Link 3.6 Changes

[AnooseLOL]

Take out links 3rd hit jab and replace f tilt with 3rd hit jab animation and keep f tilt horizontal range and knockback
gdlk

 

[Mr.Pickle]

Is anyone else getting hard Roy zoned with the second hit of usmash? Idr it ever happening in 3.5. It's just weird. And pickleman I'm curious as to what you think needs changed still.

If you want my honest opinion, I think he needs some major buffs still. I play against link a lot, so I'm all too familiar on how rough link has got it based on the duder I play the most, but recently I've been playing the character myself and I'm experiencing first hand how bad he's got it. It's actually kinda sad sometimes. In comparison to most characters, I feel very limited when I play link, like his moves are slow like a heavy, which link is, but they don't even come close to the other heavy characters' power. That I feel is link's biggest issue, he has really bad kill potential, and he has no reliable way to set any of it up since his grab is so bad. Me and beorn sat down yesterday and studied his grab, among other things, and I actually can't believe how bad it is, it is without question the worst grab in the game.

So taking a look at his kill moves, fair is ok, but you can't go off stage with it like pretty much every other character can with their fair. It pretty much costs you a stock if you try, so you pretty much have to throw it out in neutral and hope you hit them, because there isn't a really reliable way to set it up. Fsmash is ok, but it's in the same boat as fair, no setup for it, so you hope you land a randy one in neutral. Ftilt has a good angle, but it's one of the slowest ftilts in the game, plus it's pretty weak, so that's not killing anyone. Up b is pretty decent if you want to sacrifice your recovery, which btw means if you hit even once with with it you lose your bomb jump, and it also sends at a sakurai angle, so it's very easy to di. Uair isn't killing anyone anytime soon, nair is a shadow of it's former melee self, bair isn't a move, so all that's left is dair. Dair has somewhat decent kill potential, but since it hits at a sakurai angle, it's pretty easy to di, plus I believe it's tied with bowser's dair as having the highest amount of endlag on an aerial. So there's that, and the fact that the only way to set it up is with a grab, which again, is the worst one in the game. So in all honesty, it's kill potential isn't all that great once you factor in all those not so redeeming qualities.

So to summarize, link is super boo boo at killing people, buff that shiz to the level of the rest of the roster. He can already move decently, now he just has to kill like an actual character. As a side note, me and beorn are doing a little exercise in psa to experiment with the hypothetical scenario that if we had control over his design, and could give him the buffs, and certain other changes he needs to be a viable, and fair character, what would we change. When we've finished it, I'll fill you guys in, since I'd like to test my theories out before I post what I think specifically needs to be changed.

 

[Beorn]

It's actually THE slowest ftilt in the game if you want to hit someone in front of you. It's tied with Warios ftilt at frame 14, but the hitbubble isn't in front of link until frame 16 making it the slowest.

He has setups for his moves, they are mostly just his slow boomerang (which is easily DIed or swatted away) His weak hit nair, which again is very DIable and CCable, and his god awful grab (i will get in to the move further down.)

Fair can be used off stage, but it can only be used past a certain level above the ledge or you die. Same with uair and Dair. So that leaves bair and nair, which both hit like wet noodles compared to just about any other characters ability to ko people offstage. When you hit opponents recovering with projectiles, most of the cast has a hitbox around them so they get swatted away which does nothing.

Up-b is powerfull, if it didn't have a sakurai angle, use up your bomb jump, lose all its hitbubbles on shield, and have ridiculous endlag. It's frame 8 for reference, frame 11 on the back hit.

Nair, is a good move, but lost a lot of it's utility from melee. This move used to not cancel it's hitbubbles until the entire animation was over. Which is goofy looking. I don't understand why this move is still considered so good by so many. Here's a fun fact about a nair most people don't make a big deal about.

Links nair: Frame 4 hitbubble, on the latter frames he starts to pull his legs back to neutral position, giving him less than full range, hitboxes terminate on frame 30.
Foot hitbubble: 12
body hitbubble: 10
knee hitbubble: 9
Late hit nair: 7

Shiek's nair: Frame 3 hitbubble, No movement of the legs, meaning full hitbubble range throughout the duration, Hitbubbles terminate frame 30.
All hitbubbles: 14
Late hitbubbles: 9

Links was only considered amazing because the hitbubbles never terminated in melee. Now its just a regular nair with less damage than most in the game, on a character with mediocre air movement, no fast moves to cover an unsafe lcancel, and an abysmal second jump. An amazing move for Link doesn't mean an amazing move.

Usmash, is a poor kill option, with very easily sdied hits, weak kill power, and wonky hitbubbles that miss some characters.
The first two hits can be CCed until 999%. Adding to this, every character in the game can CC the first, and\or second hit, and shield grab on the second or third hit.

Bair first hit does nothing now because it has 0 base kb. Unlike melee where the first hit was actually quite usefull. Again can cc it until 999%

Dair is tied for highest landing lag in the game with bowsers dair (which has huge landing hitbubbles. Is disgustingly punishable on shield hit or bounce, has very little range for an aerial, and to top it off doesn't kill as well as a lot of smashes in the game. Also Link's jump heights make it impossible to follow up on most of the cast at relevant percents. Unless you use his terrible grab (which again I will get to)

Every kill option Link has is marred by huge commitment, Fair has lasts forever, is frame 13 and can't be jumped out of on stage. While also having very limited use offstage. Dair is tied for most landing lag in the game. Ftilt is the slowest in the game, and doesn't have much kill power to speak of, while having very long endlag. Up-b has some of the most endlag in the game, loses it's hitbubbles on shield, and neuters your recovery while not even being that fast oos, or having great kill power because of the angle. Fsmash is frame 14, without much kill power. Dsmash has to hit inside of Link, and doesn't kill until the 120s-130s. Uair is alright if link could actually jump up to where the opponent is (it has huge commitment as well.)

Link's mobility, while buffed is still some of the worst in the game. His second jump is garbage for recovery, or trying to chase faster characters that are timing you out on any stage with a top platform Link can't get too.

His projectiles are all quite slow, with terrible hitbubbles. His rang comes out melee speed (huge commitment) with 11% strong hit instead of 16 like melee (gets beat out much more easily), it comes out too high and misses some small, running or ducking characters. His arrows are completely worthless unchanged, netting him nothing but 5 percents and the possibility of getting ****ed up for hitting his opponent with them. So basically very niche use.(compare to diddys pop gun or toonlinks arrows, it's gross) His bombs are smaller than melee in size, have worse combo potential, and are generally the worst bomb projectile in the game. (compare to snakes nades or toonlinks huge ass bombs)

His OOs options are the worst in the game. Terrible shield grab, 8 frame up-b (already went into this move) bad wavedash. His best option is his 4 frame nair, which just about any character has. When your movement speed, you jump squat and height, your projectiles, your grab, and your attacks are all some of the slowest\worst in the game, it's not hard to see how big a bad oos game is for this character.

His recovery is not alright. Besides the bomb jumping problems (that no other character has to deal with) His up-b is one of the slowest rising, weakest hitting, and most easily beaten out up-bs in the game. Because of the many many frames he has hitbubbles behind him and is completely missing them, you can just run out and hit him like it's not even a move. All hits before the last one are CC able, easily sdiable, and do nothing when someone trades with you, which is certain death because, That one weak hit you got stales your up-b which ****s your bomb jump.
Besides his up-b we also have his tether which is a terrible option if your opponent knows how to beat them. So all in all you end up with a recovery that is either slightly better or slighly better or slightly worse than melee.

He has zero fast moves. His fastest being frame 6 (frame 7 actually where it can hit) on Jab one, dash attack and dsmash. Dsmash and Dash attack have huge commitment, and Jab one is very one of the slowest jabs in the game, besides being shield grabable, before the second hit can come out and very CCable. For a character that wants to keep you out of his space he sure as hell isn't made to do that.

He gets punished harder than most characters in the game, because of his slow to come out slow to end, easily cced, and weak hitting moves. He's a big character with a terrible combo weight, a terrible second jump for escaping combos, a sup par recovery that is brain dead to gimp, poor options off the ledge, Terrible OOS options, Poor movement in the air or on the ground...

Lets get into his grab. It's frame 11, like most tethers... Which is fine, but heres why it's not fine.
Besides the fact that he moves his only small grab bubble away from the enemy (which no other character does) as seen here It's also on Link, and is one of his very few kill setups. Toon link may have the same grab save a bit of range and the weird pushback link goes into, but it is on a MUCH better character with faster just about everything, kill conversions off of a plethora of moves and setups, stronger kill options, better projectiles that cover more area and convert into whatever, and much better, faster movement. Therefore his grab is not nearly as detrimental. Same with lucas and same with samus (who's grab may be slower but who's entire grab grabs out of the air. Thats not counting her movement, her projectiles, her invincible 5 frame oos option ect) I don't even want to get into ivy with her full range on frame 11 and very little cooldown grab. This would be easy to fix... Just make the larger grab bubble on his hand have a state 3 (air and ground grab) and get rid of the tiny one. Then adjust the animation to not pull back.



My point with all of this, is that you can't look at the attributes of this character and tell me he is alright. I mean just look at toon link who has a similar game plan, but is so much better at it than Link. Look at this **** and tell me that he is alright in a game with fox, Marth, Shiek, Ike, Toonlink, Rob ect ect ect. Once your opponent knows the crap attributes of Links moves you end up running away and using like 10 of his moves because the others are so situational, highly committal or just bad and not worth using.

This character can be fixed pretty easily. Without making him dumb. Small changes go a very long way in fixing his huge weaknesses.

 

[EmptySky00]

I think samus has a worse grab by a lot. I'll respond with more depth once I get an actual computer I guess.

 

[Mr.Pickle]

Damn duder finally layin down the knowledge, when you look at all that in one post it's kinda disgusting.

When you get a chance empty I'd like to hear your opinion on it, though honestly I don't see how it could be worse. It being slower is the only thing I could think of that would make it worse, but it grabs out of the air and it's grab boxes aren't garbo or have weird animation nonsense to them.

 

[EmptySky00]

It's actually THE slowest ftilt in the game if you want to hit someone in front of you. It's tied with Warios ftilt at frame 14, but the hitbubble isn't in front of link until frame 16 making it the slowest.

He has setups for his moves, they are mostly just his slow boomerang (which is easily DIed or swatted away) His weak hit nair, which again is very DIable and CCable, and his god awful grab (i will get in to the move further down.)

Fair can be used off stage, but it can only be used past a certain level above the ledge or you die. Same with uair and Dair. So that leaves bair and nair, which both hit like wet noodles compared to just about any other characters ability to ko people offstage. When you hit opponents recovering with projectiles, most of the cast has a hitbox around them so they get swatted away which does nothing.

Up-b is powerfull, if it didn't have a sakurai angle, use up your bomb jump, lose all its hitbubbles on shield, and have ridiculous endlag. It's frame 8 for reference, frame 11 on the back hit.

Nair, is a good move, but lost a lot of it's utility from melee. This move used to not cancel it's hitbubbles until the entire animation was over. Which is goofy looking. I don't understand why this move is still considered so good by so many. Here's a fun fact about a nair most people don't make a big deal about.

Links nair: Frame 4 hitbubble, on the latter frames he starts to pull his legs back to neutral position, giving him less than full range, hitboxes terminate on frame 30.
Foot hitbubble: 12
body hitbubble: 10
knee hitbubble: 9
Late hit nair: 7

Shiek's nair: Frame 3 hitbubble, No movement of the legs, meaning full hitbubble range throughout the duration, Hitbubbles terminate frame 30.
All hitbubbles: 14
Late hitbubbles: 9

Links was only considered amazing because the hitbubbles never terminated in melee. Now its just a regular nair with less damage than most in the game, on a character with mediocre air movement, no fast moves to cover an unsafe lcancel, and an abysmal second jump. An amazing move for Link doesn't mean an amazing move.

Usmash, is a poor kill option, with very easily sdied hits, weak kill power, and wonky hitbubbles that miss some characters.
The first two hits can be CCed until 999%. Adding to this, every character in the game can CC the first, and\or second hit, and shield grab on the second or third hit.

Bair first hit does nothing now because it has 0 base kb. Unlike melee where the first hit was actually quite usefull. Again can cc it until 999%

Dair is tied for highest landing lag in the game with bowsers dair (which has huge landing hitbubbles. Is disgustingly punishable on shield hit or bounce, has very little range for an aerial, and to top it off doesn't kill as well as a lot of smashes in the game. Also Link's jump heights make it impossible to follow up on most of the cast at relevant percents. Unless you use his terrible grab (which again I will get to)

Every kill option Link has is marred by huge commitment, Fair has lasts forever, is frame 13 and can't be jumped out of on stage. While also having very limited use offstage. Dair is tied for most landing lag in the game. Ftilt is the slowest in the game, and doesn't have much kill power to speak of, while having very long endlag. Up-b has some of the most endlag in the game, loses it's hitbubbles on shield, and neuters your recovery while not even being that fast oos, or having great kill power because of the angle. Fsmash is frame 14, without much kill power. Dsmash has to hit inside of Link, and doesn't kill until the 120s-130s. Uair is alright if link could actually jump up to where the opponent is (it has huge commitment as well.)

Link's mobility, while buffed is still some of the worst in the game. His second jump is garbage for recovery, or trying to chase faster characters that are timing you out on any stage with a top platform Link can't get too.

His projectiles are all quite slow, with terrible hitbubbles. His rang comes out melee speed (huge commitment) with 11% strong hit instead of 16 like melee (gets beat out much more easily), it comes out too high and misses some small, running or ducking characters. His arrows are completely worthless unchanged, netting him nothing but 5 percents and the possibility of getting ****ed up for hitting his opponent with them. So basically very niche use.(compare to diddys pop gun or toonlinks arrows, it's gross) His bombs are smaller than melee in size, have worse combo potential, and are generally the worst bomb projectile in the game. (compare to snakes nades or toonlinks huge *** bombs)View attachment 63625

His OOs options are the worst in the game. Terrible shield grab, 8 frame up-b (already went into this move) bad wavedash. His best option is his 4 frame nair, which just about any character has. When your movement speed, you jump squat and height, your projectiles, your grab, and your attacks are all some of the slowest\worst in the game, it's not hard to see how big a bad oos game is for this character.

His recovery is not alright. Besides the bomb jumping problems (that no other character has to deal with) His up-b is one of the slowest rising, weakest hitting, and most easily beaten out up-bs in the game. Because of the many many frames he has hitbubbles behind him and is completely missing them, you can just run out and hit him like it's not even a move. All hits before the last one are CC able, easily sdiable, and do nothing when someone trades with you, which is certain death because, That one weak hit you got stales your up-b which ****s your bomb jump.
Besides his up-b we also have his tether which is a terrible option if your opponent knows how to beat them. So all in all you end up with a recovery that is either slightly better or slighly better or slightly worse than melee.

He has zero fast moves. His fastest being frame 6 (frame 7 actually where it can hit) on Jab one, dash attack and dsmash. Dsmash and Dash attack have huge commitment, and Jab one is very one of the slowest jabs in the game, besides being shield grabable, before the second hit can come out and very CCable. For a character that wants to keep you out of his space he sure as hell isn't made to do that.

He gets punished harder than most characters in the game, because of his slow to come out slow to end, easily cced, and weak hitting moves. He's a big character with a terrible combo weight, a terrible second jump for escaping combos, a sup par recovery that is brain dead to gimp, poor options off the ledge, Terrible OOS options, Poor movement in the air or on the ground...

Lets get into his grab. It's frame 11, like most tethers... Which is fine, but heres why it's not fine.
Besides the fact that he moves his only small grab bubble away from the enemy (which no other character does) as seen here View attachment 63630 It's also on Link, and is one of his very few kill setups. Toon link may have the same grab save a bit of range and the weird pushback link goes into, but it is on a MUCH better character with faster just about everything, kill conversions off of a plethora of moves and setups, stronger kill options, better projectiles that cover more area and convert into whatever, and much better, faster movement. Therefore his grab is not nearly as detrimental. Same with lucas and same with samus (who's grab may be slower but who's entire grab grabs out of the air. Thats not counting her movement, her projectiles, her invincible 5 frame oos option ect) I don't even want to get into ivy with her full range on frame 11 and very little cooldown grab. This would be easy to fix... Just make the larger grab bubble on his hand have a state 3 (air and ground grab) and get rid of the tiny one. Then adjust the animation to not pull back.



My point with all of this, is that you can't look at the attributes of this character and tell me he is alright. I mean just look at toon link who has a similar game plan, but is so much better at it than Link. Look at this **** and tell me that he is alright in a game with fox, Marth, Shiek, Ike, Toonlink, Rob ect ect ect. Once your opponent knows the crap attributes of Links moves you end up running away and using like 10 of his moves because the others are so situational, highly committal or just bad and not worth using.

This character can be fixed pretty easily. Without making him dumb. Small changes go a very long way in fixing his huge weaknesses.

Link doesn't have many good ways to force a kill, yes. But he has the means to encourage the opponent to make mistakes. He doesn't have the highest lethality with his setups and whatever. He can't just go in and kill. But that's not really what the character is designed to do. Other characters of similar speed who have higher kill potential also lack projectile games, and that's what Link is designed around. And while his projectile game is certainly not infallible, it's not bad either and it gives him the potential to hold stage position and net kills through that.

The point about edgeguarding threw me off. There's no reason why you should be using Fair or Dair or Uair offstage. There are a lot of characters that can't just plunge into the abyss and throw out whatever aerials they please for an edgeguard. It doesn't make them bad. Nair and Bair may not outright kill, but they still hit the opponent a sufficient distance where regrabbing ledge will most likely nullify their ability to recover.

Up-B shouldn't use up your bomb jump, I think that's a problem that has yet to be addressed. It's a high-commitment kill move, if you land it then the endlag shouldn't matter. If you miss then you get hit. That's completely fine.

Nair now only cancels the hitboxes 4 frames before the end of the move. All they did was remove the last 4 frames so it didn't look as silly.

I too found it annoying how they made the damage dependant on where you hit it. It felt like an unnecessary complication of utility. But you also have to consider that these moves are used for different things and are on a different set of physics. Sheik also has a much higher short hop, and much lower air speed. Comparing it in a vacuum doesn't really give any insight into the move itself being lackluster. I do think that it should probably do more damage in line with the rest of the cast and that it was changed in 3.5 just because they wanted to beat the character down, but he certainly doesn't need it to be functional.

Not every move needs to be a kill option. Assuming Usmash is made to function properly, the move is absolutely fine as is.

I don't know how to respond to bair. The move links properly now like it should have from the beginning. You're trying to force a use on the move that it simply doesn't have and probably wasn't that good in the first place.

Fair is very low commitment outside of its startup. It's +1 on shield, and if you're spaced properly you can cover the grab option with jab. It also doesn't have the be a usable move offstage as I mentioned before.
Dair also kills at like 90 on reasonably weighted characters and is a great combo ender. If you miss with it you can be punished. That's just an aspect of the move.


And at this point I realize that I just can't respond to every single point you've made because I just don't agree with a lot of them in such a simple way that responding directly yields no depth. I just have an overall idea of what I want to say about it.

I don't think it's necessary to go into this character's tool kit and say that everything should be buffed because it can't do everything. When playing a character you have to know and accept the limitations that a move has. No, you shouldn't be able to go offstage with Dairs and Uairs and deep Fairs and live. Does that make those moves bad? Hell no. Uair is ****ing amazing and Fair is great. Up-B should be punishable. And so on. Yes, the character gets punished hard. Does that mean we have to give him Luigi's combo weight? No. Not at all. I'm not in favor of just splashing in buffs ad nausiam, being ill-content with every single move until it's buffed to stupidity. The character definitely has limitations and I don't think he's near the top of the cast, but the limitations are fine. Really all I want in this character is for him to be functional, and we 99% have that. If he gets buffs at all from this point they should be minor. Having a faster ground option would be nice but isn't absolutely necessary. If you just directly compare every single move a character has to some other characters' moves, you can end up making a character look extremely ****ty even if that's the case. The game isn't homogenized to a point where that's a viable method of comparison. Some moves are naturally going to do certain things better than others and that's fine.

The character has a lot of moves with very good properties such as Uair that you can't just downplay. You can focus on all of the limitations of his moveset and make him seem like he's submerged in the swamp of nonviability, or you can focus on what he actually has and realize that you can take those tools moderately far.

Damn duder finally layin down the knowledge, when you look at all that in one post it's kinda disgusting.

When you get a chance empty I'd like to hear your opinion on it, though honestly I don't see how it could be worse. It being slower is the only thing I could think of that would make it worse, but it grabs out of the air and it's grab boxes aren't garbo or have weird animation nonsense to them.

I think Link's grab is infinitely better than Samus's because it actually does something on hit. You get absolutely nothing for grabbing with Samus which immediately nullifies it as an option. With Link if you land a grab you have a plethora of punishment options. Being frame 17 or whatever is also absolutely terrible for a grab. Especially with no conversions? Even if Samus had a normal grab I think it would be mediocre based on how little it does let alone a massive commitment 17 frame startup grab.


Just saying if you throw buffs around onto everything you end up with 3.02 Mario.

 

[Beorn]

I obviously would never intend to buff everything on this character. I am of the opinion that 3.02 Link was disgusting, and I still believe 3.6 Mario is. I think 3.5 is the best thing to happen to PM and would nerf the jank out of every character in this game if I had the power to. Every character still has at least 1 move or attribute that is janky in 3.6b. I believe they should all be made less so, and that the lower characters, such as Bowser, Link and Dk should be buffed to fit in with the large pool of mid tier characters in this game.

I was trying to convey that the majority of this character is not good. He has far more weaknesses than strengths, relative to the rest of the cast. I don't need to compare moves in a vacuum. Saying his endlag on dair is tied for worst in the game and that most characters have more potent, faster and stronger aerials with none of the drawbacks is a true statement. Same with the fact that his ftilt has the most startup lag of any ftilt in the game while not even being powerful. I can go on to say that literally every other character in the entire roster can use a strong move low offstage, kill the opponent, and recover. Every single other character, but Link. These are facts. It takes no effort to make this character look ****ty, it's quite apparent in his frame data.

I don't want this character to be amazing. I want him to not be so clearly bottom 5. I feel that he is bottom 5. He has only ever been good in one smash game and that was 3.02. I don't want to hear how his uair is an excellent move, or that his projectiles are good, or that his dair is a reasonable move, with a fair risk, reward payout. Every one of these things are on a better character right next to him. They are all better and not just by a little. This is not about toonlink, but he is a great example of Links character archetype, but not bad.

Nair wouldn't look silly if you had the animation keep his leg out longer exactly like Shieks until frame 30, then keep the hitbubbles on the 4 frames of animation where he is pulling his leg in (where they are currently) basically add 4 frames of full leg extension. Full melee utility without looking goofy. Now Link has an amazing move that wasn't too good in melee, brings back some techniques from melee Link that you can't currently do, and that no other character has. This would make melee vets, and PM players alike happy.

That's the problem. Usmash doesn't function properly, kill move or not. I would increase first hit base knockback to A (10) from 0. Still CCable for a long time, but if you don't CC the first hit you can't shield the second and get hit. Homogenize last hit bubbles to 17%, from 16-17. Decent reliable kill power that makes up for the fact that the Sdi multiplier makes sense now.

Fair is not +1 on shield anymore. That was 3.02 when the move did 15% and perfect timing.

I wouldn't say getting 14% and very low percent grabs is working as intended. This move had more utility in melee. The damage is not really that important, Link isn't hurting in the damage dealing department. He's hurting in the fast\safe kill setups department. Raising the Base of the move and giving it slight growth, will still allow it to get the full 14% and grab followups at early, mid, and high percents, but at higher percents it will combo into kill moves and still set up for grabs on the first hit, if it's not CCed or shielded.

No, toonlink, Mario, Wolf, Fox, Rob, pit ect.. are all characters with similar speeds (faster) that do have projectile games that are great and or better than Links, that can also force mistakes (play smash well) and yes they also have more potent kill moves and setups while also all having better movement and arguably better recoverys.

A good grab has nothing to do with good throws. Samus'es grab is not frame 17. It's frame 14, standing, and frame 17 dashing. Which you can just JC. It also has 11 frames of lasting hitbubbles as opposed to Link's 9. Samus has more consistent ways to lock down opponents, cut off options, and space out other characters. While also having a much better CC, much better DD, Much better WD, faster moves, multiple killing projectiles, better OOS options that rely less on grab, and a stronger CC breaking game all while not even needing the grab to set up her very strong KO and gimp options. As mentioned it also grabs out of the air. These attributes all make her actual grab better than Links. I would trade all of Links throws to have some of the options that she has to get combos and kill confirms while also being able to grab characters that jump in front of your face.

Whether or not it is better than Samus'es is honestly irrelevant. There are forty one characters in this game currently. Four of them could be considered for having the worst grab in the game (ivy and olimars are good\great) That means bottom four at best. Which is still bottom tier grab, combined with all of his other weaknesses, and with no distinct powerful strengths of his own, other than being able to put on % quickly with his short combos at lower percents. This is a huge detriment in Left, Right, Z bros the game.

Link is clearly outclassed and in a game striving for balance like PM, 99% functional is not the clearly stated goal of the development team. I will not just sit back and have Link be bad in another smash game, nor the janky mess that was 3.02. This character is not hard to fix, but people need to be educated about his frame data, and stats, because I hear more misinformation about this character from players than any other in the game.

Small buffs to make moves work as intend, and make him fit his character archetype. A slow, heavy, mid range zoner, with powerful, highly committal kill moves, a mediocre but flexible recovery, a 50\50 mix of close range and projectiles .

This was not mean't to be sarcastic, or a call out to you in anyway personally. I'm just trying to prove a point.

 

[EmptySky00]

Fair is still +1. The formula says so. The damage decrease didn't change it. I'm fine with minor buffs but you definitely have to hand them out cautiously. No point in working to make him better just so he has to get slammed down again. I mostly just want a couple moves to work better then I'm content. Anything beyond that is extra to me.

I'll try to respond more eventually.

 

[JesteRace]

The only time Link feels like a bad character is against spacies. And I don't know how that can be fixed without making Link ******** again.

 

[TheBigChew]

The only time Link feels like a bad character is against spacies. And I don't know how that can be fixed without making Link ******** again.

To be honest I don't find link v fox to be that bad. Wolf and the feather *** on the other hand -_-

 

[JesteRace]

Yeah, Falco is impossible. I thought Fox and Wolf were fine until I faced good ones, but they're doable on the right stage at least.

 

[PeanutReaper486]

Guys, is this actually a thing?

http://gfycat.com/MixedFewBorzoi

I was watching VSGC's PM sponsorship tourney, and Red1 literally chaingrabbed MrLz's G&W to about 40%.

I looks like G&W can DI out after some percent, but if Link starts pivot grabbing he can still catch 'em.

 

[Wolf_]

Wow, a lot of thought and research was put into the last couple of messages, I agree after reading all of it

 

[Beorn]

That chain grab is a thing on a few characters, it's honestly not worth the risk of missing though. Also Links dthrow does 7% not really anything to write home about.

Were you referring to empty and I @ Wolf_ or the thing about spacies being hard.

 

[Thor]

That chain grab is a thing on a few characters, it's honestly not worth the risk of missing though. Also Links dthrow does 7% not really anything to write home about.

Were you referring to empty and I @ Wolf_ or the thing about spacies being hard.

We can apparently zero-death GnW off a single grab via the CG. Advantage at 0 on dthrow is 12 and advantage goes up as percent rises so that dthrow CG could win you the game vs a GnW when your back is to the wall. Not sure if he can DI high enough to avoid it and up+B out with his frame 3 up+b, but apparently he can't.

Percents where it is effective varies but on Ganondorf I've heard it goes from something like 70% to death, which is DEFINITELY worth the risk. I myself tried it on a Squirtle in friendlies and it was quite easy. I am planning to start working to implement into my game, because it turns one grab from like 13% [pummels] and maybe a spin attack that might kill to freaking 30% and a spin attack or dair that WILL kill. I believe it works on a majority of the cast, percent-dependent of course.

Also zair was ignored when discussing KO options. I don't think it's enough of a fix to make his options great or whatever, but it pops people directly up for a dash attack or DACUS or at least a bomb pull or uair attempt, and if they DON'T DI it correctly... free uair fair or dair depending on how their DI is and what their percentage is.

You had quite a big knowledge drop... to be honest, if they could tweak only one thing at this point before 3.6 is out properly [and not the beta], I'd take my Melee nair back in its entirety. Even though it would be weaker and hence less safe, I want the hitboxes that exist post IASA frames back. I also think it would be fully reasonable to put those hitboxes back without nerfing any part of nair, but if they had to do that, I'd still be happy with it.

Also I want uair's landing lag to go from 28 to 25 so that L-cancelled landing lag goes from 14 to 12 - this would make it -3 [at best] on shield instead of -5 [which is frankly terrible anyway, and only applies to the strongest hit].

 

[Wolf_]

Were you referring to empty and I @ Wolf_ or the thing about spacies being hard.

Empty and you, you guys did a lot of research holy crap haha, I find spacies easy, but I think I'm just the oddball there, although Falco's more of a pain now that boomerang is slow again, but it's not impossible

 

[Beorn]

Empty and you, you guys did a lot of research holy crap haha, I find spacies easy, but I think I'm just the oddball there, although Falco's more of a pain now that boomerang is slow again, but it's not impossible

Lol, yeah, I agree. Spacies are not my main concern. I do much better against good spacies than say, Wario, or Captain falcon. That **** is ridiculous.

 

[JesteRace]

Idk, I guess I got kinda shaken on Fox after facing Rfrizz (prominent player in my region), cause I thought it was fine before that. Wolf I've yet to have trouble with, but I swear if Falco isn't Link's worst matchup, he's only second to Sheik. Then again, I don't have years of experience in those matchups from Melee lol

 

[EmptySky00]

I obviously would never intend to buff everything on this character. I am of the opinion that 3.02 Link was disgusting, and I still believe 3.6 Mario is. I think 3.5 is the best thing to happen to PM and would nerf the jank out of every character in this game if I had the power to. Every character still has at least 1 move or attribute that is janky in 3.6b. I believe they should all be made less so, and that the lower characters, such as Bowser, Link and Dk should be buffed to fit in with the large pool of mid tier characters in this game.

I was trying to convey that the majority of this character is not good. He has far more weaknesses than strengths, relative to the rest of the cast. I don't need to compare moves in a vacuum. Saying his endlag on dair is tied for worst in the game and that most characters have more potent, faster and stronger aerials with none of the drawbacks is a true statement. Same with the fact that his ftilt has the most startup lag of any ftilt in the game while not even being powerful. I can go on to say that literally every other character in the entire roster can use a strong move low offstage, kill the opponent, and recover. Every single other character, but Link. These are facts. It takes no effort to make this character look ****ty, it's quite apparent in his frame data.

I don't want this character to be amazing. I want him to not be so clearly bottom 5. I feel that he is bottom 5. He has only ever been good in one smash game and that was 3.02. I don't want to hear how his uair is an excellent move, or that his projectiles are good, or that his dair is a reasonable move, with a fair risk, reward payout. Every one of these things are on a better character right next to him. They are all better and not just by a little. This is not about toonlink, but he is a great example of Links character archetype, but not bad.

Nair wouldn't look silly if you had the animation keep his leg out longer exactly like Shieks until frame 30, then keep the hitbubbles on the 4 frames of animation where he is pulling his leg in (where they are currently) basically add 4 frames of full leg extension. Full melee utility without looking goofy. Now Link has an amazing move that wasn't too good in melee, brings back some techniques from melee Link that you can't currently do, and that no other character has. This would make melee vets, and PM players alike happy.

That's the problem. Usmash doesn't function properly, kill move or not. I would increase first hit base knockback to A (10) from 0. Still CCable for a long time, but if you don't CC the first hit you can't shield the second and get hit. Homogenize last hit bubbles to 17%, from 16-17. Decent reliable kill power that makes up for the fact that the Sdi multiplier makes sense now.

Fair is not +1 on shield anymore. That was 3.02 when the move did 15% and perfect timing.

I wouldn't say getting 14% and very low percent grabs is working as intended. This move had more utility in melee. The damage is not really that important, Link isn't hurting in the damage dealing department. He's hurting in the fast\safe kill setups department. Raising the Base of the move and giving it slight growth, will still allow it to get the full 14% and grab followups at early, mid, and high percents, but at higher percents it will combo into kill moves and still set up for grabs on the first hit, if it's not CCed or shielded.

No, toonlink, Mario, Wolf, Fox, Rob, pit ect.. are all characters with similar speeds (faster) that do have projectile games that are great and or better than Links, that can also force mistakes (play smash well) and yes they also have more potent kill moves and setups while also all having better movement and arguably better recoverys.

A good grab has nothing to do with good throws. Samus'es grab is not frame 17. It's frame 14, standing, and frame 17 dashing. Which you can just JC. It also has 11 frames of lasting hitbubbles as opposed to Link's 9. Samus has more consistent ways to lock down opponents, cut off options, and space out other characters. While also having a much better CC, much better DD, Much better WD, faster moves, multiple killing projectiles, better OOS options that rely less on grab, and a stronger CC breaking game all while not even needing the grab to set up her very strong KO and gimp options. As mentioned it also grabs out of the air. These attributes all make her actual grab better than Links. I would trade all of Links throws to have some of the options that she has to get combos and kill confirms while also being able to grab characters that jump in front of your face.

Whether or not it is better than Samus'es is honestly irrelevant. There are forty one characters in this game currently. Four of them could be considered for having the worst grab in the game (ivy and olimars are good\great) That means bottom four at best. Which is still bottom tier grab, combined with all of his other weaknesses, and with no distinct powerful strengths of his own, other than being able to put on % quickly with his short combos at lower percents. This is a huge detriment in Left, Right, Z bros the game.

Link is clearly outclassed and in a game striving for balance like PM, 99% functional is not the clearly stated goal of the development team. I will not just sit back and have Link be bad in another smash game, nor the janky mess that was 3.02. This character is not hard to fix, but people need to be educated about his frame data, and stats, because I hear more misinformation about this character from players than any other in the game.

Small buffs to make moves work as intend, and make him fit his character archetype. A slow, heavy, mid range zoner, with powerful, highly committal kill moves, a mediocre but flexible recovery, a 50\50 mix of close range and projectiles .

This was not mean't to be sarcastic, or a call out to you in anyway personally. I'm just trying to prove a point.

HAHAHAHAHA I typed out an entire ****ing response and Smashboards crashed 4 times while I was doing it. I pasted half of it on here then finished the last few sentences then Smashboards crashed again.


I'm ****ing done.
Here's my last sentence though ;DDDDDDDDDDD

Edit: I just retyped it. It's shorter and I left some stuff out that I don't particularly care to respond to but I recovered the point.

If you remove every unique or "Jank" aspect of all of the characters then you just end up with a boring pile of mediocre characters. I think aiming for mid tier is too low and we should instead be aiming for around Ike's power level. If you centralize the entire cast around a medium or low power level, it makes the game more MU-centric because Matchups are determined by how well your limited set of tools align with the other character and thus takes skill out of the interaction because you have less to negotiate bad MUs. Again, it's also far less interesting. We obviously don't want a game full of Foxes, but I think characters should still be strong to a reasonable degree. I think if you still believe Mario is stupid then your standard for too good is a little bit low. I think Mario is just fine. Just an opinion.

But in trying to convey that Link's not good you just cited obvious things that the character's moves can't do that they aren't designed to do. The end lag on Dair doesn't matter because you're almost always converting into it, where the end lag will be irrelevant provided you don't miss. And it still obliterates people at 100. And I don't know why you're so on Ftilt. To be blunt, the move is worthless. Not because it doesn't have its niche uses, but because it's not a necessary or important part of Link's tool kit. If the move was removed from his moveset, I wouldn't even consider it a nerf because it's not important. If it was made faster, I wouldn't really consider it a buff because it's not important. And you're greatly exaggerating about every other character being able to go deep with strong moves. I can list a ton of good characters that can't go super deep with heavy hitting moves like Marth and Roy, but it's not even necessary since going YOLO offstage with a heavy hitting move isn't even what entails good edgeguarding, hence Marth. It just seems like an arbitrary standard that you've created. And frames aren't everything. There are more aspects to moves than just when their hitboxes are active. If you showed me Ike's frame data and I had no other information, I could reasonably assume he isn't that good, but that's not the case. Frame data is important, but it isn't all there is to be explored.
And you're just going to nullify everything I say on the basis that Toon Link is in the game. Well I'm not here to debate Toon Link and I don't really care about his existence. Link's Uair is still amazing, regardless of whether or not TL's is as well. Link's projectiles are still solid, regardless of TL.

I don't think 4 extra frames on his Nair is going to tip the scale of the move into the territory of "amazing."
Yes, make Usmash function properly. Conversely, the PMDT could have not stuck their ***** in the pudding and made the move along with a plethora of other multi hit moves (such as Pit's Usmash) stop working just for some arbitrary bias against SDI modifiers. I personally don't even see the problem with them. Taking them away just introduced fatal counterplay to a lot of multi hit moves and made them worthless against a non-comatose opponent as long as their controller was plugged in. SDI out of multi hit moves is absolutely stupid in a lot of cases. If I hit someone with the absolute center of Usmash, they shouldn't still be falling out. And this happens. Over and over. Someone on here iirc told me that it should still work if I only use it while they're deep in the hitbox. 1. this is a ****ing ******** restriction to have on a move's use, and 2. that's completely false because they can still just shimmy their way out of the attack lol. Ya, I'll take SDI modifiers plz with a side of ketchup.

More apples and oranges. This discussion is just an orchard at this point. Falco has a better projectile than Link therefore why play Link?

Quite the opposite, a good grab has A LOT to do with good throws. Let's take Sheik and take away all of her throws except Uthrow. Suddenly you have a character with a ****ty grab game. The entirety of what makes a grab good is 1. Range. 2. Setups into grab or the ability to land it. 3. Conversions out of grab. 4. Speed, which is nearly standardized.

And by this metric, yes Link's grab isn't good. His range doesn't matter because full range is slow as hell and you're seldom hitting it anyway. It's slow, and he has limited setups into it. Fine, but you can't say having good throws isn't a huge factor in how powerful a grab is.

And here you go comparing apples to oranges again. You're saying her grab is better because she's Samus and it grabs out of the air. You turned it from "Her grab is better" into "She's a better character" which was already understood and was not a part of my statement at all. You're also not grabbing characters that are jumping into your face because by the time you've grabbed them you've already been hit. I don't think it matters as much as you think it does. But the grab still does nothing and is thus garbage, regardless of the character surrounding it. I don't know what you want me to say. And most Samus players default to dash grab because of the lower end lag from my understanding. But what do I know, I just play Link.

I'm fine with minor buffs that make the character better, but him working properly is my priority tbh. I hate when my **** doesn't function. It actually pisses me off.

 

[Deleted member]

can someone post a list of what chars link can CG and what % range on any DI? thanks

 

[EmptySky00]

I could use my dthrow stun chart to figure it out

 

[GarmWyrda]

Ok, 3.6 full release is out !

Unfortunately I can't play right now, can someone tells me if the upSmash is back to what it was during 3.5 ?
There is no longer the SDI modifiers -thing... They just changed the angle on it... I don't know how it will impact it..

Any feedback on this move would be greatly appreciated !

 

[JesteRace]

I really hope upsmash works again. That's such an important move against fast fallers.

 

[EmptySky00]

Never mind. Analyzing. The usmash change should help slightly I think. Tbh they should have just reverted it.

 

[Thor]

They still didn't give back Melee nair. I want Melee nair for 4.0 [if Link only got one change, I would make it to add those frames back to nair to give us Melee nair duration]. I think the usmash change will help slightly, but even if it does nothing, it can still shield pressure people on platforms [situational but relevant to Link's toolkit].

 

[EmptySky00]

It's only 4 frames.
If I had one change it would be to make boomerang hitbox not go over people's heads.

 

[Beorn]

I'm just gonna assume that the complete lack of a grab bubble on the latter part of Links grab was an accident.... I can't download the netplay build to get shots of it, but all Links need to go test this to see if I'm crazy.

 

[Shadic]

@ Beorn The range really isn't worse.. I had the same thought as you at first, but here's a comparison:

(Both pictures taken the last active frame of the grab - 3.6's ends earlier, so it's earlier in the animation)

Also worth noting is that the grab is a bit disjointed in front - meaning that his grab range in the early frames of the animation is actually improved. Also he has two grabboxes on the head for his dash/pivot grab, giving it a bit better coverage.

 

[EmptySky00]

So usmash second hit still Roy zones like crazy.

 

[Beorn]

@ Beorn The range really isn't worse.. I had the same thought as you at first, but here's a comparison:

(Both pictures taken the last active frame of the grab - 3.6's ends earlier, so it's earlier in the animation)

Also worth noting is that the grab is a bit disjointed in front - meaning that his grab range in the early frames of the animation is actually improved. Also he has two grabboxes on the head for his dash/pivot grab, giving it a bit better coverage.

It is still very confusing. The claw stops grabbing before the claw even starts to close. It's also 3 frames less active going from 9 to 7, and very visually confusing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg4aElY1uiI&feature=youtu.be

 

[Wolf_]

I don't understand that, the dev team nerfed Link's melee Nair just to make it match visually, but then they do that to his grab? Isn't that a double standard?

 

[E2xD]

So the active frames at the end were nerfed (therefore no longer matching the animation), but the same grab length is still there. I think this is a rather silly nerf both in Aesthetics and in Design.

 

[JesteRace]

This change in his grab isn't in the changelist. Was it accidental? If so, please fix it because that's stupid. If not, please fix it because that's really f***ing stupid.

 

[TheBigChew]

first Up smash now his grab, just one thing after another, dear god.

 

[Deleted member]

Also worth noting is that the grab is a bit disjointed in front - meaning that his grab range in the early frames of the animation is actually improved. Also he has two grabboxes on the head for his dash/pivot grab, giving it a bit better coverage.

i think just as much, is there any way to fix link's upsmash? i was talking to adam and zach about how link lost a major OOS option and projectile > dacus conversions since upsmash is simply not a reliable tool and good players will simply avoid it. unfortunately, this is problematic for link, who already loses most of his conversions at higher level play (which is why i was interested in increasing his run speed in the first place). i tested it where it was pretty easy to DI out of even from the center hits since theres like a 12 frame window between the hits, and thats not even accounting for side hits which are way more common in real gameplay. disregarding the ethos behind changing SDI modifiers, i dont think links upsmash was problematic even at 0.0 due to the highly situational positioning needed to benefit from it. i dont understand why it had to go straight to 1.0 instead of like 0.5 where the move is still good enough to justify using.

sorry if i derailed the grapple rants.

 

[E2xD]

I decided to go a little bit more in depth in how much further and whatnot 3.6b was in comparison to 3.6 Full:

Furthest Grab 3.6 Full (frame 15):http://prntscr.com/86f2b0

Furthest Grab 3.6 Beta compared (frame 16/15): http://prntscr.com/86f36y

Frame 16: http://prntscr.com/86f45z

Frame 17: http://prntscr.com/86eyhv

Frame 18: http://prntscr.com/86ez37

Frame 19: http://prntscr.com/86ezh8

As you can see the grab range was slightly affected/shortened first and foremost. Next you can see that the next three lingering grabboxes were removed from the previous version. (Here is the [meh quality] video I threw together to view everything side by side: https://youtu.be/kLv5zFBytfQ )

I'm not going to be a Zigludo and write a book on how this is bad game design. I just think this is rather silly the hidden nerf/oversight (whichever one you guys will want to claim) on one of Link's most precious tools. Ill let the pics do the talking.

 

[Shadic]

i think just as much, is there any way to fix link's upsmash?

I tried with the adjustment to the second hit.

I also agree with you, but long story short I don't make all the shots.

 

[Thor]

It's only 4 frames.
If I had one change it would be to make boomerang hitbox not go over people's heads.

Where on earth are you getting the number 4? Melee nair is active frames 4-39 and ends on frame 39, with IASA on frame 36. If I am reading the frame data thread correctly, current nair is active frames 4-31. It's 8 frames back, and those 8 frames are what allow for things like double nair on shield, as well as [if my math is correct] a spaced autocancel nair on shield (if the shieldstun and shieldhitlag numbers carried over from Melee, I believe properly spaced autocancel late nair on sheld is +1). It makes Link's fullhop nair a lot better and also means if you can time when you hit the nair carefully, it's easier to combo out of, since you could do another action literally the next frame if you're perfect [landing AC nair -> DACUS is something he'd potentially have if the nair was actually made into Melee nair].

 

[Deleted member]

I tried with the adjustment to the second hit.

I also agree with you, but long story short I don't make all the shots.

ahh i didnt mean to put the pressure on you specifically. nice to know anyway. i'll try to make a more formal argument for whoever called the shots this particular time.

 

[Beorn]

I have actually tested adding 4 more active frames to the part of the animation where his leg is still out. It still ends with the hitbubble changes the DT made. It allows you to do melee stuff, while only being half of the missing frames. It is pretty ****ing awesome.