ESAM - Let's Talk: Tier Lists

Tier lists. A subject that causes much debate over where characters should be placed, if one should exist at all, how they should be formed, and much else. Many efforts to devise tier lists have been made from EventHubs to the /r/smashbros monthly voted tier list with each project having various levels of success and failure. But just how important are they in the long run and how should we approach using them to select characters?

Pikachu main and Smash 4 player ESAM discusses just this with his latest Let's Talk video. He gives his professional opinions all about tier lists and discusses the different motivations for playing characters either who are the best or worse. Give it a watch and leave personal thoughts in the comments below.

 

tournaments are a way to measure skill. why wouldn't you play the best you can by playing characters you believe are the best.

Most people do play with the best characters they can choose, especially if money is put on the table.

It may be just me, but wouldn't winning with Zelda or Charizard rather than Sheik or Rosalina prove you are an elite player? Sure, choosing Sheik and winning can get you somewhere, but going through trial and error with a supposed "low tier" character personally seems more rewarding.

 

Playing only to win ruins the fun. Who wants to go to a tournament where the entire thing consists of only Shieks and Rosalinas?

It maybe fun to play as Zelda or Doc, but unless you're really good with said characters or have them as secondaries, handicapping yourself out of money will make you look silly to your opponent(s).

Most people do play with the best characters they can choose, especially if money is put on the table.

It may be just me, but wouldn't winning with Zelda or Charizard rather than Sheik or Rosalina prove you are an elite player? Sure, choosing Sheik and winning can get you somewhere, but going through trial and error with a supposed "low tier" character personally seems more rewarding.

That trial and error is going to be an extremely long experiment. Unless people started with said characters since release, I don't see that happening.

 

For all of you that think tiers don't exist, do yourself a favor and go learn about frame data. Actually learn about it and what it means for your character in comparison to the other, better characters. If you still don't believe in tiers, well... good luck winning a tournament any time soon, my son.

Think about it this way: Picking a character is like picking a gun, and all guns will get the job done, but some... well some get the job done better.
Anyways, I am gonna go back to playing my mid tier in Melee. QQ

 

Tier lists are incredibly flawed. I have made many comments on this before, but I do want to say this: Smash 4 has an egalitarian balance and the only difference between victors is skill level, characters are =. If you do not accept this, then you are simply caught in the old dogma of previous games where it is more true and have obviously not thought enough and done enough exploration of the characters. Furthermore, all characters are 100% viable options. Learn them to their fullest and apply a mastery of universal smashsonian skills and you will have victory.

I see what you're saying but I would have kind of a hard time believing that all the characters are perfectly equal. It's just not possible to make a game where that's the case. But, like I said before, I would love to see more representation of characters that aren't just top 10.

 

Part of what makes a character good is whether or not s/he meshes with your particular style.
DK doesn't have near the options or coverage that Sheik or Rosa, but try as I might, I SUCK as Sheik. I'm better with Dedede or Roy.

 

To be honest characters do have strengths and weaknesses plus these game is still in development so lets say Zelda a low tier gets a few good buff's someone plays her at a big tournament gets 3-5th place boom she becomes mid tier

 

I mean, to be honest. I want to become a meta game changer so the fact that I keep to Rosalina, Link and Palutena is only flared even more when I hear so much negativity towards them.

 

Someone who wants to make money.

That's how some people see that game. Some people don't care. It's weird how everyone seems to forget that.

Also, some people seem to forget how its almost impossible to earn a stable amount of money. You have to be extremely serious and give up all of your opinions and decisions to have even a slight chance of being at a point where you get tournament prizes on a normal basis. I feel like htat takes the fun out of the game, but then again maybe people aren't looking for fun, which in that case I can see why Nintendo is slightly against the SM4SH scene. If you love the game, dont try and earn money from it. If you dont and only see it as a cash grab, well, to each is own.

 

Look at the poster Pikachus cute

 

I posted those because he said there is no tier list, but previously he stated his personal tier list. As for Samus, I'm not sure why he thinks she is viable at all. Maybe if she was tweaked and fine tuned to where some of her attacks didn't whiff, had a faster projectile game, and was able to wall out a lot of the characters like most zoners, then I'd agree. But she's got problems.

I know, but see that it's incomplete. While it is a personal tier list you'll notice some of the placements very, very far out of place (Like Diddy Kong barely in top 20, much less top 10) and this confused me for awhile until ESAM made this video, which made his mindset very clear.

 

People say that Duck Hunt is terrible due to having only one kill move and thinking down b is bad. I think he is highly underrated and should probably be higher in the tier list when an official one does come (that down b move will be your final days if used right, trust me I know).

As a DH main, can confirm

 

this will sound kinda random, but who here in this perpetual debate is NOT living in the States? I've been told international players don't give as much a damn about tiers as US players do...

way I see it, Melee's had 14+ years to develop it's establishment of what's good and stuff, Brawl had a few years, too, but the MK debate stifled any further growth. PM frequently changes, so trying to make a tier list isn't reliable.

Smash 4 is still not a year old, and yet people think they can judge the game? to hell with them, I'll play whoever suits my playstyle!

 

While that is true for tournaments, it isn't in For Glory. In a For Glory setting, playing to win is a toxic habit for both the "pro" who will generally learn nothing/get meaningless practice and the casual who will generally learn nothing/have no fun. But that's off topic now.

Just one of the many reasons that I will never play for glory, rofl.

 

Conclusion: only buff characters that really need buffs (bottom and low,maybe some in mid) and nerf sheik :v

 

Shoutout to Tonetta . Samus hype!

 

In a fighting game, there will naturally be characters that excel and characters that don't, hence why tier lists exist. Not all characters are created equal and anyone that thinks so is obviously very inexperienced. You can't blame people who enter tournaments to play to win it's what they're there for, everyone wants to win, why wouldn't you pick a character that could get you good results?

 

Conclusion: only buff characters that really need buffs (bottom and low,maybe some in mid) and nerf sheik :v

I'm fine with low-mid tier characters receiving buffs, but Sheik doesn't need to be nerfed, she's not broken like Brawl Meta Knight. If every character who was considered good was nerfed then the game wouldn't be fun to play any more and the meta would come to a screeching halt. It's called "Adapting" and people need to start doing a lot more of it, instead of whining about nerfing good characters.

 

I'm fine with low-mid tier characters receiving buffs, but Sheik doesn't need to be nerfed, she's not broken like Brawl Meta Knight. If every character who was considered good was nerfed then the game wouldn't be fun to play any more and the meta would come to a screeching halt. It's called "Adapting" and people need to start doing a lot more of it, instead of whining about nerfing good characters.

She needs to be nerfed, bro.

 

"Silly Bowser, teirs are for queers!"

NO, TIRES DON EXITS!

 

I'm not saying I'm a Filthy Casual, because I'm certainly not, but tier lists shouldn't be used to determine which characters are the best, it should determine which characters have a slight edge over others, which matchups need development, and which characters might need nerfs/buffs in future patches. People who say I play "low tier" because I play MK and Dedede can go shove it. Tiers are a mindset, not a reality.

 

She needs to be nerfed, bro.

Maybe you just need to get better

 

I'm the best in my area at Brawl and Smash 4, and I clearly main Ness in both. I went into Smash 4 thinking Ness would be difficult to work with like he was in Brawl, but he turned out to be great. Because of this, I often get called a tierwhore--a name that tears at my heart when I know my wins come from love for the character--especially in Brawl. It's come to me wishing Ness were low tier again just so I could feel the satisfaction of taking games with him like I did in Brawl and avoid being called such foul names that aren't even true. Ness was the first character I knew what I was doing with, and whose game is the first I had the fortune to enjoy. I wish people wouldn't be so presumptuous.

On a completely separate note...
...is that voted tier list really accepted? Lucas higher than Expand, R.O.B. higher than Lucas? I find this very odd...

 

I'm the best in my area at Brawl and Smash 4, and I clearly main Ness in both. I went into Smash 4 thinking Ness would be difficult to work with like he was in Brawl, but he turned out to be great. Because of this, I often get called a tierwhore--a name that tears at my heart when I know my wins come from love for the character--especially in Brawl. It's come to me wishing Ness were low tier again just so I could feel the satisfaction of taking games with him like I did in Brawl and avoid being called such foul names that aren't even true. Ness was the first character I knew what I was doing with, and whose game is the first I had the fortune to enjoy. I wish people wouldn't be so presumptuous.

On a completely separate note...
...is that voted tier list really accepted? Lucas higher than Expand, R.O.B. higher than Lucas? I find this very odd...

Have no remorse for playing Ness, especially if you have mained him in other Smash games, the people calling you a "tier-*****" are scrubs who would rather complain then adapt. I play Ness as a secondary and he is a lot of fun to play on top of being super good

 

Actually I think what most people don't like about ness is the for glory pk fire spammers, myself included. hi Hark17ball

 

Super Smash Bros.'s tier lists should be taken with a grain of salt. They can be a general guideline for which character(s) to pick in a tournament setting [especially if someone wants to win (some money)] but they are based on which character places in a certain place in tournaments. Not every character is played to the same degree of skill as another character by every player, and not all tournaments are covered. Plus, every player has a preferential playstyle (a lot of higher tier players seem to like fast characters with easy-to-use combos and few-but-powerful finishers), and thus certain characters will rarely if ever be used by players. No two characters are exactly equal unless they are near-exact copies of each other (like Ryu and Ken were at one point in history), but that does not mean that one of those two characters will always win against the other in every situation.
And I know that many people want characters to be based around one-on-one matches on a very specific stage, but Super Smash Bros. is still a multiplayer game. A character may be balanced if not superior against the entirety/majority of the cast in a one-on-one setting, but that will not necessarily hold true in a multiplayer setting if the character does not have the tools to effectively deal with more than one character. The developers clearly do not want the game to be centered purely around one-on-one matches on "fair" stages. Every time I hear "competitive balancing", every one seems to leave out any match-up that isn't one-on-one.
And let's not even bring canon character attributes into the mix. Some characters just cannot be competitively fair at all and some don't match up with their Super Smash Bros. portrayals (Samus V.S. Zero Suit Samus for example).

 

Esam is (as much as it pains me to see sheik players) right. Why would you use Zelda over ZSS? Its not the communities fault that the developers idiotically put in a stupidly good character, they're just using what's available. Concerning the extra credits "perfect balance would be bad", the way I see it is that every character should have AROUND the same bad matchups and good matchups. Also, technically speaking, a lot of aspiring players are "tier whores". They do in fact use what are considered the "best or overpowered" characters. Can I blame them? No. If perhaps MYSELF had developed the game would the characters be more balanced? Who knows. What I do want to point out is there's an update on the 30th that will probably change the tier list yet again (probably gonna ignore shiek again -_-) so if you wanna spam sheik's fair, or DK's ding dong for this week, why the hell not? On a side note, when it comes to balancing, usually the devs look more at the Japanese tier list. For reference to the current 1.1.0 Japanese tier list, I have left 2 links below:
(Where to find the Source) Simplified Reddit Version:
https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/3ha37w/latest_japanese_tier_list/
(Original Source) Raw version via Game8:
https://game8.jp/archives/14691

 

Playing only to win ruins the fun. Who wants to go to a tournament where the entire thing consists of only Shieks and Rosalinas?

I agree 110%. Everyone wants to win, but if you're not having fun while trying to do so, why are you even playing, even if you wanna make a living out of Smash? And if nowone uses the characters they actually like, no matter their tier placement (Some people do it, which is great. aMSa, Sethlon, Triple R, GimR, among others), you can't expect the meta to advance that much.

 

I have a friend who is in a "war" with event hubs. He always comes on Skype and complains about how Wario is at 45th or Luigi is at 20th or something. And how high link is.

Don't get me started on reddit, I once made a joke about the alphabet and someone tried to debate me about the alphabet... (this was in /r/smashbros mind you)

 

I completely agree with ESAM, tiers matter in the extent of groups like good, okay, and bad, but it's more about the match-ups than anything.

 

Going to play Sonic forever whatever his tier placement is





Got lucky this time though :^]

4 REal Like Eff Tier Lists im gonna play who ever i love & main & dat is SONIC !!

 

Melee is slowing Smash 4's meta growth, just sayin'.

 

But these fufill what he just said. Most of the top 20 are the "clearly viable" characters and the bottom 11 are the "clearly unviable" characters.
Still baffled why ESAM says Samus is in the "kinda viable" area and not the "unviable" area.

Character bias most likely.

 

I just hope Palutena can raise up in the tier list again. She's done nothing but drop from C+ since the game started and these sub par buffs aren't helping much :/ (rip forward tilt)
I hope the patch on the 30th actually manages to improve Palutena so she can at least get back to C+ (or they could just replace her counter with something tbh)