Here's the article:
https://www.eventhubs.com/news/2019...-finals-super-smash-bros-ultimate-tournament/
Apparently, it wasn't two insta-kills in a row, per se. It was a snooze that led to a fatal crit F-smash. (Snooze is still basically an insta-kill if it lands though) Then the player that had just died respawned only to instantly die again at 0% to thwack. Stupidly lucky, for sure, but damn that kind of RNG is some premium bull. I'd be SOOOOO tilted to lose to that. That said, I'm still not convinced one way or the other whether Hero should be banned, but something's gotta give here. So many things in his kit are downright stupidly overpowered.
The ban conversation hasn't really brought up certain very important points:
First, I don't think the RNG should be viewed in isolation to itself. Most of Hero's Command spells allow hit really, really hard or insta-kill, aka. kill really early. The crits and more importantly the other specials / aerials also do that since they also hit really, really hard. That convinced me of one thing: Sakurai and Sora Ltd. intentionally made Hero into half-magic, half-swordie heavy hitter. The RNG serves that. I understand the pro-ban side's point there, just think it should have been worded with his normal moves in mind.
Secondly - as a result of being a massive heavyhitter the Hero's
ridicolously vurnerable to counters and reflects. Half the cast has a counter or reflect - Palutena's does both. Snooze, Whack and Thwack can be reflected too. Also, the only defense he has to reflects is avoiding the projectile or rolling Bounce. Sure Bounce comes up semi often, but it has a distinct audio clue telling the opponent with a reflect "Oh hey, I should just do something else, like mindgaming Hero!" There are also a few characters that can just ignore Bounce:
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: Pocket and Oil Panic can wait out Bounce.
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: Can just heal off of the projectiles.
: Can Revenge most projectiles (Not Kafrizz, since it's multi-hit. Haven't been able to work out if he can Revenge Whack / Thwack, but if he can, hoo boy.)
: Can get Arsene super early off Hero's attacks. Including Kafrizz.
Counters? Well, most counters work off of both sword hits and projectiles. Note that while the Zap spells can't be reflected, they can be countered. Unlike Incineroar's example most counters work off of Kafrizz, and the crits can be countered too.
What I'm trying to say? Hero's balance is a bit too tilted towards Hero out-reading his opponent or vice versa. His heavyhitters and RNG all promote such a playstyle. But in return, while most counters are slow they can prove devastating to Hero. So Hero has to play things methodical and out-read his opponents a lot. Still, even if a character lacks a counter they can be dangerous to Hero - Pikachu and Pichu are really dangerous since a good one can get into Hero's face fast.
For the record, I'm anti-ban since I don't believe Hero's strengths and weaknesses to be so pronounced that his playstyle / counters are onedimensional. Hero can use his tilts and aerials to play semi-agressively too without relying too much on his heavyhitters / RNG. He has several weaknesses too - combos, reflects / counters and bad frame data on the normals. Still, I do believe that Hero's balance is problematic and worth talking about.
