Work In Progress Competitive Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage Character Rankings (Outdated)

[FullMoon]

I would say bump Lucas down to ★★★.

He has some nice combos from D-Throw, yes, but he's lacking in kill setups (PK Hoo-Hah only works at specific percentages and can be DI'd off from pretty easily). Lucas's combos are also easier to escape than most I believe, considering his main damage racking move is N-Air chains and follow-ups which can be escaped through DI or SDI, making his combo game a bit too unreliable I'd say.

His edgeguarding is okay. PK Thunder can stage spike and harass the opponent, but it's pretty slow, B-Air and D-Air spike, but the first is slow and the second is pretty unreliable overall.

His advantage just doesn't look as good as the likes of Mario, Falcon, Greninja and Diddy to me.

 

[DunnoBro]

The last thing I would like to touch up on is these four characters. Are they truly this low? Are they organized correctly?

I think it becomes easier to understand when you recognize DHD wins neutral a LOT. Like... A LOT, really easily. But he isn't doing much to scare you away from him. If he had the advantage state of even mario or pit he'd be bonkers.

He just lacks the fundamental options needed to pressure a disadvantaged opponent.

His smashes are objectively the worst set in the game. As such, he lacks the option to consistently cross up landings or punish with smashes.

He also lacks an air dodge punish that results in a kill. Nair lacks the range and duck hunt the air speed to make good use of it, bair has no linger and is already very precise for the tipper (that isn't even that strong to begin with) If he tries to punish an air dodge with upair, generally he'll be falling with them and they will fall out of it. Upair only connects properly while duck hunt is rising.

There's not a single reliable kill scenario for the character that isn't character specific or reliant on the opponent making a huge mistake.

 

[san.]

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.

is very good at racking up damage and can trap into kills. He's also very good at edgeguarding. It's just that his average kills are going to be ~20% more than most other characters outside of edgeguards, cannon uppercut, smash attacks at the edge, and uair up top. Gunner can be at 2.5 to 3 stars if 3 was truly average. The average just seems to be way above 3 at the moment lol. Gunner's skill floor is just quite high and many people aren't going to convert from light damaging attacks like fair into more damage.

Attacks are generally high damage, it's just fair and nair with low damage: For 0/0, nair is 5.7%, fair is 3.5 to 5.7%, bair is ~11.6%, utilt is 9.6%, dtilt is ~13.6%, ftilt is ~8.5%, 5.5% sourspot, usmash is 15.6%, dsmash is 13.3%, uair can go up to 11% or so. Projectiles are generally good damage. Missiles are ~9.6% and can be combod from, charge shot is 21% at most and has combos into it, grenade is ~7.6% and can be combod from.

Fair true combos into things like dash attack, smash attacks, charge shot and other fairs at all % (dash attack only at early %).

Utilt combos into itself until ~25-40 ish.

Missile combos into pretty much anything from 0 to high %, most notably bair and nair.

Bomb drop can combo into uair if lucky.

With poor DI, dthrow combos into nair at 0%, dthrow combos into uair at middle-high %, and uthrow may kill at ~150-160 if they don't DI the lazer. You have to DI opposite ways for dthrow and uthrow.

Nair is good at replacing traditional uairs. It starts above and wraps around to almost the same spot. You can combo into dash attack at low %, but it'll mostly be used in the air to juggle, edgeguard, and help lengthen strings along with the other aerials (minus dair) and projectiles.

One thing I haven't yet gotten comfortable with is using reverse jump cancelled usmash instead of the traditional jump cancelled usmash in order to keep the opponent in for the last hit. I need to confirm how good it is.
Also, a side note on 's usmash. It is very reliable now since the patch and one of the better usmashes in my opinion. It is easy to land and has some setup/trap opportunities with jab and fair.

 

[Trifroze]

I'd argue 3.5-4 for Lucario. He's at least 1-1.5 with low aura because despite his lack of damage and kill options he has some decent combos, and at 150%+ Lucario is most likely 4.5-5 just because of his immense kill power and damage output (despite most of his kill options requiring commitment). It would even out at 3-3.5, but more often than not Lucario is going to be at above-mid aura simply because things become a lot easier for him (neutral in particular) and the average kill percent in this game seems to be something like 120% anyway. I'd probably rate this character 3.5 / 4 / 3 (neutral / advantage / disadvantage).

 

[san.]

Also a gif on the gunner boards, credit to @GS3K

The gist is that nair can combo into stuff at higher %, possibly even a bair if you hit with the end of it. The part before is a little gimmicky and can be switched out with a lot of other attacks (most notably a simple missile as of the patch).

 

[⑨ball]

the difficulty of getting a grab has nothing to do with it, it's what happens once he gets the grab.

Would you consider the aspect of entering advantage more so neutral? I personally tend to think of it that way, but looking at what's listed it seems safety has played a big part in what's thought of as a relatively powerful advantage.

DK's advantage is undoubtedly fantastic, but I wouldn't put him in the same category as ZSS and MK. Although DK can make similar conversions off of grabs, that's pretty much the only time you will see that from him. ZSS and MK have that on top of having random hits in advantage converted to the same. MK with dash attack being exchangeable for dthrow, random uairs in advantage that will always chain into more and a shuttleloop, and the majority of his kit putting opponents into position for just that. ZSS is similar in that she doesn't have to rely on grab alone to convert into kills from advantage, any random uair can turn into the elevator, just as any win of neutral will always put the opponent in position for such, on top of flip kick frame traps, dsmash landing traps, tether trumps ect.

You can't really ask for a better transition into advantaged state than a good grab/throw game, but I think it's much more threatening to say I can kill you from this state if I touch you rather than I kill you if I grab you.

 

[Trifroze]

Would you consider the aspect of entering advantage more so neutral? I personally tend to think of it that way, but looking at what's listed it seems safety has played a big part in what's thought of as a relatively powerful advantage.

DK's advantage is undoubtedly fantastic, but I wouldn't put him in the same category as ZSS and MK. Although DK can make similar conversions off of grabs, that's pretty much the only time you will see that from him. ZSS and MK have that on top of having random hits in advantage converted to the same. MK with dash attack being exchangeable for dthrow, random uairs in advantage that will always chain into more and a shuttleloop, and the majority of his kit putting opponents into position for just that. ZSS is similar in that she doesn't have to rely on grab alone to convert into kills from advantage, any random uair can turn into the elevator, just as any win of neutral will always put the opponent in position for such, on top of flip kick frame traps, dsmash landing traps, tether trumps ect.

You can't really ask for a better transition into advantaged state than a good grab/throw game, but I think it's much more threatening to say I can kill you from this state if I touch you rather than I kill you if I grab you.

ZSS and MK are being overrated relatively to DK in the sense that their setups really aren't that consistent. DI can really throw you off and sometimes outright ruin your chances of getting a proper conversion, and after that you're most likely past the percentage where you had your "low% to death" chance. MK's bnb isn't possible at all if your opponent DIs away on your dash attack unless you connect with the weak hit. If you DI inwards on ZSS' grab but ZSS expects you to DI outwards, the bnb isn't possible. You could argue that ZSS could react to wherever the opponent is DI'ing before jumping, but time and time again we see top players having to resort to uair -> bair or uair -> uair without up b because they misread the DI, and usually they can only react to it after they already jumped. Moreover with proper DI, up b's final hit is not going to kill early except on low ceiling stages (where you die vertically before the final hit) or if you initiate it close to the edge, and on small (and certain other) characters the up b is very difficult to connect properly no matter how ideal their percents are.

This is not to say they don't have the best advantages in the game though. MK's DA into up b works forever and he can convert juggles into kills really easily at basically any percent, and ZSS can start her bnb off of a nair or dsmash or go for completely different setups that are just as lethal usually involving death by down b spike. What I'm getting at regarding DK however is that once he gets the grab, he gets the grab and you either take 30-40% or die.

The only good arguments in my opinion against DK having a 5 in advantage are rage and mashing out of cargo at low percents (which I previously didn't think was possible if the DK buffered every input). Rage benefits ZSS' bnb in many ways, letting her bnb start working even earlier and giving up b's small hits so much knockback that the opponent dies if just a couple hits connect. I'd imagine MK doesn't care much about rage either.

 

[san.]

With Rage, DK's cargo to uair kill % are just shifted downwards and become slightly narrower. DK himself is still great with rage. At high %, cargo jump+bthrow and normal bthrow can both kill off the top and side.

 

[Trifroze]

I always thought rage increases cargo uthrow knockback more than it does uair knockback, causing the uair to stop connecting before it starts killing. How narrow is the kill range between something like medium and max rage?

 

[san.]

I always thought rage increases cargo uthrow knockback more than it does uair knockback, causing the uair to stop connecting before it starts killing. How narrow is the kill range between something like medium and max rage?

It's dependent on the character's floatiness. Assuming a medium floatiness character, there's a good 10% area or so with high rage roughly.

To counteract the high rage cargo % from failing, you want to stale the cargo uthrow so that it will kill. From my experience, I only needed to stale it a tiny bit (cargo uthrow->hit->cargo uthrow or cargo uthrow->cargo uthrow), assuming you've been getting it regularly throughout the match.

DK's whole other moveset still benefits from rage, so he continually has good options.

 

[PK Gaming]

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.

Don't forget his down throw follow ups. On certain characters you can tack on an upwards of 20ish % at lower percentages. Then there's the kill throw set up, which is far from guaranteed (except against a few characters), but it definitely puts Robin at an advantageous position after use. The only reason his advantaged state shouldn't be higher is because

1) his off stage game isn't that great. You can't really go in and edgeguard all that well outside of Elwind spikes (which are admittedly effective against certain characters)

2) He can't really lock down his opponents. Robin can't really keep the pressure on for an extended period of time after his tomes run out, and he isn't agile enough to chase an opponent down. He does a ridiculous amount of damage in bursts, he's great at damaging shield, and has multiple KO set ups, but his movement is limited. Earlier I made the mistake of only accounting for the first 3 points and disregarding movement entirely (which directly correlates to pressure), hence my ridiculously high initial score.

 

[Pazx]

I'd like to make a suggestion: bump EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER with a ★★★☆ or ★★★ advantage rating down half a star, so we can shuffle them around from there with slightly more realistic ratings.

 

[⑨ball]

ZSS and MK are being overrated relatively to DK in the sense that their setups really aren't that consistent. DI can really throw you off and sometimes outright ruin your chances of getting a proper conversion, and after that you're most likely past the percentage where you had your "low% to death" chance. MK's bnb isn't possible at all if your opponent DIs away on your dash attack unless you connect with the weak hit. If you DI inwards on ZSS' grab but ZSS expects you to DI outwards, the bnb isn't possible. You could argue that ZSS could react to wherever the opponent is DI'ing before jumping, but time and time again we see top players having to resort to uair -> bair or uair -> uair without up b because they misread the DI, and usually they can only react to it after they already jumped. Moreover with proper DI, up b's final hit is not going to kill early except on low ceiling stages (where you die vertically before the final hit) or if you initiate it close to the edge, and on small (and certain other) characters the up b is very difficult to connect properly no matter how ideal their percents are.

This is not to say they don't have the best advantages in the game though. MK's DA into up b works forever and he can convert juggles into kills really easily at basically any percent, and ZSS can start her bnb off of a nair or dsmash or go for completely different setups that are just as lethal usually involving death by down b spike. What I'm getting at regarding DK however is that once he gets the grab, he gets the grab and you either take 30-40% or die.

The only good arguments in my opinion against DK having a 5 in advantage are rage and mashing out of cargo at low percents (which I previously didn't think was possible if the DK buffered every input). Rage benefits ZSS' bnb in many ways, letting her bnb start working even earlier and giving up b's small hits so much knockback that the opponent dies if just a couple hits connect. I'd imagine MK doesn't care much about rage either.

Can't speak for anyone else but in my case I simply don't think a single strong setup should equal out to a 5 star advantage. If that was the case characters like Pacman, G&W, Jiggs, Wario, Ganon and WFT would all be questionably high in advantage. Since the advantage state can cover such a wide area of gameplay it's more appropriate to look at as many situations as we can and how a character's strengths convert regardless of what situation that may be.

Whether or not DK deserves to be in the same category as those two really comes down to the same question we ask when looking at the top in any category: "Is this character playing the same game as the rest of us?" When we look at Sheik in disadvantage the answer is clearly no. It's either a true combo or she can BF out and gain access to aerials that have 10 frames of landing lag and come out as early as frame 3. Offstage you're either challenging BF or trying to catch vanish's 1 frame ledge vulnerability. When we look at ZSS and MK we know that the grab can lead to death just like DK, but we also know that even if it doesn't, even if they just happen to nip you with an aerial, even if you enter the disadvantaged state yourself by doing something like jumping above them or being on a platform your situation hasn't changed much if at all. This is not the case with DK. If you jump above DK, or he puts you there with anything that isn't grab, he's playing the same game as the rest of the cast. He'll hit hard for sure if he lands a hit, but it'll usually be that singular hard hit compared to ZSS and MK who will hit to convert into a possible kill.

Even your comments about their lack of consistency really just further illustrates how much differently their tools let them handle advantage. ZSS MIGHT not get a full conversion off a random nair/uair in neutral if you DI correctly(if I recall it's something like 66% chance)? MK MIGHT not convert fully if the player DIs the early hit on one of his multiple bnb starters? Most characters would kill to have those "mights" including DK.

Again, I'm not arguing the ding dong isn't disgustingly good, it is, but from a full spectrum of the advantage state, DK just doesn't have the same threat factor.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

I'd like to make a suggestion: bump EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER with a ★★★☆ or ★★★ advantage rating down half a star, so we can shuffle them around from there with slightly more realistic ratings.

Sounds like a good idea! That area in particular looks like the most problematic to me atm anyways.

What I could also do is just bump every single character Rank ★★★★ and below down half a star, and then slowly filter what characters need to be bumped up from rank to rank after I do that. Though Rank ★★★★ looks decently solid atm.

Ranks ★★★★★ and ★★★★☆ seem pretty good though, so I probably won't be touching them.

 

[Trifroze]

Can't speak for anyone else but in my case I simply don't think a single strong setup should equal out to a 5 star advantage. If that was the case characters like Pacman, G&W, Jiggs, Wario, Ganon and WFT would all be questionably high in advantage. Since the advantage state can cover such a wide area of gameplay it's more appropriate to look at as many situations as we can and how a character's strengths convert regardless of what situation that may be.

Not sure what would warrant G&W a place among the characters you listed, but if it's his side b then on average he needs 9 conversions to get a stock off which is average. Regardless as we both acknowledge the characters you mention don't transition into their strongest tools very smoothly, but a grab is the most reliable way to transition your neutral into advantage in this game and DK has great grab variations plus the biggest reward out of it. Even if it's a single tool, your advantage can be pretty much fully attributed to it as long as that tool is realistic for you to consistently connect on the opponent. Grabs are the only single option that isn't blatantly beaten by something (shielding), so DK fits the picture whereas Jigglypuff, Wario etc don't. Not to forget the rest of DK's moveset, his advantage was always stronger than average.

Even your comments about their lack of consistency really just further illustrates how much differently their tools let them handle advantage. ZSS MIGHT not get a full conversion off a random nair/uair in neutral if you DI correctly(if I recall it's something like 66% chance)? MK MIGHT not convert fully if the player DIs the early hit on one of his multiple bnb starters? Most characters would kill to have those "mights" including DK.

Again, I'm not arguing the ding dong isn't disgustingly good, it is, but from a full spectrum of the advantage state, DK just doesn't have the same threat factor.

Wait, are you saying that a chance of getting a kill is better than being guaranteed to get one? Rather than what you said, I'd say that any character including ZSS and MK would kill to have the reliability of DK's cargo uthrow to uair. I would much rather get my kills 20-30% later and never miss them, than sometimes get them at 50% and sometimes at 130%. I think MK is "even weaker" in this regard in the sense that he mostly relies on dash attack which is beaten by shielding, although at least he has a good dash grab to threaten that. However as far as I'm aware his dthrow leads to nothing but a little bit of damage at low-mid percents.

Also the 66% with ZSS you're talking about is the likelyhood to escape her grounded up b if the opponent starts to DI it starting from the first hit. If ZSS holds left and the opponent holds nothing or left, they will get fully hit by it, but if they hold right they'll escape. If they hold right and you hold right or nothing, they'll get hit, but if you hold left they can escape. On an aerial up b if you miss the first hit, there's 0% chance to kill with it unless the opponent is a big character or two of the following are true: 1. the ceiling is low, 2. they're light 3. you have considerable rage. In this case they'll die from the couple or few hits that do connect.

 

[⑨ball]

Not sure what would warrant G&W a place among the characters you listed, but if it's his side b then on average he needs 9 conversions to get a stock off which is average. Regardless as we both acknowledge the characters you mention don't transition into their strongest tools very smoothly, but a grab is the most reliable way to transition your neutral into advantage in this game and DK has great grab variations plus the biggest reward out of it. Even if it's a single tool, your advantage can be pretty much fully attributed to it as long as that tool is realistic for you to consistently connect on the opponent. Grabs are the only single option that isn't blatantly beaten by something (shielding), so DK fits the picture whereas Jigglypuff, Wario etc don't. Not to forget the rest of DK's moveset, his advantage was always stronger than average.



Wait, are you saying that a chance of getting a kill is better than being guaranteed to get one? Rather than what you said, I'd say that any character including ZSS and MK would kill to have the reliability of DK's cargo uthrow to uair. I would much rather get my kills 20-30% later and never miss them, than sometimes get them at 50% and sometimes at 130%. I think MK is "even weaker" in this regard in the sense that he mostly relies on dash attack which is beaten by shielding, although at least he has a good dash grab to threaten that. However as far as I'm aware his dthrow leads to nothing but a little bit of damage at low-mid percents.

Also the 66% with ZSS you're talking about is the likelyhood to escape her grounded up b if the opponent starts to DI it starting from the first hit. If ZSS holds left and the opponent holds nothing or left, they will get fully hit by it, but if they hold right they'll escape. If they hold right and you hold right or nothing, they'll get hit, but if you hold left they can escape. On an aerial up b if you miss the first hit, there's 0% chance to kill with it unless the opponent is a big character or two of the following are true: 1. the ceiling is low, 2. they're light 3. you have considerable rage. In this case they'll die from the couple or few hits that do connect.

Landing the grab itself, or transitioning into your advantage state is more so neutral though, yeah? One you land the grab with DK you have won neutral, what you get from winning neutral is your advantage( Ding Dong). In this case characters like Jiggs should already be assumed to have used whatever method that is to enter advantage, and in the case of things like rest combos or 30 frame farts on the ledge, these are comparably powerful setups. I concede that G&W is probably pushing it, but I could see someone arguing it on clutch factor alone. That said, it's not the single tool I have an issue with in agreeing with the 5 star rating, it's the limitations of the tool in comparison to the others.

When the chance of getting a kill is dependent on something as manageable as reading DI? Absolutely. We're not talking about RNG or anything here. We're not even talking about the same kill percents. We're saying at around 30-35% on average, ZSS and MK can kill you through elevator combos if they read your DI correctly(though in ZSS' case 30% is reliant on not knowing how to DI it at all). We're saying that after that specific percent, they might also kill you in the same manner through similar strings, while retaining the ability to do so as long as you are above them as they're not restricted to grabs in neutral in order to convert. Perhaps I'm overthinking it too much, but given that you want to win neutral as few times as possible before you kill(unless your neutral is dumb then who cares), I believe being able to go for that chance in a completely doable way from multiple options in multiple situations, amounts to a bit more than single setup guaranteed later. How do DK mains feel about this? @Man Li Gi @ NachoOfCheese @Locke 06 (Do you still play DK?)

Also afaik MK can get the same results with dthrow as he can with dash attack. Is the 66% thing grounded upB's only? This probably isn't the place for it, but I figured I'd ask while the topic was up.

 

[Jamurai]

MK's Dthrow isn't really a substitute for dash attack (DA), if any throw should have that title it's sliding Fthrow. Dthrow is mainly used for low % combos but there are so many combos you can do to tailor your opponent's % to Uair combo kill %. If you're just going for optimal damage the opponent will take 30%+ (Dthrow > Nado or D/Bthrow > DA > followup). Also Dthrow and Fthrow both lead into Shuttle Loop into the high %s, with sliding Fthrow comboing into it at kill %s for a lot of characters (as does DA).

Also I'm not sure about MK's Uair combo being unreliable. The strong hit of DA pops the opponent almost directly above MK with no DI so to hit someone who DIs away we just need to jump forward and Uair afterwards. At later %s we aim for the weaker hits of DA anyway. Also DIing the Uairs themselves doesn't change much against a MK who can do the combo consistently, it doesn't change your trajectory enough to escape after DIing one Uair, so the MK can change his jump direction to follow your DI. Essentially it's all on the MK to screw up, there's not much you can do during the combo.

Will confirm that MK doesn't care about rage, in fact he loves it. It doesn't affect the reliability of his Uair combos, it just means he can start them earlier and kill earlier. For example, with 100% rage, dash attack to Uairs to Up-B 0-deaths Rosalina. Also moves like Fsmash and Bair scale very well with rage.

While DK's grab game is truly ridiculous I don't think it alone warrants 10/10 or 5 stars. Advantage is not just about combos and kill setups, it's also about stuff like juggling and edgeguarding. While DK can do those things, he's not on the same level as MK and ZSS in that regard. I think 4.5 stars is the right place for him, despite him being mid-tier overall it puts him up with the greats like Sheik and Fox.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

Landing the grab itself, or transitioning into your advantage state is more so neutral though, yeah? One you land the grab with DK you have won neutral, what you get from winning neutral is your advantage( Ding Dong). In this case characters like Jiggs should already be assumed to have used whatever method that is to enter advantage, and in the case of things like rest combos or 30 frame farts on the ledge, these are comparably powerful setups. I concede that G&W is probably pushing it, but I could see someone arguing it on clutch factor alone. That said, it's not the single tool I have an issue with in agreeing with the 5 star rating, it's the limitations of the tool in comparison to the others.

When the chance of getting a kill is dependent on something as manageable as reading DI? Absolutely. We're not talking about RNG or anything here. We're not even talking about the same kill percents. We're saying at around 30-35% on average, ZSS and MK can kill you through elevator combos if they read your DI correctly(though in ZSS' case 30% is reliant on not knowing how to DI it at all). We're saying that after that specific percent, they might also kill you in the same manner through similar strings, while retaining the ability to do so as long as you are above them as they're not restricted to grabs in neutral in order to convert. Perhaps I'm overthinking it too much, but given that you want to win neutral as few times as possible before you kill(unless your neutral is dumb then who cares), I believe being able to go for that chance in a completely doable way from multiple options in multiple situations, amounts to a bit more than single setup guaranteed later. How do DK mains feel about this? @Man Li Gi @ NachoOfCheese @Locke 06 (Do you still play DK?)

Also afaik MK can get the same results with dthrow as he can with dash attack. Is the 66% thing grounded upB's only? This probably isn't the place for it, but I figured I'd ask while the topic was up.

What's unique about the Ding Dong is that it can only be done out of a grab (Unlike ZSS, who can start from a falling Uair), and that DI is literally not even part of the equasion. Once you get grabbed at a specific percent range, a la Ness, you are dead. Thing is, once you get to a certain (relitively slim) percent/rage, it stops working. But this causes what I like to call the "Shiek effect."
Let me explain. When you're at 130%, if you get grabbed by Shiek you will be able to escape her 50/50s because the Dthrow sends you too far. However, just above this percent, Forward air will start to KO. A FRAME 3, massively disjointed, lagless move will kill you. Who needs a grab when you have that?
Same goes for DK. Ding Dong stops working? No big deal. All you gotta do to get the kill is land a random utilt or bair or Bthrow and they're dead.
The thing is, due to Cargo uthrow -> Nair -> Bair/Uair
combos at low percents, getting to kill percents is easy (unless the opponent can keep you out. This is notable in the Lucas matchup).
When compared to metaknight or ZSS, it's essentially a smaller percent range at a higher percent for the kill, in exchange for not having to read DI.

 

[Molk]

Call me crazy but i feel like G&W's advantage state is a bit too low, and that it should probably be bumped up to 3.5 stars

Mr. Game and Watch's combo game is excellent. G&W is more than capable of comboing the vast majority of the cast for large amounts of damage, and pretty much anyone who's played with the character is more than familiar with this. G&W's down throw is an excellent combo starter, and with character specific knowledge it isn't too hard to get ~30% minimum out of every down throw. Against some characters, it's possible to get 40% or even 60% or more out of a single dthrow. If you'd like a few examples, i'd be happy to give them.

G&W's combo game isn't just limited to down throw, though. G&W has a bunch of other moves that are capable of starting highly damaging combos consistently. Including bair, usmash, and nair. For example, the landing hit of Bair can true combo into Nair+Up B on certain characters for about 35% assuming all hits, and the landing hits of Nair and Uair can true combo into Uair at KO percents.

Mr. Game and Watch is also a very good edgeguarder. in my opinion, he has multiple good, disjointed/invincible options to keep people from returning to the stage including Fair, Bair, and Up B, and his low falling speed and good recovery mean that he can go deep relatively safely. Dair's initial hitbox is a powerful spike, and the late hitbox is also somewhat useful for edgeguarding considering it's capable of stage spiking and just how much ground it covers. Speaking of stage spiking, Bair and Up B are also effective options for stage spiking. There are also a few other tools that G&W has for edgeguarding, but they're a little bit situational/gimmicky so i don't think they'd be worth mentioning here

Killing is probably the weakest part of G&W's advantaged state, he has very few kill set ups and the ones that he does have aren't as reliable/easy to land as the ones that some other characters have, but they're still there and can take stocks off on occasion, with toot toot being the one that's most commonly seen. The lack of reliable kill set ups is why i'm only suggesting he move up by half a star for now, but 3 stars is almost certainly too low for G&W imo, especially considering how top heavy this list is at the moment.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

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

Works for me

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.

Thanks for the compliment! And yeah, good points on Mac possibly moving up a bit~

I would say bump Lucas down to ★★★.

He has some nice combos from D-Throw, yes, but he's lacking in kill setups (PK Hoo-Hah only works at specific percentages and can be DI'd off from pretty easily). Lucas's combos are also easier to escape than most I believe, considering his main damage racking move is N-Air chains and follow-ups which can be escaped through DI or SDI, making his combo game a bit too unreliable I'd say.

His edgeguarding is okay. PK Thunder can stage spike and harass the opponent, but it's pretty slow, B-Air and D-Air spike, but the first is slow and the second is pretty unreliable overall.

His advantage just doesn't look as good as the likes of Mario, Falcon, Greninja and Diddy to me.

Ah okay. Fair enough. And I agree with those characters having a better advantage than him.

Speaking of which, what is your current stance with Greninja's current placement alongside with those characters?

I think it becomes easier to understand when you recognize DHD wins neutral a LOT. Like... A LOT, really easily. But he isn't doing much to scare you away from him. If he had the advantage state of even mario or pit he'd be bonkers.

He just lacks the fundamental options needed to pressure a disadvantaged opponent.

His smashes are objectively the worst set in the game. As such, he lacks the option to consistently cross up landings or punish with smashes.

He also lacks an air dodge punish that results in a kill. Nair lacks the range and duck hunt the air speed to make good use of it, bair has no linger and is already very precise for the tipper (that isn't even that strong to begin with) If he tries to punish an air dodge with upair, generally he'll be falling with them and they will fall out of it. Upair only connects properly while duck hunt is rising.

There's not a single reliable kill scenario for the character that isn't character specific or reliant on the opponent making a huge mistake.

Hmm...so would you agree with him having the worst Advantage state in the game? His kit is definitely specifically catered towards the Neutral, though.

How is his Disadvantage state btw? I know that you can use Trick Shot during just about anything, but does he have any other reliable tools to help him get out of a bad situation?

is very good at racking up damage and can trap into kills. He's also very good at edgeguarding. It's just that his average kills are going to be ~20% more than most other characters outside of edgeguards, cannon uppercut, smash attacks at the edge, and uair up top. Gunner can be at 2.5 to 3 stars if 3 was truly average. The average just seems to be way above 3 at the moment lol. Gunner's skill floor is just quite high and many people aren't going to convert from light damaging attacks like fair into more damage.

Attacks are generally high damage, it's just fair and nair with low damage: For 0/0, nair is 5.7%, fair is 3.5 to 5.7%, bair is ~11.6%, utilt is 9.6%, dtilt is ~13.6%, ftilt is ~8.5%, 5.5% sourspot, usmash is 15.6%, dsmash is 13.3%, uair can go up to 11% or so. Projectiles are generally good damage. Missiles are ~9.6% and can be combod from, charge shot is 21% at most and has combos into it, grenade is ~7.6% and can be combod from.

Fair true combos into things like dash attack, smash attacks, charge shot and other fairs at all % (dash attack only at early %).

Utilt combos into itself until ~25-40 ish.

Missile combos into pretty much anything from 0 to high %, most notably bair and nair.

Bomb drop can combo into uair if lucky.

With poor DI, dthrow combos into nair at 0%, dthrow combos into uair at middle-high %, and uthrow may kill at ~150-160 if they don't DI the lazer. You have to DI opposite ways for dthrow and uthrow.

Nair is good at replacing traditional uairs. It starts above and wraps around to almost the same spot. You can combo into dash attack at low %, but it'll mostly be used in the air to juggle, edgeguard, and help lengthen strings along with the other aerials (minus dair) and projectiles.

One thing I haven't yet gotten comfortable with is using reverse jump cancelled usmash instead of the traditional jump cancelled usmash in order to keep the opponent in for the last hit. I need to confirm how good it is.
Also, a side note on 's usmash. It is very reliable now since the patch and one of the better usmashes in my opinion. It is easy to land and has some setup/trap opportunities with jab and fair.

Thanks for the info!

Hmm...how would you compare his Advantage state w/Mega Man? I'm mostly interested in knowing more about Mega Man's edgeguarding capabilities, if you have any information about that.

I'd argue 3.5-4 for Lucario. He's at least 1-1.5 with low aura because despite his lack of damage and kill options he has some decent combos, and at 150%+ Lucario is most likely 4.5-5 just because of his immense kill power and damage output (despite most of his kill options requiring commitment). It would even out at 3-3.5, but more often than not Lucario is going to be at above-mid aura simply because things become a lot easier for him (neutral in particular) and the average kill percent in this game seems to be something like 120% anyway. I'd probably rate this character 3.5 / 4 / 3 (neutral / advantage / disadvantage).

Hmmmm...I might probably roll with those numbers in the future. Minor adjustments might possibly be needed, though other than me being unsure about his disadvantage state, somewhere around ~3.5 seems fair for his states. Thanks!

Also a gif on the gunner boards

The gist is that nair can combo into stuff at higher %, possibly even a bair if you hit with the end of it. The part before is a little gimmicky and can be switched out with a lot of other attacks (most notably a simple missile as of the patch).

Okay yeah that looks pretty solid. I'd be more likely to bump him up to Rank ★★★ as opposed to Rank ★★☆ at this current time. Seems like his Advantage state is a bit tricky to utilize, but his edgeguarding is indeed quite solid.

Don't forget his down throw follow ups. On certain characters you can tack on an upwards of 20ish % at lower percentages. Then there's the kill throw set up, which is far from guaranteed (except against a few characters), but it definitely puts Robin at an advantageous position after use. The only reason his advantaged state shouldn't be higher is because

1) his off stage game isn't that great. You can't really go in and edgeguard all that well outside of Elwind spikes (which are admittedly effective against certain characters)

2) He can't really lock down his opponents. Robin can't really keep the pressure on for an extended period of time after his tomes run out, and he isn't agile enough to chase an opponent down. He does a ridiculous amount of damage in bursts, he's great at damaging shield, and has multiple KO set ups, but his movement is limited. Earlier I made the mistake of only accounting for the first 3 points and disregarding movement entirely (which directly correlates to pressure), hence my ridiculously high initial score.

When I mentioned Robin's grab, I was subtly refering to his Dthrow by extension Sorry about that, lol

And yeah, those other points on Robin seem fair. I didn't think his edge-guarding was that bad though...factoring out poor mobility and recovery anyways.

Call me crazy but i feel like G&W's advantage state is a bit too low, and that it should probably be bumped up to 3.5 stars

Mr. Game and Watch's combo game is excellent. G&W is more than capable of comboing the vast majority of the cast for large amounts of damage, and pretty much anyone who's played with the character is more than familiar with this. G&W's down throw is an excellent combo starter, and with character specific knowledge it isn't too hard to get ~30% minimum out of every down throw. Against some characters, it's possible to get 40% or even 60% or more out of a single dthrow with no opportunity for escape. If you'd like a few examples, i'd be happy to give them.

G&W's combo game isn't just limited to down throw, though. G&W has a bunch of other moves that are capable of starting highly damaging combos consistently. Including bair, usmash, and nair. For example, the landing hit of Bair can true combo into Nair+Up B for about 35% assuming all hits, and the landing hits of Nair and Uair can true combo into Uair at KO percents.

Mr. Game and Watch is also a very good edgeguarder. in my opinion, he has multiple good, disjointed/invincible options to keep people from returning to the stage including Fair, Bair, and Up B, and his low falling speed and good recovery mean that he can go deep relatively safely. Dair's initial hitbox is a powerful spike, and the late hitbox is also somewhat useful for edgeguarding considering it's capable of stage spiking and just how much ground it covers. Speaking of stage spiking, Bair and Up B are also effective options for stage spiking. There are also a few other tools that G&W has for edgeguarding, but they're a little bit situational gimmicky so i don't think they'd be worth mentioning here

Killing is probably the weakest part of G&W's advantaged state, he has very few kill set ups and the ones that he does have aren't as reliable/easy to land as the ones that some other characters have, but they're still there and can take stocks off on occasion, with toot toot being the one that's most commonly seen. The lack of reliable kill set ups is why i'm only suggesting he move up by half a star for now, but 3 stars is almost certainly too low for G&W imo, especially considering how top heavy this list is at the moment.

Very good writeup on G&W And yeah, you can go ahead and mention his Dthrow combos. The more information, the merrier!



Oh, and random mention I am going to throw out there in regards to G&W (since I've seen it around twice now): Judge is not going to be factored in to his Advantage state at all, as it is entirely lucked based. Not to mention you have to be kind of lucky to land a hit with the move anyways, due to its high startup lag.



Anywho, I am going to wait for a bit more opinions on the characters/current Advantage list before updating to the next one. As a reminder, I am going to be bumping down a lot of characters to go along with @ Pazx 's suggestion. Lastly, we are still missing a couple of characters, so any information on them would be highly appreciated!

Not on the list:

 

[DunnoBro]

Hmm...so would you agree with him having the worst Advantage state in the game? His kit is definitely specifically catered towards the Neutral, though.

How is his Disadvantage state btw? I know that you can use Trick Shot during just about anything, but does he have any other reliable tools to help him get out of a bad situation?

I don't think he has the worst... Characters like palutena or mewtwo without decent juggle options come to mind first.

He has good option coverage and combos while in advantage but they just don't convert into stocks.

His disadvantage isn't awful either. Get sent at least slightly above double jump height and you can trick shot to cover your landing, also each of his landings themselves are a 50/50 for a combo due to frisbee. Either you fail to shield it and he gets the combo, or you don't and if he chose not to frisbee, he just got to land for free. It's also hard to shield itself since the timing of the blasts can be altered.

No nair or quick meaty aerials to break him out of strings sucks but his return to neutral is good.

His recovery holds him back a lot but it's an okay disadvantage state overall I'd say. If it wasn't for his recovery it'd be a 4+ easy but due to it I'll say 3.

Advantage I'd say... 1.5 still. It's a fine advantage state until you need to kill, but that's the goal of this game so being bad at that loses it a lot points. I think palutena's advantage is worse overall though.

 

[Vyrnx]

Yeah G&W's advantage state is great. In addition to what has already been said, he is a really great juggler (no pun intended). You really don't want to be above G&W. His nair is one of the best juggling moves there is (even ZeRo has said this), and he can mix his juggles up with uair to make you whiff moves and punish with any of his very powerful smash attacks. You can retreat to the ledge, but he has good options there to keep you from getting up too easily, including a dsmash with very good range (comparable to Mario's dsmash covering the ledge) and his invincible up smash.

As for edge guarding, I have gimped more characters with G&W than any other. His fair, dair, and bair are great for edge guarding and wind boxes on uair, up b, and dtilt can really screw people up. Once a Little Mac was recovering with side b and the wind box from up b sent them flying all the way underneath the stage. The replay is gone now...

His up b, imo, has to be the best single edge guarding move in the game. Good luck teching the stage spike. As for the PSI boys, the windbox on up b makes this matchup as fun for G&W as it is for Rosalina and her down b. This move is hugely important in his disadvantaged state, but more on that later.

 

[san.]

Hmm...how would you compare his Advantage state w/Mega Man? I'm mostly interested in knowing more about Mega Man's edgeguarding capabilities, if you have any information about that.

Gunner is better at racking up damage and edgeguarding, while Mega Man can kill much easier. Mega Man's usmash keeps them in and his bair is fast and strong. Mega man has to work a bit more for damaging setups, while Gunner has to work a bit more for killing setups, which favors Mega Man more for advantage imo. Both have pretty weak throw games that can only combo with poor DI, but both are good at getting the grab. I am not familiar with Mega Man's kill setups outside of metal blade and just throwing things out.

Gunner has to sacrifice more if he wants early kills with cannon uppercut vs. a more distant recovery + edgeguarding with upB1. It used to be a worse option, but missiles can now cover gunner better than before, so not having a hitbox on the recovery isn't a death sentence.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Call me crazy but i feel like G&W's advantage state is a bit too low, and that it should probably be bumped up to 3.5 stars.

I think his neutral is a bit too low as well fwiw. Not sure when he has been added at neutral and who came up with such a low number.

 

[Vyrnx]

I think his neutral is a bit too low as well fwiw. Not sure when he has been added at neutral and who came up with such a low number.

G&W's neutral holds the character back quite a bit. While most people would now put G&W around high mid tier to low high tier, this is because of his very good advantage state and resistance to gimping, while his neutral on the other hand is total garbage. Neutral feels like an uphill battle and looks like an uphill battle even for GimR and Regi. Regi won neutral at Evo with perfect shielding, something he was very good at, but this is more a testament to Regi's skill than G&W's neutral since any character can perfect shield.

He has no safe on shield aerials, bad grab range, and a projectile that can't be used in the neutral. Basically he has no approach options whatsoever, not dissimilar to Jigglypuff or Zelda in that regard. Only his dash attack is okay, but of course it like all dash attacks can be very punishable.

His oos options are decent but still below average, and most people will pressure G&W from midrange and beyond instead of up next to his shield since G&W can do very little about it with no approaches.

This isn't just me throwing this opinion out, the low opinion of his neutral is widely held. G&W was considered a bad character for the first few months of the game because his neutral is awful and he's so light, but it's only recently that he's been seen in different light mostly because of his advantage state. The general opinion on his neutral is that it is still crap.

G&W is my third or fourth most used character, but I can hardly stand going from Samus to G&W because even Samus's neutral craps on G&Ws. Most matches as G&W are spent running around out of the opponent's reach and waiting for an entrance, similar to what MKs have to do. He might be the worst at approaching in the whole game.

 

[Nobie]

G&W's neutral holds the character back quite a bit. While most people would now put G&W around high mid tier to low high tier, this is because of his very good advantage state and resistance to gimping, while his neutral on the other hand is total garbage. Neutral feels like an uphill battle and looks like an uphill battle even for GimR and Regi. Regi won neutral at Evo with perfect shielding, something he was very good at, but this is more a testament to Regi's skill than G&W's neutral since any character can perfect shield.

He has no safe on shield aerials, bad grab range, and a projectile that can't be used in the neutral. Basically he has no approach options whatsoever, not dissimilar to Jigglypuff or Zelda in that regard. Only his dash attack is okay, but of course it like all dash attacks can be very punishable.

His oos options are decent but still below average, and most people will pressure G&W from midrange and beyond instead of up next to his shield since G&W can do very little about it with no approaches.

This isn't just me throwing this opinion out, the low opinion of his neutral is widely held. G&W was considered a bad character for the first few months of the game because his neutral is awful and he's so light, but it's only recently that he's been seen in different light mostly because of his advantage state. The general opinion on his neutral is that it is still crap.

G&W is my third or fourth most used character, but I can hardly stand going from Samus to G&W because even Samus's neutral craps on G&Ws. Most matches as G&W are spent running around out of the opponent's reach and waiting for an entrance, similar to what MKs have to do. He might be the worst at approaching in the whole game.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, but I feel like Smash players have this really bizarre view of the neutral game, possibly as a side effect of Melee.

Smash players conflate "Neutral" with "Approach," when Neutral is so much more. Here's a useful video to explain the idea in a general fighting game sense, with the caveat that Smash Bros. is somewhat different:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_Rgk1CiZJ0

tl;dw: Neutral/Footsies consists of three aspects in a rock-paper-scissors relationship: Poking, Whiff punishing, and Moving Forward. Whiff punishing beats poking, moving forward beats whiff punishing, and poking beats moving forward. All of these are ways to establish an advantage on your opponent, by taking advantage of flaws in their thinking.

Some characters are better in some areas than others. Other characters are good at all three, or perhaps not that great at any of it. However, I highly doubt that you can say Game & Watch is bad at all elements of the neutral game, bad enough to be considered the most horrendous hindrance to him. After all, what you describe as "just running around out of the opponent's reach and waiting for an entrance," THAT'S a neutral game! It is whiff punishing/moving forward, and on top of that G&W has a ton of disjoints so he can also reasonably poke at the opponent in the right circumstances. You just...shouldn't short hop aerial like it's a religion.

What holds back Game & Watch is truly just his weight, and it affects him in all three states, with advantage being much less so. I would argue that Game & Watch actually has a pretty decent neutral, maybe 2.5-3 stars under normal circumstances, but the risk of getting demolished for losing the neutral is very much there. Similarly, his Disadvantage is amazing, but he has to constantly worry about making THE wrong move.

 

[DungeonMaster]

I'm going to question a bunch of the current rankings starting from the top:

Metaknight - Is definitely NOT top tier advantage. His kill combo can be DIed and survived by heavyweights. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kbC-v6UOrM He's too slow for much aerial follow up, basically up-B, his offstage is average to below average. Three and a half stars at best.
Rosa - Virtually NO combos out of hit confirm. No ability to produce tech chases, no ability to follow them up. Needs to drop a half star.
Fox - Has essentially no offstage game. Attempting to drag people with a specific hitbox of fair is cute, but no, it's not an offstage game. You're basically safe offstage vs. fox. Likewise, needs to drop a half star.
DK- Again, no ability to tech chase, very limited combos. Half star lower.
Kirby - Basically can't follow anyone in the air. Having him on the same level as diddy kong is absurd, no, he does not have as good a combo game or aerial follow ups, not even close.
Dr-Mario - His combo game is below average. His offstage is below average.
Gannon - Putting Gannon on the same level as Samus is absurd. Samus can do 40+ damage out of grab, a dash, an up-tilt, a d-air etc... can tech chase you with a kill projectile out of piles of moves and has entry-level simply super missile kill combos, ignore the fancy stuff like jab combos. Samus can follow you in the air, follow up on almost every hit in her movelist. No, just no. Samus is near top-tier in advantage. Gannon has 1 move to produce a tech chase and it's no where near as good/guaranteed a follow up as charge shot.
Megaman - Megaman has virtually no combos and is in a constant struggle to rack damage. If your character is constantly struggling to rack damage, you are not average. A single potent knockdown tech chase and a few metal blade shenanigans means that my favorite rock man, your advantage state is awful. Near rock bottom.

 

[DunnoBro]

Might have to redo DHD... Apparently not a single top DHD realized frisbee comboed into itself and then into kill moves lol

 

[TTTTTsd]

Dr. Mario's offstage as far as edgeguarding is far what I'd call below average. His distance offstage that he can go out to gimp/kill you isn't good, but he has actual strong low edgeguard options and his Bair unlike Mario's will actually kill you near the ledge and not near the blastzone. He has Dair, Down-B (which, if he gets you far enough out, has killed Bowser at sub 80% with no rage), and Bair, all of which are competent, with Down-B being especially good for partially low edgeguards and long, lingering hitboxes to catch airdodges (because the last hit is really the only one that matters).

I'd go as far as to say Dr. Mario's edgeguarding is better than Mario's, I'm 100% positive it is. There ARE some better traits about the character as much as I think he's not good overall.

Also to talk about Ryu's neutral, I think pre-kill % it's about 3 or 3.5 like @Emblem Lord said, but but but, I think once someone is in kill range for Ryu, his neutral jumps up a bit in rating because while it was already good, now it converts into a kill very easily. It's a neutral that I find very dynamic and hard to rate, but it's how I'd go about it personally.

 

[warionumbah2]

The moment I clicked the vid I was already sceptical, its already a well known fact that there's literally no competent mks on FG. Anyway lemme break it down.

1st part - he got u with the right dash attack at the right percent. He got the 3rd hit of dash attack at 17% with 60% rage.

2nd part- some omega stages have higher blastzones resulting in no rage uair combos to not kill, you get this alot on bf its basic knowledge.

3rd part - he got you at 18% but with the first hitbox of dash attack which is easier to DI and he got you at the wrong percent. this time he had 79% rage this mk is very ignorant of his uair percents.

I remember you making claims of airdodging inbetween uairs which is very false. Samus is one of the many characters that get abused by uair combos for being really really floaty.

 

[Molk]

And yeah, you can go ahead and mention his Dthrow combos.

Alrighty :]

Down Throw---->Utilt--->Nair--->Up B is pretty much the bnb low percent dthrow combo, and does 41% not counting pummels. Most of G&W's combos are variations of this one combo.

Against certain characters, you can squeeze even more damage out of this combo. against fatties like say DK, it's possible to perform Dthrow--->Utilt--->Nair--->Double Jump Nair or Uair--->Up B for around 57-58%, and on Captain Falcon in particular, it's possible to even get a second Utilt in there if you turn around for the second one, because he's a very comboable fellow.

At higher percents where Utilt stops connecting fully, you'll want to go straight for Nair and then follow up from that most of the time, depending on character and percent you can go for a wide range of other follow ups, including a second Nair into Up B, Uair into Up B, Fair, Bair, or just an Up B straight up. Judge is another move that Nair can easily lead into, but there are usually more reliable options than that.

As anyone who's watched Xanadu knows, at higher percents, Dthrow into Uair can lead into a KO off the top, although outside of pretty specific percent windows where it can true combo, it relies on an air dodge read.

At exceptionally high percents where nothing else will connect, Dthrow--->Up B will still connect for a decent amount of time for 10%, not including damage from pummels.

Certain fastfallers such as Fox will fall out of Utilt at 0%, but G&W can still land a few combos on them at those percents, including Dthrow to Jab, Dthrow to Ftilt, Dthrow to footstool Dair (way easier than it sounds) and Uthrow to Up B with a possible Fair followup.

Last but not least, while not a true combo, Dthrow--->Utilt--->Bair--->Bair--->Up B at the ledge can lead to some really cheesy kills at very early percents. As i said, it's not guaranteed, but it's still a good thing to know while playing as G&W

Do note that some of these combos are a bit DI dependent, but as long as you're able to read DI, they should be able to connect otherwise with no problem, and Nair's huge hitbox and long duration in particular help quite a bit here.

Personally i feel like G&W's advantage state could even reach 4 stars+, but idk if that's pushing it considering his limited kill set ups.

 

[Jamurai]

Metaknight - Is definitely NOT top tier advantage. His kill combo can be DIed and survived by heavyweights. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kbC-v6UOrM He's too slow for much aerial follow up, basically up-B, his offstage is average to below average. Three and a half stars at best.
[...]
DK- Again, no ability to tech chase, very limited combos. Half star lower.
[...]

TIL MK is a below-average offstage fighter and he actually has a pretty average advantage state because someone survived his death combo once online so it must be garbage.

Someone already explained about the kill combo stuff so ya. Could you please explain to me how a character with 6 jumps and several disjointed hitboxes on aerials (one of which has a KBG of over 200), two of which are multihits, as well as three good recovery moves, is "below average" offstage, or even average?

Also DK's dash grab has crazy range and he has down-B and Dsmash, of course he can tech chase. And I don't really know what you mean by "limited". DK's throw combos don't care about DI, they also work on most if not all of the cast (iirc). What are they limited by?

 

[Amadeus9]

Since when has setting up tech chases been an important thing in this game? This isn't Melee.

 

[DunnoBro]

Since when has setting up tech chases been an important thing in this game? This isn't Melee.

...Tech chases were important in freaking brawl dude they're essentially roll reads handed to you on a platter.

 

[Amadeus9]

...Tech chases were important in freaking brawl dude they're essentially roll reads handed to you on a platter.

Ok that's not exactly what I meant. Obviously you can chase a tech. But it's not like melee where a large number of fighters can set up mindless tech chases off throws and **** (sheik, anyone), or even brawl with snake and gaw throws, and other situations. It's just something that's not particularly strong in this game. You can't use "lack of ability to setup tech chases" in smash 4 like it's some big negative when few characters can even set up situations like that.

 

[DunnoBro]

Ok that's not exactly what I meant. Obviously you can chase a tech. But it's not like melee where a large number of fighters can set up mindless tech chases off throws and **** (sheik, anyone), or even brawl with snake and gaw throws, and other situations. It's just something that's not particularly strong in this game. You can't use "lack of ability to setup tech chases" in smash 4 like it's some big negative when few characters can even set up situations like that.

Generally in smash 4 tech chases aren't things too intentional (due to them usually being via soft hit aerials intended to be strong hit or stray stuffs that go unteched) but being able to capitalize on them is still important.

I'll agree they're not a make or break factor of a character though (unless that's their kill set-up like fox's tech chase/kill set-up)

 

[warionumbah2]

Fhjuovbtlool@

 

[DungeonMaster]

1st part - he got u with the right dash attack at the right percent. He got the 3rd hit of dash attack at 17% with 60% rage.
2nd part- some omega stages have higher blastzones resulting in no rage uair combos to not kill, you get this alot on bf its basic knowledge.
3rd part - he got you at 18% but with the first hitbox of dash attack which is easier to DI and he got you at the wrong percent. this time he had 79% rage this mk is very ignorant of his uair percents.

It's the SAME stage, with almost IDENTICAL conditions. I had higher % and he had higher rage with the final up-B and I survived on the same stage. You're telling me I will die earlier with less knockback? Don't believe that for a second.
Sorry bud, but he tried again and again, and it failed, again and again. It's the most clear cut example I can give, your words vs. my video evidence.
No MK is not as good as you think he is in advantage. The argument for low ceilings goes both ways, many characters benefit from a lower ceiling.

 

[DunnoBro]

Having magic % kill confirms imo aren't enough for 5-star due to the inherent "tipping" effect they have. MK isn't much more potent than mario or kirby when both players are at high % and nowhere near luigi in the same situation.

 

[warionumbah2]

It's the SAME stage, with almost IDENTICAL conditions. I had higher % and he had higher rage with the final up-B and I survived on the same stage. You're telling me I will die earlier with less knockback? Don't believe that for a second.

First time he got you he was at 60%, the second time which you survived he got you at 16% instead of 17% and had literally no rage. Also i went into vs mode and tested this out, on FD Sheik dies to uair combo's at 27% but on the Omega stage you played on she lived.

No MK is not as good as you think he is in advantage. The argument for low ceilings goes both ways, many characters benefit from a lower ceiling.

Only stages that don't allow mk to kill via uair combo's without rage is BF. Also throw in a few Omega stages, other than that stages with the same ceiling as FD or lower is fine. I don't think FD is considered a low ceiling stage its pretty meh.

Having magic % kill confirms imo aren't enough for 5-star due to the inherent "tipping" effect they have. MK isn't much more potent than mario or kirby when both players are at high % and nowhere near luigi in the same situation.

magic kill percent + edgeguarding + juggling + kill confirms at higher percents(not Luigi level reliable however). Jamurai already went on about edgeuards so i didn't want to repeat what he written about.

Edit about magic kill percent: Some characters are very forgiving if you mess up, Sheik is unforgiving the percent is strict and she herself is hard to fight against, Samus is very forgiving so forgiving that a scrub MK can give a good Samus a tough time.