Is Captain Falcon underrated in Smash 4?

[IrkenPPG]

I main Falcon in Smash 4, and I think he is top tier. I have seen decent amount of Falcons in tournaments, but not as much as I would like to see. Falcon is fast, strong, and has amazing combo potential. However he can be predictable and his recovery is just ok. What do you guys think?

 

[Mochamico]

I main Falcon in Smash 4, and I think he is top tier. I have seen decent amount of Falcons in tournaments, but not as much as I would like to see. Falcon is fast, strong, and has amazing combo potential. However he can be predictable and his recovery is just ok. What do you guys think?

He's good but he's definitely not top tier. What you said is true, but he has a huge disadvantage to characters that rely on projectiles like Villager, Mega Man, and PAC-MAN. Not only that, other characters that combo well (Ness comes to mind here) can body him completely.

He's high mid-tier at most in my opinion.

 

[teluoborg]

I have seen decent amount of Falcons in tournaments, but not as much as I would like to see.

Where do you live ? Every time I go to a tournament there are douzens of Falcon players, and at least 10-15 Falcon mains.

 

[Warlock*G]

Where do you live ? Every time I go to a tournament there are douzens of Falcon players, and at least 10-15 Falcon mains.

That's the worst argument I ever saw for a character's tier placement. Why is it the worst? I'm not telling.

 

[Silvalfo]

If anything Falcon's one of the most overrated characters in this game.

True, if the Falcon player is much better than his opponent, he'll have an easier time utterly decimating his victim due to Falcon's unforgiving punishes and reads. However, there are many match-ups in which Falcon just can't get in, gets comboed all day and is really easy to edgeguard, which clearly do not favor Falcon against top-level opponents.

I agree with Mochamico, he's high mid-tier at most.

 

[Trifroze]

I do think he's high tier as I can't think of more than 9 characters who are definitively better, those being Sheik, Rosalina, ZSS, Sonic, Pikachu, Fox, Luigi, Mario and Diddy and 4 more who compete with him, being Ness, Yoshi, Wario and Villager. Anything else is a stretch except possibly Mega Man, Pac-Man and ROB unless we're going to see some ridiculous meta developments from them. The last patch might make one think otherwise but I still believe many of the characters I mentioned are more likely to get nerfed in future patches than Falcon is. Custom Falcon might also be a thing with his LFK infinite if Sakurai continues his habit of not patching custom bugs.

I also don't think Falcon struggles versus projectiles, instead he's an anti-projectile character for the most part although his massive dash makes powershielding out of dash pretty annoying sometimes. He really struggles with characters who can easily combo him offstage and then put him into a bad situation where he has very few options and if he chooses wrong he gets gimped. Such characters would be Sheik and Pikachu and I'm not convinced about any other straight up bad matchups yet. Many others can do the same but they struggle versus Falcon in other areas too much.

 

[teluoborg]

That's the worst argument I ever saw for a character's tier placement. Why is it the worst? I'm not telling.

I never said anything about tier placement I was just talking about the number of Falcon players I encounter, maybe you should learn to read before trying to sound smug

Now about tier placement : Falcon can't be top tier because of how exploitable his weaknesses can be (mainly lack of good defensive game, below average neutral game and bad recovery), but he can't be lower than high tier considering his mixup game and the rewards he can get from it, inflicting tons of damage from a throw and getting kills as early as 50%.

 

[Warlock*G]

I never said anything about tier placement I was just talking about the number of Falcon players I encounter, maybe you should learn to read before trying to sound smug

And maybe you should learn to read between the lines. The fact that it's not a tier-placement argument makes it the worst tier-placement argument I ever read. I was j o k i n g . Ergo, the and the "I'm not telling" part... though I ended up having to spell it out anyway.

 

[teluoborg]

And you fell into my trap. I told you to "learn to read" when it's pretty obvious that you already know how to read since your reply was taking the content of my post into account, sorry buddy but you've been o u t j o k e d.

Now it would be delightful if you stopped being off topic, thanks in advance.

 

[UzakiuzuG]

I think he's very underrated in terms of players. I think he is more of a joke/ swag/ style kind of character to a lot of people (Easy combos at lower level play. P.S When you play tournament play Falcon I think he's a very difficult to use). It probably just varies from scene to scene. From where I'm from "Good ole Louisville KFC Kentucky" I've only met..3 Falcons including myself.

 

[Space Stranger]

Falcon isn't underrated at all. It's just that characters like Sheik, Pikachu, and Rosalina outshine his combo ability. That isn't to say he's bad. In the right hands, he is good at baiting frequent whiffs with his combination of speed and power. Like others have said, he's easily gimped by some projectile users and when offstage due to his predictable recovery. The amount of Falcons at the local tourneys depends on your area.

Most players see him as overrated due to his meme popularity and easy for low-skilled players to pick up.

 

[AdaptiveTrigger]

I think the thing with Falcon is that in order to be successful, you need to have good reads. With top tiers in this game, it feels like you can "just do stuff" or "just press buttons" whereas Captain Falcon feels like he thrives on taking advantage of the absolute perfect opportunities. He has "good buttons" but they can't just be thrown out to the same extent as other characters.

That's just my...noobish take on the subject.

 

[teluoborg]

Well you just explained in your own words that Falcon has a bad neutral game with a strong punish game, compared to some top tiers that have good neutral game and good punish game (though not as good as Falcon's).

Some character can "just do stuff" because even if it's shielded or whiffed it's safe, Falcon can't. That's why Falcon is player dependant, and you should see what happens when the best player in France goes Falcon, it's crazy.

 

[Slurzen]

no not really, a lot of people use him.

 

[RyeSSB]

Why would he be underrated? Most top players agree that he lies within the top 15. He has fast and powerful moves, great frame data, an amazing grab that has really good followups, he's heavy, and he has a good amount of kill options. His main downfalls are linear approach option and a mediocre recovery. I don't see how he's underrated at all.

 

[monzer]

There are a lot of falcon mains and most people see him as a mid/high tier character. I wouldn't consider him underrated at all.

On his placement, he should be in mid/high tier because he has great combos, many kill options, but he has no projectiles.

 

[Lionman]

High-Top but with really bad match ups

 

[monzer]

High-Top but with really bad match ups

How are his matchups bad? He even has a positive matchup against Diddy, but I guess that isn't as notable since after the nerf Diddy probably won't be #1 on the tier list anymore.

 

[Superfiremario]

Not at all. Every match online is against Captain Falcon for me.

 

[IrkenPPG]

Not at all. Every match online is against Captain Falcon for me.

Well are they good players or for glory Falcons meaning they roll all over the stage and spam dash attack. If that's what you're talking about, then that doesn't count. I'm talking about "good" players.

 

[Lionman]

How are his matchups bad? He even has a positive matchup against Diddy, but I guess that isn't as notable since after the nerf Diddy probably won't be #1 on the tier list anymore.

LoL diddy

 

[A2ZOMG]

Well you just explained in your own words that Falcon has a bad neutral game with a strong punish game, compared to some top tiers that have good neutral game and good punish game (though not as good as Falcon's).

Some character can "just do stuff" because even if it's shielded or whiffed it's safe, Falcon can't. That's why Falcon is player dependant, and you should see what happens when the best player in France goes Falcon, it's crazy.

Falcon has that B-air though. Not much short of a really well spaced sword is going to beat it head on, and it's totally safe on block.

That alone makes his neutral game decent. Certainly not top tier good, but better than most characters.

 

[Swagmaster]

I love Falcon and he is utterly amazing against many players with his speed and power, but I have to admit that there are several characters the exploit his lack of defense and destroy him. For me some of these are Link, Toon Link, Ness, and Marth. I definitely think he is an awesome character to play, and I would argue that he is the most fun character to play. It's definitely a good idea to pick up a few other characters to use against the characters that can destroy Falcon. I would put him at high mid-tier or low high-tier.

 

[monzer]

Well are they good players or for glory Falcons meaning they roll all over the stage and spam dash attack. If that's what you're talking about, then that doesn't count. I'm talking about "good" players.

What qualifies as a "good" he layer though. Would it be tourniment level, or just someone who can short hop.

I love Falcon and he is utterly amazing against many players with his speed and power, but I have to admit that there are several characters the exploit his lack of defense and destroy him. For me some of these are Link, Toon Link, Ness, and Marth. I definitely think he is an awesome character to play, and I would argue that he is the most fun character to play. It's definitely a good idea to pick up a few other characters to use against the characters that can destroy Falcon. I would put him at high mid-tier or low high-tier.

I use Villager or Mario against those characters. Another thing that prevents falcon from being top tier is his recovery.

 

[IrkenPPG]

What qualifies as a "good" he layer though. Would it be tourniment level, or just someone who can short hop.


I mean a decent player. Someone who doesn't roll all over the stage, or spam certain moves like the counter for example.
A good/decent player should know their character's weaknesses and strength an know how to use it. Not tournament level though