Howdy, everyone.

[Detective Riptide]

Hello there! I'm Detective Riptide. I've lurked the forums here for some time interested in the upcoming Smash 4 as well as getting into the competitive community for Smash Bros. in general.

To get myself started, I'm a person who for a while has played Smash casually for some time now. I've seen a lot of tournament match videos and the like and have been really eager to get to that level of skill. It looks like insane amounts of fun and I'm certain I'd enjoy myself playing in Melee or Project M tournaments.

I have a few other interests besides Smash. I'm looking into a career in writing, hopefully creative writing. I'm a big fan of fighting games of all kinds, especially Smash Bros., and that love of fighting games is spurring me into learning how to play them at a higher level, starting with what many have told me is a very entry-level competitive fighter.

To finish this off I do have one large question: When it comes to choosing a main character, does their tier placement exactly matter? There's a number of characters I've been looking to play at a tournament level, but I'm not sure if I should opt to start off with one that's a high or top-tier character.

 

[Hokori]

Typically, the higher a character's tier placement, the better off they are with their Match-Up spread compared to the rest of the cast. There really is a good bit that goes into official tier list placements though, but that's something to keep in mind. I'm not one to care for tiers though. I pick my characters based upon my connections with them from playing their games outside of Smash. Luckily for me, those characters end up being pretty solid for the most part. You can still win with lower-tier characters though of course. They may not be as good as some of the high-tiers, but there will be people that won't know a MU due to the lack of representation a character has so they don't get to fight them as often. If you use a top-tier character like Fox, Falco, Marth, Sheik, etc, just be prepared because most tourney players have plenty of experience with those MUs.

My advice starting out is to just play with whoever you want to play with and really learn that character. If it happens to be a high-tier character, then so be it. First and foremost, just have fun and treat things as a learning experience. It's okay to lose. That's expected at first anyways.

Welcome to SWF though! Looking forward to seeing you around.