EVO Top 32 data

[verbatim]

Courtesy of Z2G, writing for smash4u.net here, we have access to a lot of cool data from 43 of the 46 sets played in the top 32 bracket at EVO (they couldn't find the sets). They had some cool stuff about regional representation, but I think the most pertinent to competitive discussion is their data on character selection and stage choice. Each graph will be accompanied by my thoughts, but don't hesitate from adding your own.


Character Choice:

• Nearly 1/4th of the characters used in top 32 were Sheik, relative to the second most common, ZSS, being used around 8% of the time. EVO happened prior to 1.1.0, which did nerf Sheik's Fair, but I expect at least, that if Sheik keeps having unparalleled showings, that more nerf's are in her future.

• Luigi has often been hailed as a top 5 character in the game, which isn't really supported by this data. Prominent Luigi's like Boss and JMiller didn't attend Evo, so this could be representative of a bad day on the side of the two players who used Luigi in the top 32 (False and ConCon). That being said, Larry Lurr, also a Luigi player, did not use him in the tournament, and actually elected to use a Pocket Sheik as a counter in his match against Captain Awesum. It's also worth noting that several characters that are not prominent in the American metagame managed a better showing than Luigi, despite being played by a single player. Examples include Dabuz's Olimar, Abadango's Wario and Pacman, Tyrant's MK, John Number's WFT, Regi's G&W, etc. I don't think this shows that Luigi's a bad character, Larry Lurr got a lot of mileage out of him at CEO, it just goes to show that he has some problematic matchups against some of the top tiers that might be better addressed with a co-main strategy.

• Customs had less of an impact than many thought they would going in. The majority of Sheik's, including first and second place, opted for 1111 instead of custom variations. Of the top ten, the characters that benefited most from customs were Sonic, Rosalina, Villager, and Pikachu, which will be discussed below.

• Hammer Spindash helped Sonic in the current metagame, but it still didn't allow him to achieve rankings like those at Apex, where 6WX took 4th. I personally think that, as nerfs have slowly but surely removed all of his kill moves, Sonic's optimal playstyle has shifted from offensive to defensive.

• Pikachu placed worse in EVO than in SmashCon. I personally think this is more representative of ESAM being too aggressive with Heavy Skull Bash, which cost him a pivotal game against Abadango in top 8, and that Pikachu is still an important threat to watch out for in future tournaments, customs on or off.

• Rosalina's placings also weren't significantly boosted by customs, with Dabuz doing worse than he did in Apex. Once again, I think this is more representative of unfortunate seeding than it is an indicator of Rosalina's custom prowess.

• The character with the most benefit from customs was Villager, being represented by SS, MJG, and Captain Awesum. People worried about Villager a lot going into the tournament, but, honestly, I think that the results really don't point towards Villager being broken. MJG is a well known Villager player customs on or off, and one of the best doubles players along with longtime teammate FOW. Captain Awesum, got a lot of **** about the way he played, but ended up making a response post explaining that he plays the same way customs on or off, and places in the top 3 in his region regardless. I couldn't find a lot of information on SFA SS, but he has a notable number of placings in non custom tours, such as 4th at MVG Sandstorm, which had 1st Zero 2nd Nairo 3rd M2K.

Stage Selection:

• The preference among Smash 4 players for Smashville was shown in a big way at EVO, being played on for almost half of the matches in the top 32. It's hard to speculate on what the results for the lesser represented stages were (note, EVO was FLSS, so there was no built in boost to "starter stages"), since they were picked so little, but I find it interesting that Lylat was played more than Delfino. I suppose this can be partially attributed to a previous patch dealing with issues regarding its ledges.

• It's nice to see Duck Hunt get some love, I personally consider it the best non-starting stage in most rulesets.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Just to address the stage points, let's all remember this tournament used FLSS.

 

[TheAnomaly]

You briefly touched on the customs aspect but is there also a table for the customs moves used for this? I think it would be very useful for customs discussions in the future having some hard concrete evidence to point to when attempting to make a point. Granted a sample size of 1 tournament is not enough but it is at least the biggest smash tournament of the time which should count for something.

 

[verbatim]

Unfortunately there were not, and I don't have time to dig through the 43 matches and calculate it myself. Just off the top of my head though, the one's that helped their users the most consistently on stream were Speeding Bike, Rocketbarrel Attack, Hammer Spindash, Explosive Balloon Trip, and Timber Counter. I think that Luma Warp, and HSB are all examples of good custom moves that didn't get a good showing. Kong Cyclone and Jumbo Hoops were used, but I believe that they didn't make an enormous fact because they both have exploitable weaknesses (endlag on kong Cyclone and no super armor at the top and bottom of Jumbo Hoops).

As an aside, I think that a number of characters that get good custom moves didn't make a showing because their underused status in the non custom metagame meant that few high level mains would exist and be willing to experiment with customs for EVO. Examples include Ganondorf, Dr Mario, Power Suit Samus, Megaman, and ESPECIALLY KIRBY.

As an aside, if you ever have to fight Spinning Bike, keep in mind that pretty much any hit breaks it, so don't treat it like Spindash, you can challenge it and win. Of the three people Abadango fought with Wario, only ZeRo really challenged it, breaking the bike with Fair.

 

[DanGR]

Every category in the "Character Choice" chart is directly correlated to the placings of the characters. What other relevant information can be gleaned from this chart that can't be easily extracted from just glancing at the placings and bracket? Additionally, all of these numbers are totally muddled by counterpicking, pocket picks, bracket luck, and skill gaps. Worthwhile analysis comes from analyzing the individual sets and matches- not aggregate use statistics.

 

[verbatim]

Obviously bracket seedings played a huge part in this. Nairo and Zero never lost a game getting into top 32, so literally everyone paired with them early on either went out or had to go on a huge loser's tear that would still put then at a disadvantage in top 32.

I covered a lot of the big points that I felt could be reasonably inferred from the data, but my knowledge of a lot of the characters that placed well is decidedly lacking, so people can add to anything that I missed or challenge any of my claims.

I put this in the competitive discussion because it's reflective of shifts in the meta as a whole, and covers a broad area. Individual match analysis is more informative, but I think that data is best used in specific matchup arguments.

 

[Zeekfox]

Every category in the "Character Choice" chart is directly correlated to the placings of the characters.

Yeah, this is what I noticed immediately. Zero Suit Samus is the "second most picked character", yet only one person played her. He just happened to place third. Yet characters with multiple users are lower on the list because they got knocked out before games went to best of 5 instead of best of 3.

 

[Raijinken]

I wonder how well Smashville would have done if people HADN'T deliberately chosen it against Sheiks.

In other words, if people had properly used FLSS, I wonder how things would look.

 

[TriTails]

Just popping in to say:
- Luigi has bad customs
- Luigi only has one rep, and that is Mr. CC.

and


- Mr. CC SD'd TWICE in Top 32. One when he had a huge percent lead against False and the other when he Quick Missile misfire'd from the center of Smashville in the first 5 seconds and instantly died at 0% against Hammer SD Sonic.

 

[Xeze]

Just popping in to say:
- Luigi has bad customs
- Luigi only has one rep, and that is Mr. CC.

and


- Mr. CC SD'd TWICE in Top 32. One when he had a huge percent lead against False and the other when he Quick Missile misfire'd from the center of Smashville in the first 5 seconds and instantly died at 0% against Hammer SD Sonic.

Actually Mr. CC was at 30% when the misfire SD happened. But I get your point, even at 0% that situation would result in an SD.
Luigi doesn't really need customs tbh. He has a good default set. The thing that is keeping him out of the top places is the lack of (good) representation in majors.

 

[TriTails]

Actually Mr. CC was at 30% when the misfire SD happened. But I get your point, even at 0% that situation would result in an SD.
Luigi doesn't really need customs tbh. He has a good default set. The thing that is keeping him out of the top places is the lack of (good) representation in majors.

IDK. He said himself he SD'd at 0% in the first five seconds in our board somewhere.
http://smashboards.com/threads/luigis-social-mansion.324187/page-20#post-19717580

 

[Xeze]

IDK. He said himself he SD'd at 0% in the first five seconds in our board somewhere.
http://smashboards.com/threads/luigis-social-mansion.324187/page-20#post-19717580

Isn't this the match he's talking about?

 

[TriTails]

Isn't this the match he's talking about?

Ah yes. Perhaps his mind was a bit boogley there.

 

[Piford]

Sheik was used more throughout top 32 than other characters because the Sheik players placed far giving them more games to play. This made it seem like Sheik was chosen as a main over every other character significantly. It's really just that the top 2 players picked Sheik and they got to play a lot more games than lets say Tweek with Bowser Jr. who only got to play 2 games max. Now, this data still shows that Sheik is a dominant character, but her usage would really only be lower if the people playing her didn't place as well compared to other character. The same thing applies to ZSS, who if I recall, was only played by Nairo, yet got the second most usage just because he placed 3rd.