extent, safety on shield goes up massively) go up fairly with high aura too.
Only his disadvantage doesn't change/arguably goes down (due to the more rocket-nature of his up-b and it's lag).

Probably should just pretend Lucario is an anomaly.

I could kinda see DK's advantage being pretty high right now; although cargo transitioning/etc gives more time for people to mash (I bet you $5 a player like Reflex would probably never have DK get a cargo follow up before 50%, if not a lot higher). Up to this point mashing/grab breaks in this game wasn't a technical barrier for low tiers in particular but everyone when you considered ICs for doing well in tournament/necessary to handle bad match ups. The mechanics of it has been changed between games too and needs clarification.
Otherwise there may be other consistency factors to consider for DK's advantage (who can avoid the ko follow ups)

 

[DunnoBro]

So yeah, to this advantage thing I guess we could also consider the ability to juggle/trap, setup for kills, and Pressure.

I think Yoshi has a pretty good advantaged state because he constantly chases you and leaves you with no room to breathe, and if he gets you offstage, even if the move is not to outprioritize others, the risk of getting spiked is always present. Not sure how to rate it just yet considering people are still deciding which ones are the most powerful ones, but yeah Yoshi is pretty high in the list.

Yoshi's a hard one. His "chase game" yields very high rewards and is very safe but it isn't too consistent on the rewards. Either he gets the juggle and ridiculous amounts of damage (30+), the stock, or nothing at all. After certain percents, it gets between the stock and nothing. With rage mode and no real kill set-ups, this is a huge issue.

But his "punish" game is severely lacking and that leaks into his neutral since people aren't afraid to make mistakes in neutral vs yoshi at higher percents.

I'd say overall he's just 3.5-4 on advantage state. The main thing about yoshi is that his disadvantage state flows into his advantage state better than his neutral does.

@Lucario: I'd be inclined to attribute his aura/rage interactions to his disadvantaged state rather than try to categorize him with/without aura. While radical, his end playstyle is similar to jiggs, yoshi, and wario. Meh neutral with a gimmick that negates him losing the neutral.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Oh hey, we almost have all of the characters on the ADVANTAGE rankings already! We can definitely finish this one up before moving on to the DISADVANTAGE state, though I am going to wait until a few more results before we do that.

Spoiler: Advantage Rankings (Part 2)

( ✪ = )

★★★★★ =
★★★★☆ =
★★★★ =
★★★☆ =
★★★ =
★★☆ =
★★ =
★☆ =
★ =
☆ =

Not on the list:

Explanations~

Undoubtedly the Queen of Neutral still. is the only character that comes close, but even then, ZSS takes the cake.

Most people seem to agree that he belongs in Rank ★★★★☆, so I bumped him back up. Kargo Kombos, in particular Cargo Uthrow -> Up B/Uair, are extremely potent. With Cargo Uthrow -> Up B dealing about 40% damage, and Cargo Uthrow -> Uair being able to finish off stocks.

@ ~ Gheb ~ mentioned he could be a bit higher, but for now, I will leave him in Rank ★★★★ to see if there are any additional opinions about his Advantage state.

Both were added in Rank ★★★★ for now because of their excellent grab combos. However, I only really have @ Jamurai 's opinion on them as of right now. I would like to see more opinions about them to help solidify their ranking.

These characters were dropped a peg, though like the above characters, I would like to see more opinions about them to help solidify their positions.

Both were dropped to Rank ★★★☆, though both also have mentions of them potentially being in Rank ★★★★ instead. For Mewtwo, he does have followups and a respectable amount of power, but one mistake could completely turn the tables on him. For Shulk, he just seems to be having mixed responses in general. I'll wait for more opinions on both, as well.

The last character that was bumped down, though I have a special mention for him. Thanks to the recent patch, he is now able to do Arc Thunder -> Nosferatu, which does a decent 25% damage. However, when you factor in Nosferatu's ability to heal Robin, things get a bit more interesting. At minimum, he heals 13% from his opponent. However, if he uses Nosferatu on an opponent that has far less damage than him, his potential to heal increases. Let's say that he just took a stock on somebody, and he currently has 100% damage. Against the opponent with now 0% damage, if he lands Nosferatu, he heals a whopping 40% damage. So, if he were to use Arc Thunder to help link into Nosferatu in this kind of situation, he would deal 25% damage, and heal 37% damage (drops a bit because Arc Thunder connected before Nosferatu). When you combine those totals, he closed the gap by an incredible 62% damage. Of course, this can widely vary depending on his opponent's percent, but even at minimum it closes the gap by 38% damage, which is nothing to scoff at either. So despite Robin's limited use of Nosferatu per stock, what I wanted to ask was how do people feel when it comes to this affecting Robin's Advantage state? Of course, he now has other combos from Arc Thunder now too, such as Arc Thunder -> Fsmash/Usmash/Grab. Though all of these rely on Arc Thunder to land, so I don't know just how much this affects his Advantage state as a whole.

Added to Rank ★★★☆ since there seems to be a bit of a consensus on him being here. Has good combos, but nothing that can really convert into a kill (sans Helicopter Kick/etc though this is ranking Default 1111 Brawler).

Although there was discussion about bumping him up to Rank ★★★★, for now, I have decided to leave him in Rank ★★★☆. This is due to the earlier conversations about him discussing that Rank ★★★★ was too high for him. So I would like to see more consensus on this character before bumping him up. Now that the Advantage Rankings have new results, maybe this will help solidify people's opinions one way or the other, to help determine if he needs to move or not. Ledgetrumping Bairs are certainly scary, however.

Is a huge *** question mark right now. His Aura mechanic really confuses things, because depending on his percent, he can either have a really poor to a pretty solid Advantage state. Lucario in general is a wildcard when it comes to his Neutral/Advantage/Disadvantage states. So for now, I am just going to leave him off of the lists in general until further notice/there are more detailed opinions about him.

The last thing I would like to touch up on is these four characters. Are they truly this low? Are they organized correctly? Little Mac has great power and mobility...on the ground. But virtually worthless aerials and the worst recovery in the game, which greatly hinders his follow up and edgeguarding capabilities. Bowser doesn't really have any followups, in contrast to Ganondorf's potential for followups, but he still has a large amount of power and Fair/Bair. I'm pretty sure Mii Gunner could have a few tricks up his sleeve to make him better, and idk about DHD. Requesting @san. and @ DunnoBro to offer their updated opinions about these two characters.



Also, a reminder:

"Oh, and one thing I would like to mention: Don't worry about there not being any characters in the lowest ranks. If it so happens that no characters are truly that low in any particular Rank, then it doesn't really matter. It just means that no character is truly that low, and I will just keep the there unless there are warranted reasons to place characters in that said Rank. This is because the Ranks will eventually be converted to a "point based" system to be used in a graph later. But in order to smoothly translate into that, the number of Ranks needs to stay consistent across the board for the Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage states."

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Diddy at 4 stars is probably not entirely wrong so I'd just roll with it for now.

 

[Jamurai]

The last thing I would like to touch up on is these four characters. Are they truly this low? Are they organized correctly? Little Mac has great power and mobility...on the ground. But virtually worthless aerials and the worst recovery in the game, which greatly hinders his follow up and edgeguarding capabilities. Bowser doesn't really have any followups, in contrast to Ganondorf's potential for followups, but he still has a large amount of power and Fair/Bair. I'm pretty sure Mii Gunner could have a few tricks up his sleeve to make him better, and idk about DHD.

Mac could possibly move up because his speed on the ground enables him to punish stuff like landings solidly, he also has moves like Dtilt which combo into a lot of stuff including KO Punch. His aerials are actually not bad combo tools because they have such little knockback, he has some combos involving SHFF Fair into regrab or something (I'm not an expert tho), and his Dair famously jab locks which, if it connects on a missed tech, makes them eat a charged Usmash. He does have no offstage edgeguarding though. I would only move him up half a star, one star absolute max. His neutral is godlike though because he is so good at footsies, unfortunately he has like the worst disadvantage in the game probably. He's so extreme lol.

The others seem right though. Bowser has few followup opportunities, his moves just hurt like hell. Gunner and DHD are about winning neutral repeatedly and are not really about followup on disadvantage state.

List is shaping up quite nicely imo.