DAir is not only pikmin specific but also requires hitting your opponent with the sweet spot of the move, otherwise it'll have a more horizontal knockback.
Fautor Animus, do you have any proposed mind games you can so generally point to as the solution? Also I'm not quiet sure your SSBM Yoshi comparison is solid. I agree yoshi is a weird one to learn, but I don't feel yoshi is too powerful in some cases.
Balance is a tricky thing, especially in a game with so many different characters/moves/properties/possibilities. However I don't believe difficulty to learn falls into the broad category of "Aspects that maintain Balance." If it did, then not only in smash, but in all competative games, you would see only one real option, the character who took the most time to learn and was given advantages for that reason, because once learned that character would naturally have fewer weaknesses than the rest.
(Read the following if your interested in why no character is harder to learn than another)
Moreover, To absolutely know any character inside and out is a collection of so much information it balances out all learning curves. Slight differences in "more complex" characters or even just moves (like marths uptilt can spike in the right position but fox's only hits in one spot quickly with priority) is a very tiny % compared to the overall.
For instance say if knowing Mario absolutely through and through gave you a standard we'll call 100 learned character units (lcu). Someone comes and says oh mario is so simple i learned Ness he is so more complex, you can laugh at him, because hes bragging for nothing. To absolutely know Ness all the way compared to mario's 100 lcu, Ness would be about 100.01 lcu. Every character has the same number of moves, same number of characteristics such as weight, and same number of possible situations to be in. While their moves offer slightly different "levels of complexity", it doesn't amount to anything but the smallest fraction, and that slight fraction plays no outcome on the game. Differences in knowledge between opponents of their character (cause no one knows 100%), as well as each players ability to adapt, read patterns, and stay focused all determine the winner long before any level of character complexity plays a part.
So, back on topic at last. Is our beloved Oli too powerful for his own good, or at least this game. Fact is, we don't know yet. Too few people have the game, and have experienced only tiny amounts of the possible situations so far, and have only used some of the options available to respond to the situations. For instance, recently theres been an overall interest growing in a type of aerial lag cancel dependent on the timing of certain moves, allowing for less land lag and faster action/play. Olimar doesn't have bad landing lag, but as far as I know (until I can test myself or get someone reliable to do it this week) Olimar does not have aerials that can do this. If for some reason it becomes a huge factor in game play and performance, Olimar isn't going to be too powerful at all. People are noticing that non obvious techniques are so far character specific, not game specific. Another example is our discovery of Olimar's whistle armor. No one else can do that, but will it be useful enough to overcome the specific strong techniques other characters have?
In light of this though, Olimar does show a strong potential. He doesn't have simply useless moves, things like falcon punch that are simply too slow/awkward to ever use. Having more viable moves gives olimar more potential options, one of which may in some way, whether obvious or not, be able to overcome some challenge he is presented with. Also he has the strength in ranged attacks, not speaking of projectiles but large hit boxes. Marth from SSBM shows us how much an impact that can make when used correctly. However we are all also familiar with olimar's recovery weakness. Some characters may develop a two hit combo that along with an edge guard, kill olimar every time. If so, who is going to figure out if any of olimar's moves are able to overcome this? Who knows if he even has a way to overcome this? Only time will tell.
So far I have only approached this scientifically, breaking down general aspects of the game to show what is important, a examples of what benefits or troubles olimar may have as this game develops. As far as opinions go though, I am a Marth main with a secondary Peach. I came into the smash competative community far too late to ever be famous or win tournaments, but I was at least able to start truly developing an understanding of fighting games in general. I enjoyed marth for his range, you could hit someone further away than they could hit you, and I valued that characteristic. I also learned to greatly value the importance of situation and familiarity. I learned and played peach because her timing, floatiness, and moves are all drastically different than the normal fox falco sheik marth CFalcon stereotype. I would use this to put other players out of their familiar settings, where they had to think about things because they are different against peach than most other characters. In Brawl I fully plan on maining Olimar. Why? Because he efficiently combines both the range and unfamiliar aspects I value. Is that enough to make him a strong character? Or does mixing the two come short of overemphasizing one of the traits? We'll see.
-True
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