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Make Your Move 21: The Moveset Design Contest | Top Fifty Is Up! Next Contest Approaches...

Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,439
MYM21 Moveset Ranking
★★★★★★★★★★
Aurelia Midam by ForwardArrow
Sylvia by JamietheAuraUser
Kamoshida by Smash Daddy
Okumura by MasterWarlord
Rime Marz by UserShadow7989
★★★★★★★★★☆
Ulrich Hetfield by FrozenRoy
Necalli by FrozenRoy
Copy X by FrozenRoy
Himiko Toga by Katapultar
Shinobu by Katapultar
Yui Hirasawa by Katapultar
Percy by Professor Lexicovermis
Scratch by Professor Lexicovermis
Ribbon Witch Velvet by UserShadow7989
Honey Witch Eleanor by UserShadow7989
Kilton by WeirdChillFever
★★★★★★★★☆☆
Roxas by FrozenRoy
Xaldin by FrozenRoy
Lexaeus by FrozenRoy
Toxicroak by FrozenRoy
Paper Witch Mint by UserShadow7989
PlanetMan.EXE by UserShadow7989
Frost Witch Idella by UserShadow7989
Paper Mario by Munomario777
Rex, Pyra, and Mythra by Munomario777
Blados by Smash Daddy
Chalis by Smash Daddy
Golem by Slavic
Aromage Rosemary by Katapultar
Washizu Iwao by MasterWarlord
Mountain by MasterWarlord
Bill Blastette by Professor Lexicovermis
★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Bounty Hunter by KafkaKomedy
Wrecking Ball by Rychu
Black Knight by Bionichute
Omega by The Jim Jims
Hidan by Katapultar
Elpizo by FrozenRoy
Nightmare by Smash Daddy
Misko/Lambda by WeirdChillFever
Girimehkala by MasterWarlord
★★★★★★☆☆☆☆
Kris, Susie, and Ralsei by KafkaKomedy
Baron Von Guu by Professor Lexicovermis
Impa by WeirdChillFever
Astronaut by bubbyboytoo
★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆
King Dedede by Munomario777
Guzma by Katapultar
Cat Battleship by Professor Lexicovermis
Steve by bubbyboytoo
★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆
Merasmus by bubbyboytoo
Rintaro Okabe by Slavic
★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆
Corn Barnacle by Professor Lexicovermis
Link by Munomario777
★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Sora by rat.jpg
Dehaka by GolisoPower
★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Weavile by PeridotGX
 
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GolisoPower

Smash Master
Joined
Sep 17, 2017
Messages
4,315
Temporary as in it lasts for a certain timeframe, it lasts until Kirby loses a stock, or it lasts about as long as an inhaled Copy Ability (aka if Kirby taunts or takes enough damage it goes away)?
Option A. I mean, I’m worried about having the Essence being too OP for Dehaka or Kirby, so I’d say that seems good. About 20 seconds, give or take.
 

Smady

Smash Master
Joined
Apr 29, 2007
Messages
3,306
Location
K Rool Avenue
Hi IQ and sorry about this being so late, same sentiment to all the sets from around when this time. Fark is certainly your best set, revolving around a Counter and Meter mechanic in an elegant, straightforward way. Fark doesn't have many fancy gimmicks, instead just having basic melee for the functional playstyle. This is an interesting change of pace after your sets have gotten downright bizarre in the recent past, but I like this new approach. It emphasizes a sense of balance that felt sorely missing in your old sets. Roy also touched on how this set is the biggest improvement yet in your sets and I have to agree there. Even if the set is pretty "dry" and I have very little to say in terms of substance, it's not got any glaring flaws.

The counter mechanic is a decent concept that isn't utilized all that often, if at all in Make Your Move. I really like the way the windows work to reward players landing the harder version and then feeding into the meter. My primary problem with the set is honestly how underwhelming the meter ends up being. I'm not asking for a web of interactions of buffs to each move per meter, but it's not particularly fun just creating weak projectiles on smash as your reward for precisely landing a counter. It's not like Fark is greatly suited for landing these counters either, he's so lightweight that a foe just charging a smash for a fraction longer and hitting him during counter's end lag likely means he's dead at Jigglypuff's weight. He really needs some bigger rewards for the meter for landing counters, as is he's pretty underpowered.

The set overall is a strong foundation however. The down special super form is good enough, again I felt like it wasn't utilized all that well in the set (maybe if it gave some extra mobility for his aerials or standards and didn't rely on range). I also didn't get a ton of personality out of the set, other than him being kind of annoying in the same way as most Sonic and Sonic-esque characters who are like mosquitoes to other fighters. It's not bad at all and even if it has been a while since posted I hope you have other sets up your sleeve.

Shantae was an interesting set, I didn’t know she had such potential! In all seriousness SCRATCH is a fun experiment that is a surprisingly decent set beneath some quirky mechanics and an entertaining read. The main detriment to the set is it doesn’t try to explain the duplicates mechanic in the up special. They’re all controlled at the same time? What one does the player control? Can’t you just keep using up special and down smash intermittently to recover forever as you delete duplicates and then recover? You could get high enough percent to die in one hit and negate the mechanic, especially when she’s so easy to hit, but it could just as easily seesaw in the other direction too. That’s the one mechanic I thought was a little busted.

It’s surprising then that the rest of the set avoids any huge mistakes because it does try and have a unique trait in every move. I don’t mind the ftilt mechanic, I would’ve liked an icon or asterisk for these claw moves, still a good idea. The smashes had some neat concepts in there if a little half-baked, as said the dsmash + uspec is a little broken, but those were some fun moves. I’m not sure the balance was thought out for stacking status effects, and generally the set is fairly random when it does introduce such mechanics. What status effects does SCRATCH even have to abuse this? Not a ton, and in general the set is definitely quite unfocused. I also second that the 12 frames of lag is a little steep. The overall idea is good but the set has a lot of unpolished areas.

Overall however I still really enjoyed reading the set for one obvious reason, the writing style is incredibly funny. There’s a distinct sense of humour in this set that is rare to come by in MYM, it’s a very dry and somewhat insulting humour, that when directed at basically a random character like Shantae is really amusing to read. It’s shocking how well you keep up the joke without it getting old or it getting in the way of the moveset. In the same vein the set is very, very experimental and definitely has a few sketchy parts to its balance, but manages to toe the line in not being absolutely broken. As is, the main thing keeping SCRATCH balanced is tripling her own potential to take damage on up special, or it would be stupidly broken. I would’ve preferred if the set had polished its balance in a few key areas, but I can’t deny I had a ton of fun reading it and I’m glad it exists.

Post-edits edit: The new SCRATCH is easily my favourite set of yours now you've changed all the worst moves, reworked the clones, gotten rid of some of the clunkier mechanics. The characterization also shines through with the erratic but coldly logical AI of the forks. I really like the new nair animation and the set is generally about 10x slicker, more cohesive and feels less experimental, while keeping what I liked about the experimental elements! A massive improvement Lex, great job.

Hi once again bubbyboytoo bubbyboytoo this is your third set, and second set for an astronaut. Colobot Astronaut is easily your most ambitious set trying to bring in these mechs that help him and dips a little into deeper playstyle, the two smashes sharing similar animations at first, as well as trying to give a clearer playstyle summary. I’d say this was a success overall and a step above what you did in both Blupi and Jeb. I like again that you manage to create an intriguing character out of these disparate elements, a character who wants to the same as Jeb dominate stage control in a logical playstyle for an astronaut. The aerials give a wacky personality waving his arms around and planting a flag on dtilt for a nice little bit of flavour. He’s not as goofy as Jeb but neither does he take himself fully seriously and that’s good.

As has been the case in your other two sets the specials are the highlight, I especially like the way the mine can be de-activated and the small, important difference between the neutral and side special vehicles. A big criticism I have however of these vehicles and the one in grab/dsmash is you don’t say how big they are exactly. While I can see the vehicles in the images I still can’t tell how big they’d be in Smash and if they’re really huge that’s a key detail to add. I also felt like despite the interesting differences between neutral and side special, these moves are a little redundant when the big change is if it has a powerful hitbox early or later. I felt that the grab was also strangely under-utilized, look at that impressive bit of machinery. Surely it can have some creative throws.

As in your other sets, I do enjoy the specials and when you let yourself get creative in later moves, for example here in the grab and down tilt. There are however then moves such as the side tilt kick and most of the aerials not having a whole ton going on. I’m not asking for paragraphs here, just for every move to have at least the creativity of something like dtilt while adding to the playstyle. I’m also not against the astronaut just punching, and the aerials do give the basic necessary details, I’d simply like a little more beyond that to make the set cohesive.

If I was to nitpick I’m not sure I see how a move like fsmash or dsmash can exist and not be horribly laggy. I know you don’t state they are, but look at them reasonably. He drops a cube, shoots it, the vehicle is created, and then the vehicle begins its charge. We’d consider a Warlock Punch to be a very slow start up, when all this has to happen you’d have to assume it’d take ages to get to the part where the hitbox is finally created. This is pretty advanced for someone who just started but I honestly would’ve kept all the vehicles in the specials, perhaps mapped to one or two inputs to avoid the redundancy of shooting at the cubes each time and having more smashes like usmash plus a traditional melee grab game. Not that the wheeled grabber isn’t fun, it is, but it’s again hard to see how this isn’t very slow if it has to be created out of a cube first. Failing that just skipping the cube part somehow would work too.

In the end I did enjoy the set and I’m glad to see another one from you so soon, I don’t think we’ve ever had two astronaut sets in such a short period of time, let alone from the same person. I can sense you trying to improve your style in this one and I really appreciate that, I think you made a few minor errors in the execution and that’s only natural when you’re taking new risks. I hope to see you again try to reach new heights for your sets.

I’m glad I didn’t comment Kilton immediately as you were able to add in the full Spring Hammer mechanic and changed that one throw to make the rock into a bone instead. The former was especially a great change as it helps improve the melee to a respectable level, one of the areas I was less sure on in this set when it has very strong specials and throws. You were concerned about adding too many mechanics but this set does such a great job of meshing them together, it comes together perfectly. The important part of making a set juggle various mechanics is making it all intuitive and here it couldn’t be more intuitive, and I like the complexities for the character too. Just feels right that Kilton would have a multifaceted, eclectic playstyle that mixes all sorts of elements together.

The specials are very impressive overall, in particular the minions on neutral B/Monster Mask are great. There’s not only smart conceptual design going on here, Kilton abusing monsters to fight the foe, it’s also very well balanced and characterized. I enjoy that Kilton can only block attacks from one monster at a time, and then he can just lose his mask anyway (this might be a little too frail) so he’s either limiting his monster usage or playing around his own monsters becoming hostile. There are a lot of very neat little details here like the monsters recognizing he’s a fake if they see him without the mask on. It’s shocking how well it’s written and balanced, a massive step up from previous sets you’ve posted.

The other specials are as good as could be expected. The Wario Bike-esque side special fits well into his collector-ish playstyle, of course you need the mixing special to get the most out of his collector aspect in the first place (maybe those buffs could be a little more specific?) and up b is delightfully quirky. You could obviously have made the up special a bigger concept but as is it’s already far better as a move than I would’ve expected after the other exhaustive moves.

The standards are where you delve into Kilton’s melee and after you expanded on his Spring Hammer it’s hard to criticize much here. All I can really say is dash attack is a little underwhelming when it could be a powerful KO move. I will say here specifically, you have a great writing style just describing Kilton’s basic melee. It’s really easy visualizing all these moves. The smashes I was honestly less sold on as they are largely there to give Kilton traditional KO moves and not be a complete bum reliant on minions. Talking to you, I can’t complain about the Dark Link part, and it does add a little variety, I think I’d have just liked them to be a little more Kilton than Dark Link if possible because this character could have some very funny smashes, even if he’s dressed up as Dark Link.

Surprisingly the set has great throws and this is where it’s at its most impressive post-specials. The bone and bone breaking mechanics are really fun and work really well into his overall playstyle, it’s another great mechanic in this set. It’s kind of amazing how you are able to recognize the importance of grabbing the minion and not fall into some traps we did earlier on in MYM’s life getting too obsessed about it, putting the focus where it’s needed. Finally we get to the aerials and because the set wasn’t good enough it has a strong collection of both mop and hammer moves to expand his melee. You could’ve fallen back on just one or the other or been lazy here, but as this is Kilton that was not going to happen. My only real complaint with the melee is it can feel ever so slightly clinical. Kilton could ever lose his balance, overextend himself, and do a generally weird/funny animation. The set is mostly well characterized in a meta/self aware sort of way rather than directly.

One thing I didn’t mention up to now is the rhyming and that was a very fun addition to the set’s already very nice writing style. It has been a while since a set tried this sort of thing, and while in the past it has been annoying in other sets, here it was always fun to read. As said, the writing in this set is very well done and I appreciate the images you’ve done and have/are in the middle of adding for the masks/UI. There are a few minor balance quibbles I have like Kilton’s mask being too frail or the potions being a little too general. Those aren’t even that bad, this set is simply awesome overall and you should feel very proud of it. Please do keep updating it and thinking about whatever you plan next as I am definitely interested to see where you go next.

Hi Altais, I should get around to reading Revali, it may interest you to hear that a very good Kilton set was posted recently and has Revali rhyming along in the writing style. Who’d have thought? Rex is as always a good read and very easy to understand, you’re one of the most painstaking when it comes to images at this point. I didn’t expect quite so many core moves to be annotated so well. I also do get a strong sense of the kind of playstyle you wanted and the set succeeds at that, a faster, better version of Shulk that has a ton of flash, but also enough rudimentary melee to not get swamped in gimmicks. From a balance point of view, this set is pretty interesting as Kafka pointed out swapping grab speed for a jab and revolving around his Pyra/Mythra charge.

Kafka largely was on point I feel in his comments about the grab game and the specials outside of the first one, so I’ll avoid commenting on that aspect. For me I wasn’t too sure what the overarching purpose was of Pyra and Mythra, and it seems a little under-elaborated how these moves work. Pyra and Mythra take away Rex’s sword as he just stands there waiting for them to finish. It would seem a good idea to establish then that the foe could punish Rex in this down time, or perhaps this could include some extended intangibility? Maybe Rex could have a very limited moveset for this time without his sword, like his grab, similar to Olimar?

I also find it hard to see an overall difference between Pyra and Mythra. I don’t get a sense of their abilities or personalities. For example what the move is based on, Robin’s Thunder tomes are all obviously based on the Thunder tomes and scale in power, for P/M these moves largely don’t have any real consistency or seem like natural evolutions in a line of moves. For example if Pyra focused on the melee side, culminating in her current move, and Mythra specialized in ranged combat leading to hers. It feels muddled now why you’d pick one over the other besides preference, undermining the choice.

What Kafka said about the playstyle rings true too, good and bad. Rex is unique as a short heavyweight who has to rely on his gimmicks to make up for his lacking range, largely the set does a good job picking the right move for the job. I do feel like the dsmash is not fit for the input however given it hits in front and above Rex, not on the other side, it practically would be well suited swapped for fsmash which could have a behind hitbox. That’s small potatoes though. Honestly Rex is a little underpowered given his slow start up and he might be fast, but has poor mobility and recovery too. Ironically I’d say Rex feels more glued down by his own mechanics than Shulk, who can easily swap between Monado Arts on the fly for say a Shield at dire times, or speed to chase a foe. Rex by comparison’s just far slower and feels a little clunky dragging along the Vision, Back Slash and weak recovery.

Overall this set is decent, but it has its flaws. The grab game is definitely the weakest part and I get the sense outside of the main playstyle, which is very unique and well done, you weren’t entirely sure what to do. Still, it’s a very competently made set in most ways and has a lot of good ideas. Great to see another from you Altais, and I’ll be sure to read Revali one of these days.

Alucard is already your fourth set Kafka and I can’t help but grow an understanding of your style/goals. This set was largely made as spur of the moment to represent the game and character in a respectful way. The character easily could be given a complex moveset, but this is a simple moveset that instead revolves around a choice of a healing or recovery-focused faerie minion, an aggressive poking devil or defensive attack speed buffing sword. For what it’s worth, this still is an accurate enough impression of Alucard and his game, it just falls a little short in the set besides that, though it isn’t anything notably bad.

The set generally does the basic interpretation of Alucard, but it has a few moves I wasn’t sure about. The jab and ftilt being the same move is a bit off for me, MegaMan’s ftilt is the same move but it is done when he’s moving, so this could’ve at least justified a small write-up noting the huge difference in functionality. I wasn’t sure about the up tilt summoning a disjointed spirit, Alucard already has some very slow and awkward moves without the up tilt being a spirit that doesn’t cover his front or back. It’s weird too that Alucard spares the clouds of bats for his fthrow, and a fireball for his bthrow, it’s stranger still this fireball is his best KO throw, returning for bair. It’s odd that while much of the set relies on the Crissaegrim he’d start using flashier magic in his throws and bair of all places. I think a large part of this stems from having to devote all smashes to the Sword Familiar, a fun idea on paper but really Alucard has so many fun potential moves on smash it feels like a waste. He could practically fill two or three smash sections.

I was confused at times about the size and statistics of things like Alucard’s wolf form, the bat, the fireball the bat summons, bair fireball and that utilt spirit aren’t explained in detail. Range in general, even the Crissaegrim, is often left unexplained.

For all my complaints it’s not a bad set and mercifully short as a casual read. I just don’t see a ton of playstyle here. When they’re so simple and effectively lock you in to level them up, it’s hard to see Alucard really deviate much from using Devil early to rack damage, switch to Faerie for healing or Sword for KOing (he really has no reason not to unless he needs to heal and the foe is at KO percent), so it becomes a little bottlenecked. I think either these Familiars needed to branch out more, or to have a few more choices available to emphasize their strengths. The set feels a bit too defensively strong too, while being weak offensively. Played well, he would end up feeling Little Mac-ish, which is good and bad, but I don’t think that’s a great result for a playstyle.

In any case, this set was fun enough to read and I’m always glad to see Castlevania sets posted in Make Your Move. It’d just be wrong if we got none when Simon/Richter was just added to Ultimate. I’m pretty excited for what you’ve been working on lately and this was a nice little project to tide me over, keep up the good work Kafka.
 
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bubbyboytoo

Smash Cadet
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Apr 3, 2018
Messages
45
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Canada
NNID
bubbyboytoo
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Also check my retrospective write-up!

--- MAKE YOUR MOVE 21 ---


Placing sets: Jupiter (42nd)

--- MAKE YOUR MOVE 22 ---

Placing sets: Zeraora (42nd), Whisper (45th)

--- MAKE YOUR MOVE 23 ---

Placing sets: Cyclohm (25th), Polterkitty (28th), Robobot Armor (33rd)

--- MAKE YOUR MOVE 24 ---

Placing sets: Calliope Mori (30th), Cookie Scouts (41st), Tainted Forgotten (47th), The Science Team (48th)

--- MAKE YOUR MOVE 25 ---

Placing sets: Tsukumo Sana (26th), Asbestos (44th)

--- MAKE YOUR MOVE 26 ---

Placing sets: Goldenglow (24th)
 
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Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,439


Check out Perfection Incarnate's moveset on Google Docs: [ LINK ]
King Dedede by Munomario

The first question I have regarding this moveset is the text in Courier New. You say they’re “pre-patch” changes the Lord made to his large son, but I’m not sure if you want us to keep them in mind when we read Dedede. I’m just going to treat them as flavor text right now, so that’s how my perception of the moveset will be.

Expending a midair jump to turn around is a neat idea that gives him more options when playing on the stage with aerials. I don’t know how I feel about such a heavy character stopping as quickly as the Blue Blur as it seems contrary to how momentum works in my mind but it’s a nice feature that compliments the dashing ground attacks. On a related note I don’t have a problem with him preforming any ground attack out of a dash because that’s how a juggernaut-style character should play. My last comment on the stats section is that for reference I wish you would have included the number of midair jumps Dedede has because I couldn’t remember when I started reading and had to look it up. You didn’t need to include the rest of his unchanged stats but when you have a mechanic or trait that builds off one of them it would be helpful to include it just as a reminder.

Waddle Dee Toss is a nice move and exactly how I imagine it should function. I especially like the hammer interaction with a Waddle Dee. Inhale is more of the same with quality of life changes from the King’s Smash moveset, like the cancelling of the move into a weak attack, prolonging the input to inhale more foes, and of course the interaction with the Waddle Dees. I thought the star mechanic was a nice touch. I still like the recovery as I feel its signature to Dedede but I would like it more if the landing explosion created stars for Dedede to inhale. Yes, I know you can squish the Waddle Dees rather morbidly to create them. I also think Leap Shortening is a good technique, it’s quite cool that you’d think to write that in here. I could see how the King has a nice stage counterpicking meta with this in mind.

Jet Hammer alters his stats exactly how I imagined it would. This is a sweet move and works incredibly well with his playstyle and is what I look for in a synergistic move. The damage build up follows along the logic of the move itself too, and altering his non-hammer moves into hammer moves is a great if unexpected function. It makes sense considering Dedede’s motives are usually greed rather than malice, so players will want to act greedily and build up as much charge as they can even when the smart thing to do would be to shield. The next part of the move is where I have a major question. You wrote that special moves don’t use his hammer, so B is mapped to hammer throw. Does this mean every special is now a hammer throw, or just the Down Special? How does Dedede recover with a hammer charge active? If he could throw it then use his recovery as it flies back to him that would be pretty neat. I do like the fact you can toss it to Waddle Dees but I do wonder the personality implications of the King entrusting his mallet to disposable mooks who he regularly crushes, bludgeons, and yeets at the foe.

Moving on to the standards, I wouldn’t consider a jab that does very little knockback as a “get off me” tool as the foe is still right there in your face unless you’re using it to interrupt a combo. Even so, jointed hitboxes typically don’t have priority over disjointed hitboxes that are usually what combos consist of. Then again, I may just be misunderstanding it from my perspective. I do like the follow-up jab, it follows the logic I’d expect from the move. You mentioned perfect pivoting in the forward tilt and I didn’t actually know what that was so kudos for helping me learn new Smash techniques. I like the Jet Down Tilt but the “spider eggs” comment is completely lost on me as I suspect it’s a reference to a moveset I haven’t read. Just for future posterity, these sorts of comments don’t age well and seem awkward to future readers or the uninitiated so try not to include them. The combo hit at the end is a welcoming touch for combo players.

Reading the up tilt’s animation after not having played a Smash game in so long has me confusing what Dedede’s original move animations were... here I was thinking that his original up smash was him twirling the hammer above him. I digress, I suppose it would be helpful if I pulled up Dedede’s moveset and cross-referenced it but I’m at work and don’t have that liberty. Scratch that, the Smash Wiki has gifs of his moveset with frame data. Neat! Turns out I was thinking of the up aerial. As for the dash attack, the reading metaphorically stopped flat on its face until I realized you wrote it that way for humor rather than it actually not doing anything since it’s the same as his Smash 4 dash. (Fun fact, his dash attack qualifies as one of Hemmingway’s Six Word Stories.) I really like the jet dash but you mention it has ending lag then say multiple times to “cancel it” without telling the reader how to cancel the move.

Now for the smash- oh we’re doing grabs next, okay. I like that Dedede can grab Waddle Dees and can also pummel them to get that star even though you don’t mention it. You should mention it, by the way, if a move has synergy with other moves because I’m sure a few readers missed that interaction! Also, his Star Allies form? I never played that, let’s Google that right quick... aaaaaaand he has big bara tiddies, okay. I am enjoying envisioning Swole Dedede doing these moves but describing the forward throw as a “pole vault” and also describing his feet as “adorable” is, uh, not the choice of words I would use, much less envision. (Seriously, adorable? He doesn’t have gamer girl feet, Muno.) The rest of the throws are pretty bread-and-butter, and I don’t have anything negative to say about them although I’m sure some readers will miss his chain grab down throw.

I enjoyed the smash attacks. It turns out your up smash is what I was thinking the original Dedede’s up smash was before I even got to this move. Weird, huh? Angling the forward smash is really clever and is such a seemingly small but helpful detail that helps with the King’s attack flow. I could say the same thing about Dedede’s turning Down Smash, and you finally referenced the star! As for the aerials, starting with neutr- okay apparently forward air goes first these days, we have a forward input that hits up then you can do it again like a jab to hit down... okay. Pretty useful attack though! I don’t quite understand the “changing states” part though. I think you mean you can jump while doing this combo, but if you land on the ground while doing it, will Dedede do a forward tilt? Can he keep this combo up after a freefall state or an air dodge? They are states, after all. I do like having multiple aerials that hit upwards with a character that’s good in the air. That’s just good design.

Ah, multi-hit down aerials. They are, as you say, quite satisfying. Especially when you hear that rapid “thunk” against a shield. About as satisfying as shooting with an automatic suppressed weapon in an FPS. I think that if I played a lot of Dedede I would be jumping up high in the air and drilling the foe below me. So great job on that. Also, who puts Down Aerial after Forward Aerial then before Neutral Aerial??? Argh, Muno, you’re killing my OCD. So Nair. Dedede inflates and attacks with his WHAT? Please, please don’t use “Dedede” “girth” and “sex” in the same paragraph ever again. All jokes aside, A gut attack is exactly what I’d expect out of the King. I hope that if he gets hit during this move his belly jiggles like a water balloon, or an exercise ball. So, onto the back air, I didn’t know Dedede had toes. Same as Kirby. Their feet just sorta look like pizza dough. Maybe they do? I don’t want to search “Kirby’s toes” in any search engine out of primal fear. It’s good that this move has some small kncokacb though. And finally, the Up Air. The killing move for the big balloon boy. With that neat forward aerial, good air game, hammer charges, and all these Dees flying around, I expect to use this a lot to kill my foes as a Dedede player. Nice job putting it on the right input for the right reasons.

In conclusion, this was a nice read to get me through my shift at work today. You did a good job of putting a logical spin on an existing character with very interesting changes that still make sense. You managed to make a character we’re familiar with still interesting read and the synergy between the moves kept me wanting to read to the end. Everything flows well and nothing stood out to me as egregious. It’s all worded simply enough to understand for the most part but didn’t lack detail. Everything seemed well thought out. So good job Muno, I hope the rest of your sets I’m planning on reading are as quality as this one. From the pieces I’ve seen of them, I am confident they’re actually better.
 

Altais

Smash Champion
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Nov 14, 2007
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Hi Altais, I should get around to reading Revali, it may interest you to hear that a very good Kilton set was posted recently and has Revali rhyming along in the writing style. Who’d have thought? Rex is as always a good read and very easy to understand, you’re one of the most painstaking when it comes to images at this point. I didn’t expect quite so many core moves to be annotated so well. I also do get a strong sense of the kind of playstyle you wanted and the set succeeds at that, a faster, better version of Shulk that has a ton of flash, but also enough rudimentary melee to not get swamped in gimmicks. From a balance point of view, this set is pretty interesting as Kafka pointed out swapping grab speed for a jab and revolving around his Pyra/Mythra charge.

Kafka largely was on point I feel in his comments about the grab game and the specials outside of the first one, so I’ll avoid commenting on that aspect. For me I wasn’t too sure what the overarching purpose was of Pyra and Mythra, and it seems a little under-elaborated how these moves work. Pyra and Mythra take away Rex’s sword as he just stands there waiting for them to finish. It would seem a good idea to establish then that the foe could punish Rex in this down time, or perhaps this could include some extended intangibility? Maybe Rex could have a very limited moveset for this time without his sword, like his grab, similar to Olimar?

I also find it hard to see an overall difference between Pyra and Mythra. I don’t get a sense of their abilities or personalities. For example what the move is based on, Robin’s Thunder tomes are all obviously based on the Thunder tomes and scale in power, for P/M these moves largely don’t have any real consistency or seem like natural evolutions in a line of moves. For example if Pyra focused on the melee side, culminating in her current move, and Mythra specialized in ranged combat leading to hers. It feels muddled now why you’d pick one over the other besides preference, undermining the choice.

What Kafka said about the playstyle rings true too, good and bad. Rex is unique as a short heavyweight who has to rely on his gimmicks to make up for his lacking range, largely the set does a good job picking the right move for the job. I do feel like the dsmash is not fit for the input however given it hits in front and above Rex, not on the other side, it practically would be well suited swapped for fsmash which could have a behind hitbox. That’s small potatoes though. Honestly Rex is a little underpowered given his slow start up and he might be fast, but has poor mobility and recovery too. Ironically I’d say Rex feels more glued down by his own mechanics than Shulk, who can easily swap between Monado Arts on the fly for say a Shield at dire times, or speed to chase a foe. Rex by comparison’s just far slower and feels a little clunky dragging along the Vision, Back Slash and weak recovery.

Overall this set is decent, but it has its flaws. The grab game is definitely the weakest part and I get the sense outside of the main playstyle, which is very unique and well done, you weren’t entirely sure what to do. Still, it’s a very competently made set in most ways and has a lot of good ideas. Great to see another from you Altais, and I’ll be sure to read Revali one of these days.
Yikes, totally didn’t think about that. This kind of move would make Rex pretty vulnerable--and I don’t really like the idea of giving him intangibility. That said, after sleeping on this, I’ve came up with a completely different neutral special that’s a lot less complicated and more efficient than the current one. Like Shulk’s Monado Arts, it has a gimmick that’s useful not only to Rex, but Kirby as well.

Also, now that I’ve re-thought it, Rolling Smash would be better off as Rex’s f-smash, since it is somewhat similar to Ike’s.

I’m definitely going to make a new down-special, since we already have enough generic counter moves. Plus, Foresight isn’t even used during gameplay; only in cutscenes.

As for the grab game, I’ve fixed that as well. It’s a lot more dangerous now, in terms of kill setups--which makes the slow startup all the more rewarding.

Cheers for the input; it has given me many ideas.
 

FrozenRoy

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Calling a Spade a Spade (Blados Smady Smady )

Okay, so first off, something I probably wouldn't go into much but it actually seemed to affect thoughts of move ranges: Blados' sword really doesn't seem that big, especially not bigger than Cloud's sword. I could see an argument for longer, but the sword is more thin than bulky, and Cloud's sword is preeeetty big. Compare Cloud's stupid hunk of metal to Blados in the offical artwork or in the game, I think Cloud's sword is like twice the thickness. I bring this up because some of the ranges in this set felt off to me, particularly Forward Smash (which can be larger than Bowser if down angled), and in general for range Ike's sword (which is more similarly shaped) feels like a more apt comparison. Not necessarily a big deal but it jumped out at me and is something I'm going to bring up.

Blados starts off with some fairly cool mechanics in the way that his portals work, along with his Shadow Shield. I applaud the use of a different direction for portals, especially the use of it as a momentum booster which seems quite beneficial for a character with a stronger melee focus (compared to many more projectile oriented portal sets) while having some insta-teleportation tricls. Shadow Shield is interesting not just with the shield buff, a kind of thing MYM rarely plays with, but an orbitting projectile mechanic which is fairly neat at a base. It also works well with the grenade Side Special which plays pretty well into shield pressure. Personally, I thought the Down Special was a strong move to pair with the Shield Special: Not only is it a pretty cool move on its own with the differentiation of charged vs. non-charged, and a nice interpretation of the animation, but the fact it can serve as a psuedo-dodge is a good idea to pair with buffing his shield, so the opponent can't go too hard on just punishing the shield lest they be punished. A question, though: Why does his Up Special super armor him when teleporting when, AFAIK, you can't hit Zelda etc until they come out of their teleport anyway?

The smashes are...okay. This is kind of a spot where the set lost me for a bit, in part because Up Smash (which I actually like) and Down Smash are worded in a way that made them rather difficult to follow. The way the Up Smash lightning loops precisely in terms of the actual hitbox's path along with the timing and intricacies of the Shadow Shield expansion are dense and kind of confusion. Up Smash at least gives back in being a rather cool move that has some clever applications once understood and works into Shadow Shield as well. Down Smash, though, I wasn't really a fan, the portal interaction feels weak and all of the Shadow Shield shifting feels there to be busywork rather than actually especially relevant to how Blados plays. This is especially true with Blados being able to shift both sides seperately and stuff, given Blados mostly uses his Shadow Shield to supplement a lot of his melee game I find it difficult to imagine him wanting to mess with this a lot and I'm not so sure that changing both sides seperately is all that useful. I feel like the Down Smash potentially could have worked into his game better by cutting down or streamlining these interactions and adding in more work into his melee game. Oh, and Forward Smash is cool but I don't have a lot to explicitly say about it.

Jab and F-Tilt feel like they should be switched, given Jab is the more powerful of the two and forces Blados to move while Jab is weaker and does not: Mega Man's lemons sets precedence for either and this is perhaps minor anyway. The standards, for the most part, are all kill moves with the exception of Forward Tilt, with Up Tilt killing at 100% feeling rather...odd given it actually is not all that laggy from the description and that it kills better than any of his smashes and as much as his laggy Down Tilt (Dash Attack, being slightly stronger than Link's Dash Attack, probably kills earlier). That Jab also feels like it kills rather early given the speed: It kills only 10% later than blados' strongest Smash!

This brings me to some issues I have here, mixing in to the grab game and aerials for a bit: Various moves of Blados suggest portal movements for combos or Back Theow as a combo move (but his options are also limited??), but what the hell does Blados combo with? 4 of his standards are kill moves with one being a weak projectile which is a bit more for use with his projectile mechanic, none of his Smashes work into combos except maybe as a finisher (Down Smash mostly, I guess?) and for aerials he basically has FAir. In general, I'm not sure what Blados' melee playstyle is trying to be aside from "projectile orbit for safety = good": He doesn't seem particularly adept at baiting and punishing, or comboing, and while he has a multitude of kill moves they aren't super heavy killers either, he isn't a grappler with a super strong grab game or anything, I do see where a shield pressure playstyle goes with the grenade and dynamite, but he doesn't feel like he really has the tools to effectively do that (I don't think a single one of his standards is safe on shield, nor do his non-BAirs seem to work well as, say, shorthop play against a shield). And yes, I read the playstyle section, which predominately talks about Blados' trapping capabilities: I, personally, didn't think that he had a ton to offer there (He only has a few true options to work with), but even then backing it up with a strong melee playstyle is key and the melee feels like a strong focus anyway. This is probably the biggest issue I have with the set.

Throw-wise, Forward Throw has a really cool concept actually, but I'm not 100% sold on the execution (though in this case it is more "I feel the overall options could perhaps be better") and the two portal effect seems like its pretty much strictly worse than the one portal ones. Also, this move claims it is "easily Blados' most damaging throw. " of Blados...but it deals 10.5% while his Back Throw deals 12%, Up Throw deals 13% and Down Throw deals 12% if the dynamite goes off. It is literally only more powerful than a Down Throw that doesn't go off. This is probably just an oversight, but come on. The dynamite is good and works well into the grenade's playstyle (tho the animation struck me as kinda cartoonish), Back Throw seems good although I'm not sure how much it starts combos since like the move earlier states he has limited options. Up Throw is mostly good, but I will say the stuff about the impromptu Teleport Rush and its uses felt a bit vague and unclear to me.

Aerials are mostly fine, nothing special but nothing bad and I did enjoy Down Aerial's angling. It really feels like he wishes like he had some kind of poking aerial though, as right now he feels pretty unsafe in general and it would really help out with his shield pressure game. I did also enjoy Forward Aerial and Neutral Aerial, I feel like perhaps Back Aerial should become more of a combo-usable poking tool, even if his FAir would still make this awkward, to perhaps help out with some of these issues to some degree (although this alone wouldn'y solve them overall).

I would say that overall I enjoyed Blados, but this was more for some individual move interactions and a strong core of Specials rather than as strong of a cohesive whole as some of your other sets. The portals and using them with stuff like Jab's movement is fun, the Shield Special offers a rarely seen style of twist on projectile manipulation, and they are integrated smartly with other Specials and projectiles in the set. But when it comes to the overall gameplan he seems lacking, and he additionally has oddities like his standards being so strong and often kind of oversaturating the kill move market (Up Tilt should probably be something aside from a kill move, IMO) and I feel like it could take better advantage of melee tools it has. Enjoyable, but not your best...sadly, I don't have time to read Chalis tonight, but I will say I am pretty interested in it, since another thing I liked about these characters was being a little different (and yet also somewhat close!) to normal fare.
 

Smady

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Thanks for the comment Roy, I mostly agree that Blados was a little too slow and had a few lacking moves for helping his combo game, pushing him into the underpowered side. In compensation I made a bunch of changes, ranging from small to decently large, that should help his combos and in general give more of a cohesiveness to his playstyle. I think after these changes Blados functions better as intended. My problem was mostly overestimating his sheer range (and that was changed anyway) so overdid it trying to keep his speed down.

His sword length is now a little over the length of Ragnell and width of Falchion. The most important change is a new utilt that is his fastest move, this acts as one of his primary combo/juggle moves now. The previous move was a fun concept but it was somewhat redundant with dtilt. This really helps his combo game. The other big change is I added a mechanic to dsmash that lets him create a passive hitbox from attacking his Shadow Shield, greatly improving his combo game and generally buffing his safety.

Outside of those bigger changes, I buffed jab to have super armour during active frames, the fthrow no longer incorrectly states it does the most damage, and I state the fthrow portal options all have very low end lag to enable combos. The bair now does less damage and knockback letting it combo into the other aerials. I also clarified the ftilt relies on stale move queue so is a good deal more useful than lemons. The reason I chose ftilt for that input and not jab is simply because it's more intuitive to angle the shurikens down or up, which I felt was important for combos and to make it a viable combo projectile.

tl;dr
-changed sword to Ike length, Marth width
-fthrow typo about most damage
-fthrow end lag buffed to easily combo
-new utilt that combos and juggles
-jab now has super armour
-bair now combos
-reworked dsmash to benefit melee
-clarified stale move queue in ftilt

Hopefully that helps to improve the parts of the set you thought were a little weak. Given the nature of his Shadow Shield hitboxes and range, I didn't think he needed too many direct combo moves, but it was definitely too much.
 

KafkaKomedy

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Smady Smady I was gonna comment on your Blados set but it seems FR beat me to it and said pretty much what I wanted to say. There are some exceptions though, which I will list.

I love Shield Spec. While normally on their own every move in this set would, all together, be okay, nothing to write home about but fun, Shield Spec makes them all have unique interactions that further Blados' uniquely tanky but also fast playstyle, sort of like a Dodge-Tank in RPGs, which is super cool. All of the specials having these interactions really elevates them and makes them truly great where I was invested even having not played the series (thats a pretty big rarity for me) and the interactions don't stop there, there are also a few minor ones in smashes, grabs, normals, etc. which is really cool and shows you put tons of thought into him. I do have an issue with the readability though, occasional lack of punctuation and huge paragraphs do slightly subtract from my enjoyment of the set, but the core idea is really excellent and certainly something we haven't seen in Smash before (a projectile character with good weight who's _fast_? whew boy) so it gets my thumbsup!
 

Smady

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GolisoPower GolisoPower Dehaka has a strange lack of information when it starts off so well in the statistics listing every single stat so thoroughly, then fails to explain the neutral special. The move ends on a broken sentence and the mechanic really could've been explained in the neutral special too, given that's all self-contained in the move. It doesn't go far enough explaining how the "essence" works. A character-by-character move like this, similar to Kirby's, would make sense to just leave vague. In this case this sounds more statistical, like he gains a floatier fall speed when he absorbs Jigglypuff or Sonic's dash speed. When you're so adept at stats why not list some logical formula for all this? Like for example finding the "best" stat (creating a way the game figures this out) then using an average to give that stat for Dehaka. I would make it an average too, because just gaining Sonic's speed is pretty ridiculous and would look weird even when Dehaka is randomly an extremely fast runner. Sonic's dash speed would just look glitchy on a guy this big, and that's just one example where it'd feel weird. It would help too having a visual indicator like Shulk's Monado Arts telling the players what's going on, even if it's an icon of the foe absorbed or in the HUD somewhere.

The other problem I have is how this move just KOs foes at 100%. I've done similar mechanics, but I used weight to give a fairer percent. On a super heavy like Bowser, this is ridiculously broken, but on a lightweight, it kind of sucks. I'd instead make it work on say, Jigglypuff around 70%, and Bowser around 130% just as a quick example. I also think for a central mechanic like this, forcing you to land a KO grab to use a mechanic means the mechanic might never be used in a competently played match. You could take a small liberty just letting him take the essence without directly killing the foe, just for the sake of balance. Maybe just limit it to a duration and make it permanent if you land the KO version. As is it's very imbalanced and feels unintuitive for a new player trying to play Dehaka.

There was another move I felt should honestly just be changed outright, the down tilt. This is not a good fit for down tilt at all and just feels awkward. You basically stall the match using this move, for 5 seconds. The down special is too powerful too, a 75% movement decrease just going by the speeds on Kurogane Hammer would reduce Sonic's run speed from 3.5 to the slowest in the game, below even Robin, for 15 seconds, and even the attack speed decrease of 25% is a big deal too. If they were both very short durations, or a much lower decrease (especially the movement speed one) it'd work a lot better.

It's hard to fairly analyze the set when all those moves and mechanics are around, not adequately explained or balanced. Once those things are fixed I can properly look at the rest because it's pretty broken at the moment. Sorry to be so negative, the basic concept isn't bad, but it needs a lot of work.

Altais Altais Late to this one too, but finally read Revali. We rarely get an archer set, one of the only ones I can think of is Drow Ranger and I'm not sure that had as much of a focus on the bow and arrows. Revali's main playstyle mechanic is somewhat like Incineroar's Revenge just revealed in Smash Ultimate, a Counter that works against projectiles as well as melee moves. This lets Revali outcamp other long range projectiles. The side special, Wind Dive, is fairly important too besides the reflector interaction as it lets Revali cover ground and get past foes that get in close. The base of the set is one of your strongest as all the specials fulfil an important role, in a very self aware and intelligent approach.

The set doesn’t spare the projectiles as you’d expect out of an archer as all the smashes are dedicated to different ammo for the bow. This is good overall, the one I was least sure on was down smash. It’s just a bit of a challenge to play as a character that hasn’t got a good “get off me” smash, some characters do already have smashes that don’t hit behind them but usually they’re very strong or consistently hit a huge area in front of them to make sure no one can dodge if they’re there. The fsmash and usmash however I thought worked well on those inputs and there’s already plenty of characters who have projectile smashes.

The rest of the set is a surprising mix of Falco’s melee (of course) with Revali’s talons, and in the grab game reminds me somewhat of Robin. As Robin’s uses the Elwind tome and Falco I don’t think I have go over his similarities to Revali, it all feels very logical to use for inspiration. I do feel that Revali is on the underpowered side what with only his bair being a reliable melee KO move, and he doesn’t have a KO throw. When he’s so reliant on projectiles too he might get stone walled by characters that have a reflector or absorber, in spite of his anti-reflector move as that still has to connect to be useful. It surely wouldn’t hurt to have a few more direct KO moves here and there. The throws could’ve had a little more to them as well.

The main issue I have with the set balance wise is some of these moves that deal a very low amount of damage. For example the uair only deals 3% using a wind projectile hitbox, and compares itself to G&W's move. However G&W's uair deals 7%/9% depending on the exact hitbox, and in Smash Ultimate it creates a projectile on top of that. The fair is similarly underpowered dealing only 2% and the gust deals no damage. It'd be okay if he had one or two moves that were very fast and dealt little damage to compensate, like Ness' dtilt that deals 4% or 2%. Moves like uair, fair and ftilt don't seem impressively fast to make up for their tiny damage percents.

Outside of balance complaints this set was simple and effective in my opinion, and one of your stronger sets. I quite liked what Dante turned into and Gunvolt was improved too, but this set really feels like you were conscious of the playstyle all the way through. Besides the throws and a general underpowered balance, and maybe the dsmash, the set doesn’t have too much to complain about. Very nice work here.

Time for some more extremely late and unnecessary feedback on a set I'm sure is still relevant so long after release, BotW Link. I'll get to your far more important moveset, R&P, one of these days I assure you. This set is largely what you'd expect out of BotW Link; breaking the sword for more damage, multiple weapons, and a decent amount of incorporation of other Zelda traditions. These signature attacks can feel a little wonky like the fair lunging slash, just a little wonky mind you, most of the time it was done pretty well like the nair and the shield moves on ftilt and bair feel logical. It helps in the latter case you have a multihit jab, though I think his standards are a bit awkward generally. He has a utilt that I assume has very little if any range in front, a dtilt that hits behind (?) and ftilt obviously is more of a defensive move, not like his jab is making up for all those, but it's more of a nitpick.

I honestly felt like the set was a little too plain in how it executed the throws and moves like fsmash/dsmash, particularly the dsmash when it's the big flashy chainsaw move in the set. Not asking for any complex gimmick here, just for more of a description of the hitbox, range, the animation at least could be interesting. Come on, Link using a chainsaw? That should be an exciting move. The fsmash was a lot more interesting than the other two smashes, and generally I liked the spear's usage in this and moves like dthrow as the weapon saved for the most important moves requiring massive power. It's nothing mind blowing, but it's a nice inventive use of inputs.

Unrelated tangent: this set is definitely helped by your illustrations, I was a little worried if I had to be that guy and criticize your drawings, but I never found them confusing. It's good to see you've developed this uniquely quip-y style even in a set like this one, it's a unique brand of humour in Make Your Move where everyone's usually all self-referential.

Mostly I like a selection of moves here like the fsmash, fair, nair that tend to emphasize the strong animation of the move best. I wasn't sure if you needed Daruk's perfect shield mechanic, and you could've done more with the weapon breaking period. It seems to me a lot of almost entirely positive mechanics with no real downside piled on top of one another, though kept balanced because the set has some awkward moves. This awkwardness includes using his shield on important inputs like bair and ftilt sacrificing their utility for defence, and has moves that rely on tippers, weapon breaking or projectiles for his best KO moves. It's not like it's non-functional without these gimmicks, but it seems like a weird combination of moves, probably not helped by the weapon switching. Kind of weird too he only takes out the boomerang and chainsaw a couple times.

The set might've been better if he had some sort of Fruits-esque selection special where he brings out some of these weapons, maybe throw them on the side special? The Magic Rods aren't super relevant either, though it's not like they're bad. I'm keenly aware I overuse the term "cohesiveness" but I do feel it's relevant to say here that this set could be more cohesive one way or another. It's a good set don't get me wrong, just on the messy side and might be clunky in practice. Nonetheless, good work here and as I've said already I'll get to your important set(s) as soon as I can.

Hi Luigifan18 Luigifan18 been a long time but I hope you're still open to feedback on Vaati. First of all, I would've preferred if you posted this in the thread or in a Google Doc, however this set is decently impressive for a set posted off-site. You already have posted the set on Smash Boards elsewhere though it does lack a header image (everyone knows Vaati but there might be someone who doesn't). This might be why this set was kind of ignored so far, despite being a very respectable set overall. What I always say when a set is presented in this order is to put specials first, because it only follows that the specials should be the centrepiece of a set, and how can you imagine them working that way when you read them last? It's for that reason in reveals you tend to see a final smash last to cap off the presentation, and generally specials are shown off first.

Your presentation in the stats is unique as you do have detailed stats in the attributes section, so I can't complain about these being vague or unnecessary, they're largely flavour text. It's honestly nice to read your thoughts on the character's strengths and not have it linked into the actual stats, though it's more suited to a playstyle section at the end of the set in my opinion. You also really don't have to link to pages about floats and wind hitboxes, though it's not like it hurts.

What's good in this set is despite the gimmick of wind hitboxes, it doesn't forget its need for functionality. You still have the building blocks moves like utilt to piece together the playstyle to be viable, and yet you do throw in some more risky fun archetypes like the Volcano Kick-like down tilt and up smash. I also like that despite creating wind hitboxes these moves all have basic purposes as melee attacks a lot of the time, like the ftilt and up tilt. I'm not sure you mention it, but it's important to note AFAIK that if you're above the blast zone and not dealt damage, you're not actually KO'd. If you wanted to get really deep in this set, just taking advantage of that in all these moves pushing the foe super high could've been a fun idea. That said this is already obviously the best Vaati set I've read.

Minor nitpick on the presentation again reading the deviantART version, you could really use some line breaks. The aerials are just one giant block of moves.

The aerials are a very strong section even if they're not too complex, as you again have a lot of good functional moves to aid Vaati's playstyle, utilizing the wind on some moves like his uair, then not on others like bair where it makes sense. I think you underestimate the usefulness of dair though, and in general Vaati does have a lot of crazy range on his moves. Thankfully a lot of that is wind hitboxes rather than anything too dangerous, but lining up a narrow dair laser really isn't that hard and would be the death knell to anyone's air dodge off stage in Smash 4. I think it's also a little gimmicky having the foe able to escape Vaati's grab before he can throw, just sticking them in place to be thrown is not at all overpowered. Wouldn't be if he just threw them where he grabbed them either, it's not like the tornado goes that far... I imagine. It's not actually stated exactly how far it goes. A bit odd too letting him be hit by his own bthrow projectiles, that's usually reserved for explosives, Mewtwo's fthrow doesn't do this.

The dthrow is the worst move in the set so far in my opinion as it's just out of place on a throw. This could be a good fit on a special, like Ridley's down special in Ultimate, but on a throw it's just taking space from a functional dthrow. Could be a very cool special though. Thing about this throw is it's very arbitrary when it does anything, and then it's a OHKO. Seesawing between useless and OHKO is bad balance. Though it has to be said the throws are very solid outside of this one move. You could've listed the reason for this stone OHKO in the move, and it should really be a special, you could retrieve an image of this too to show off. I did a similar thing in a set of mine from a while back now, on a down special, though sadly images are down right now due to Crash Boards. Still might be worth checking out.

After some pretty great moves frankly, it's strange the default side special is so non-descript, though I like the gist of neutral special. Both moves are under-detailed though the nspec does at least make sense for his playstyle. The side special is extremely under-detailed, it just says it "repels opponents" and "stops their attacks cold..." could be a little more descriptive here. Especially when Ultimate scrapped them it feels a little unnecessary having such complex customs anymore though I can't knock you for that. Nitpicking again but the up special is incredibly dense without any line breaks. The up special is pretty cool, although I want more of a sense of what it works like, is this Ness/Lucas' up special where he's easily interrupted with that cursor on screen, or does he have armour like other up specials? Now the down special is interesting, as I said earlier damaging the foe above the blast zone would KO them... though this move doesn't use that, could certainly be interesting if you edited in a stage-wide passive damage hitbox for that reason. Throw a foe above the blast zone, then abuse the passive damage to net a KO. Maybe even slap on some severe lag so Vaati has to do this before he juggles the foe high with non damaging wind? This would take the set to the next level.

Sadly the bad ending of Minish Cap is unavailable, I'll have to look that up. You probably didn't need to talk about the implied sexual assault in the taunts, but the rest of this would make for an excellent intro section. Seriously, these extras and the general detail of this set is outstanding. This set is definitely a little rough, but it has some great attributes to it as well. Great understanding of Smash and its mechanics. You go way, way beyond the extra mile to explain basic mechanics, just insane how much care went into this set, if it just had the traditional move order and some images, it'd be really good overall. My primary complaints outside of nitpicking the presentation is that side special being pretty under-elaborated, and the down throw is just bad. There's some minor stuff I could go into, but this set is shockingly good in spots. Very good work! Please come to our chats listed in the OP, I'd love to see more from you and help you with any future sets.

Here I am again to comment your fifth set (!!!) this contest Kafka, and this time I feel we’re hitting some new strides in your style. I said at the time that Alucard felt like a stopgap and just a bit of fun before your next big project… little did I know the very next set posted would be something serious from you, I’m very impressed by your work ethic after reading Kris, Susie & Ralsei. It helps that your style is very simple and to the point, and has zero fluff while not missing out on key details such as frame data.

I said in the chat earlier that this set is really impressive in how it portrays a team covering each other’s weaknesses. Kris himself is your typical Olimar/Popo character who can’t accomplish much on his own, but is far from useless by comparison to those two, he’s an effective part of his team. As compared to the leader of lemmings, Olimar, and Popo who is a joke by himself, it’s a nice distinction to have a team where each member plays an important part without being terrible on their own. This is accomplished by having a thoroughly detailed set for Kris alone, then adding on the other moves for Susie and Ralsei.

The way the team mechanics work is simple and well done here. Relying on AI rather than attacking all at once or having to command them individually is the most intuitive way to go about this without getting into complex mechanics and you choose well what moves to give to Susie and Ralsei. My only complaint is that you don’t go into more detail in these moves when the AI will use these moves, other than Susie being commanded by Kris. As Kris hasn’t got access to these moves himself, it’d make sense to detail that. I also think it could be cool to give some way to command the other two when Kris is in lag or by some complicated button combination, just because it would be cool to be able to directly command the other two, but as is it’s so nice and simple I can definitely understand the approach.

The substance of the set is well done too. Kris is your archetypal defensive knight and effective leader of the bunch. You know him well, and that comes across in all the personalities here too. Susie is all out aggression and Ralsei is more of a supportive character. As an aside it’s also nice to see some images of these animations, I especially like the little detail of a HUD icon for the other team members, which is really intuitive when they go over 100%. If anything this could be extended for when they’re over say, 50% too.

My one major complaint with this set is I wasn’t wholly convinced of the playstyle’s substance when all the many potential moves come together from all three characters. The specials lay out a decent basis for defending Ralsei’s healing and commanding Susie, but the moves themselves then aren’t all that impressive for offensive. It’s very useful being able to heal off Ralsei if you can defend him long enough, and debuffing the foe is very useful too, but there’s not a ton of creativity. Something like the FS but in the set is what I have in mind, some way to have them all work together like ICers considering the others are simple AI anyway, it wouldn’t be out of the question to force them to perform a flashy move if Kris commanded them to, that’d probably elevate the set a good deal for me. It’s hard to criticize the fundamentals of the set though, and it’s impressive just how strong its core is for a difficult team concept.

I would say overall this is your best Kafka, and after quite a lot of sets over a short period of time, that’s impressive. The characterisation especially is a massive step up in this set and when I look at your first set, Zoroark, it’s really night and day how much you looked out here for little details on how moves work to make them meld into a good playstyle. I think only you could really do a set like this and be able to pull it off with your style. Hope you continue to make quality sets.
 
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GolisoPower

Smash Master
Joined
Sep 17, 2017
Messages
4,315
Well, crap. My Dehaka moveset didn’t work out. Well, at least I tried. :)

I’ll try to work on explaining more about moves.
 

Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,439
GolisoPower GolisoPower Yeah please do not be discouraged by my comment. I'll happily look at Dehaka again if you make my suggested changes.
What Smash Daddy said. You actually have a great idea with the command grab getting the best attributes of the opponent. It's an idea that I haven't seen since older movesets like Videoman.EXE and TAC. You made a great translation of the heavyweight monster idea into Smash. It just needed detail and character. Also, the only way to improve is from feedback, so don't be discouraged. Bad feedback and good feedback both mean that someone took the time to read and comment your moveset.

My review of the Undertale 2 gang is finished, I need to edit it and I'll post it in a few hours, KafkaKomedy KafkaKomedy .
 

GolisoPower

Smash Master
Joined
Sep 17, 2017
Messages
4,315
What Smash Daddy said. You actually have a great idea with the command grab getting the best attributes of the opponent. It's an idea that I haven't seen since older movesets like Videoman.EXE and TAC. You made a great translation of the heavyweight monster idea into Smash. It just needed detail and character. Also, the only way to improve is from feedback, so don't be discouraged. Bad feedback and good feedback both mean that someone took the time to read and comment your moveset.

My review of the Undertale 2 gang is finished, I need to edit it and I'll post it in a few hours, KafkaKomedy KafkaKomedy .
Thanks for the encouragement, you two. Tried my best to improve the moveset. Hope it’s better now.
 

Rychu

Thane of Smashville
Joined
Jul 5, 2010
Messages
810
3DS FC
1908-0105-4965
Wrecking Ball

While scientists on the moon were experimenting on gorillas to make them super smart, a few of them had the idea to do the same with a hamster. Thus, Hammond was created. Sneaking out of his cage every single night to explore the facility, Hammond discovered his talent and love for mechanical engineering by taking apart and putting back together the various machines it took to keep the lunar colony running.

When the gorillas rose up to take over the facility, Hammond built a tiny escape pod and hitched a ride with an unsuspecting Winston, the only gorilla who didn't want to destroy the scientists. The pods got separated on the descent back to earth, and Hammond got marooned in the strange land of the Australian Outback, which had that point had been turned into a post apocalyptic wasteland.

Using his wits, he redesigned his escape pod into the fighting mech Wrecking Ball, which also served as a nifty translator, allowing him to actually use his smarts to communicate with the rest of the world. He rose through the ranks of the Junkertown mech fighting pits, and at some point later ended up in association with the former agents of Overwatch during the second omnic crisis.

This game is weird, man.

Statistics
Size - :ultbowser:
Weight - :ultrob:
Walking Speed - :ultganondorf:
Dashing Speed - :ultganondorf:/:ultbowser:
Jump - :ultbowser:/ :ultkirby:
Aerial Speed - :ultbowserjr:
Fall Speed - :ultbowser:
Traction - :ultmarth:/:ultluigi:
Mechanic - Roll
See those nifty alternate stats? Well, the main thing that sets Wrecking Ball apart is his ability to roll up and turn into a rolling ball! In smash, this is accomplished by dash attack while in your walking form! Being in ball form lets him do some nifty stuff, making him faster on the ground and even letting him become a literal wrecking ball with the help of certain attacks! When he's a ball, he uses those alternate stats - a lot of them stay the same, but there are some significant changes! His ground speed definitely improves - you'll very quickly pick up speed after a moment of rolling! His traction takes a hit, though - he doesn't necessarily slide, but changing directions takes a moment as the ball comes to a stop before having to pick up speed again. While hile he's not incredible at jumping with those mechanical legs, when he jumps as a ball he'll barely beat the height of one of Kirby's mid-air jumps as those engines weren't meant to send him straight upwards! A few of Wrecking Ball's attacks will force him into his ball form, but most of them will force him out! Assume that if he's using his guns, the mech's legs, or a grab, he's forced out, adding about 12 frames of lag to any of those attacks! We'll go over how to weaponize this capacity to roll in a little bit, but for now, just know that it's what makes him special!

Mechanic: Machine and Operator
Hammond, when not inside the rolling ball, can be seen at the top of Wrecking Ball, driving the mech around. This is problematic, since Hammond is the foe's actual target: attacks that manage to hit the small, Olimar-sized target end up dealing 1.5x their normal damage, though knockback stays consistent. On the flipside, the machine Wrecking Ball itself has a small degree of constant armor, reducing the incoming damage to .9x the damage an attack would normally deal. This makes staying a ball often a favorable position, though unfortunately not many attacks let him stay in that state.

Special Attacks

Neutral Special - Adaptive Shield
Wrecking Ball lets out a robotic "adaptive shield activated" as a blue glow surrounds the pair. If Wrecking Ball is up close and personal with his opponents, the shield reduces any incoming damage and knockback by 40% to both Hammond AND Wrecking Ball in walking form, though it caps at 25% reduction when in ball form, enough to even negate certain moves' ability to launch him away! However, the farther he is away, capping at around half of Final Destination's length, the effectiveness of the shield is reduced significantly, only negating blows by about 10%. Obviously, the duo like to get up close and personal! Keep in mind too, that his walking and rolling speed is reduced to about 70% here. The shield also gives Hammond some extra super-armor on the starting lag of his attacks that he uses his physical body - about 75% as potent as Bowser's regular Tough Guy armor! This shield, well, adapts to the foe's distance in real time, regardless, so it'll get stronger as he approaches and weaker as he retreats!

The shield has a few frames of starting lag - few enough to be quick but just enough to be noticeable - as Hammond activates the shield from within. The shield lasts for 7 seconds or until it's deactivated with a second press of the B button. It's also got some significant cooldown: 7 seconds+ as long as it was activated (so if the shield activated for its max time, the cooldown would be 14 seconds, etc.). As another note, this is the only one of Wrecking Ball's specials which forces him out of his ball form. Do not fret, though! You can roll back up immediately after it's activated.

Side Special - Proximity Mine

Wrecking Ball pops out a proximity mine about the size of a smart bomb on whichever side the move was input, taking about as long as it does Samus to pop out one of bombs. In Ball form, one of his arms briefly pops out of one of the side panels to do the deed! They're even similar in size to them, except for their sciency blue glow. Thanks to the magic of SCIENCE FICTION MOON TECHNOLOGY, the mines stay suspended in the air, exactly where they were placed, even floating a bit if placed on the ground. If an enemy comes within an area encompassing a diameter 2.5x its own size of one of these bombs, it explodes, dealing 7% damage and upwards knockback similar to but slightly weaker than that of Snake's C4. Enemies attacking the mines from afar need to deal 15% damage to them to wreck them at a range, at which point they explode, but much less potently - dealing 4% damage and even less knockback.

Wrecking Ball can have 3 of these onscreen at any given time, and each individual mine lingers on the stage for 12 seconds before disappearing. Wrecking Ball will not create any new mines while the max number is on screen, so throwing them out willy-nilly isn't the most tactical decision in a fight. Pairing this trap with an adaptive shield while on the defensive makes Wrecking Ball a tough character to approach, often giving him enough time to set up for any number of counter attacks. Another note - these things are solid, so Hammond can't just walk (or roll) through them! They won't explode when he comes near though, unless he himself deals the damage to destroy them. He thrives in melee range, and getting opponents into melee in a variable minefield halting their retreat makes him a terrifying force up close.

Up Special - Grappling Hook
This is one of the moves that automatically transitions Wrecking Ball into his ball form! Wrecking Ball rolls up and launches a grappling hook at a generally diagonally upwards angle. The length of the tensile wire connecting it back to Wrecking Ball is one of the longer tethers in the game, measuring out at a bit longer than Link's tether recovery. It will automatically target the nearest grab-able ledge, which conveniently includes Wrecking Ball's own proximity mines! Opponents won't be able to hit the hook away, but the hook doesn't deal any damage either. As soon as the hook is hooked on whatever it targeted, Wrecking Ball can tap the special button again to snap to the ledge as normal. But, if he doesn't...

This is where his name becomes quite literal. Instead of tapping the special button again, Wrecking Ball can instead hold button down and tap the control stick in the whatever direction he sent the hook out in. He'll begin to swing forward, and after a few frames will pick up enough speed to become a hurling fireball of death! He'll continue to swing as a fireball for a full half-circle arc (or until he hits a wall - if he doesn't he can actually go around in a full circle, though the top half of that arc won't quite meet fireball speeds), with the wire retracting to prevent him from hitting the ground.



In addition, the player can release the input mid-arc to let him fly off diagonally in a particular direction, effectively turning him into a projectile attack. Keep in mind you'll continue with your momentum for longer distances depending on when you release, in keeping with relatively realistic physics, though a general rule of thumb is that he'll stay a fireball for about 2 seconds after a release. When the fireball subsides, his regular fall physics return, and he'll behave in the air like he'd just taken a bit of knockback as he falls. He can also cancel the extreme speed by attacking while in the air. Releasing at the right time also allows him to roll across the ground in this state - he can cover a final destination length about as fast as Jiggly Puff using a half-charged rollout!

A swinging Wrecking Ball will deal 15% damage to any foe (or proximity mine - watch out!) it comes into contact with, and decent knockback - enough to KO reliably off the side in the mid 120 to 130%s! The ball generally won't deal multiple damaging hits unless it swings around to hit a second time, but it will generally carry foes with it on its arc with a second, non-damaging wind hitbox, keeping them close. If Wrecking Ball comes into contact with a wall before the midway point of his arc, he'll lose his momentum and snap to the ledge or mine he grappled Grappling from a far enough distance, this swing can theoretically allow him to go around the bottom of certain floating stages like Smashville.

Wrecking Ball is treated like a projectile while in this state - well-timed shields or reflectors will reflect him as they would any other projectile, and moves like Game and Watch's bucket will absorb his momentum-gained fireball effectively stopping him in his tracks. Additionally, he moves fast enough that spot dodges or rolls can avoid him, and he's very vulnerable to counter moves like those of the FE Swordsmens'. It also doesn't have the highest priority - strong smash attacks or moves like the Falcon Punch can clash or even out-prioritize this move, leaving him vulnerable. However, aside from the damage, this move makes him an unpredictable and surprisingly fast opponent for his size and weight class.

This is especially true when paired with a well-placed Proximity Mine, which serves to give him these swinging options on otherwise flat stages. Placing one offstage not only serves to make for a decent trap ledge guard, but also gives Wrecking Ball the ability to launch himself back onstage after getting knocked away, rather than just snapping to the ledge. Combining his ability of launching back onto the stage and then equipping an adaptive shield once you're back in the fray makes him a dangerous target on or off the main stage, though with his high falling speed and low aerial movement doesn't make it his ideal batlleground. Be careful though, as his grappling hook does have a short cooldown between uses - he'll need to wait 2 seconds before he can start swinging again!

Down Special - Piledriver
Hammond comes built-in with his very own stall-then-fall! Wrecking Ball will stop in mid-air, begin rolling VERY quickly, before rapidly plummeting to the ground in the same fashion as the Koopa King, even falling at a similar speed. Once he hits the ground, anyone unfortunate enough to be below him or in an area extending about half a battlefield platform around him (indicated by jumping dirt upon impact) is dealt 14% damage, but surprisingly little knockback. This fixed knockback merely bounces them a bit off of the ground, about the height of a floating battlefield platform, nicely covering for the relatively heavy 25 recovery frames it takes for Wrecking Ball to stand up, putting him right into firing range! Note that this move will force him out of his ball form upon landing. Against opponents in the air, this will provide a spike downwards if they're directly below him and relatively strong diagonally downwards knockback if he hits them at the bottom edges of his hitbox, but if you're trying to offstage spike Wrecking Ball falls so rapidly that he'll most definitely be the first stock taken - use it instead to knock opponents to the ground!

This pairs nicely with his ability to launch himself out of a swing - this is the most reliable way to stop your momentum and place yourself on the stage. Since it's never ever going to KO an opponent, it can situationally knock opponents into Proximity Mines, but its best use is to get Wrecking Ball up into his opponents face. Combining a launch with this into a quick adaptive shield lets Wrecking Ball put a lot of pressure on his opponents in a short amount of time - but hitting mid-air opponents with it can end up knocking them too far out of his range!

Wrecking Ball can use this input on the ground in a very different way - it acts functionally like a non-chargeable Sonic Spin Dash for him! While on the ground, this input will force him into ball form where he rapidly spins - identically to the startup in the air - before launching forward as the fireball! This deals the same damage and knockback as it would from a swing, and launches him forward about a third of the length of Final Destination. There's no real ending lag to speak of either once the momentum stops as he continues to roll along, but the significant starting lag - nearly 70 frames - puts it on par with Ganondorf's Warlock Punch in terms of slowness.

Standard Attacks

Jab - Primary Fire
Wrecking Ball finally uses those canons! And, to be honest, they're not incredibly strong. Each press of the jab button fires a single shot, which deals 3% damage and fairly standard jab stun in melee range and 1.5% damage and no stun or knockback at all any further than half a battlefield platform away. Holding it allows him to fire off about 3 per second, which stales pretty quickly. It has a decent range, falling somewhere between Megaman's buster and Wolf's laser. Much like Megaman. Hammond can walk forward while firing, somewhat helping him get into its effective range.

Forward Tilt - Boop Shot
Wrecking Ball swings his arm furthest from the screen (it should be noted his default stance is at a similar angle to that of the portrait I've used) in a short but tall arc, covering from the bottom of his circular body to above Hammond's head. Should this connect, it deals a nice 5% damage, and booping opponents up and away from the large bot. The second and third hits come out if he lands the first, as Wrecking Ball's other arm aims up and pops the opponent with 2 of his primary fire shots in rapid succession, at 3% each, bringing the move's maximum damage to 11%, and pushing them even further up and away. It should be noted that Wrecking Ball can start moving forward or backward as soon as the first shot is fired, letting him chase DIing opponents down! Missing the initial hit leaves him open for a brief moment but landing it gives this move the same ending lag as his jab, which is almost nothing, though the starting lag is relatively slow, coming out in about 10 frames, but its initial hitbox hits high enough to pop airborne opponents. Use this right after Piledriving down into a foe to follow up that bounce!

Up Tilt - Hamster Brawl
With virtually no starting lag, Hammond himself jumps halfway out of his mech and punches upwards, not dealing much in the way of damage, only 2%. It comes out as quick as a standard jab and has the ability to juggle heavier foes thanks to its low knockback, though a Kirby or Jigglypuff could certainly DI away fairly easily. This attack is certainly situational, but at higher percents can lead into an Up Smash against larger foes. Hammond prefers the high ground or being on an even playing field - but this move is almost worth putting yourself under the opponent to see a hamster lightly juggle Bowser with a fist pump.

Down Tilt - Foot Shot
Any Overwatch player can tell you the situational usefulness of aiming at an opponents foot - here, Hammond sticks his tongue out and raises just one eyebrow as Wrecking Ball unleashes a quick volley of primary shots at the ground diagonally in front of him - 3 in total, in rapid succession. This comes out near instantly and will always deal the 9% damage from its shots should it hit, though its short range -only about half a Battlefield Platform - makes it only useful in close range situations. Use it to pop opponents up for a quick followup FTilt, or right after a Piledriver if they managed to get out of the way!

Dash Attack - Rollout/Slingshot
Pressing the dash attack while in his walking form simply puts Wrecking Ball into his ball form after a very brief 5 frames, allowing him to quickly reach his max rolling speed! Simple, yet effective. Using it while in that ball form is a lot more fun, though - since his other standard attacks take him out of his ball form, this input instead keeps him rolling! While dashing as a ball, Hammond fires his grappling hook about half a BFP forward, latching onto the ground and firming up. There's a bit of a stall frame as Hammond sets Wrecking Ball into MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE for a brief moment, picking up enough speed to turn into that flaming ball of death by the time he reaches the end of the tether's length.

The tether tenses and quickly pulls him back, launching him in the opposite direction, keeping that hitbox active until he releases that tether once he reaches it's opposite end! This is a lot quicker than it sounds - the hitbox is only active for about 7 frames, and deals 8% damage and light diagonal upwards knockback. At lower percents, he'll often catch up to opponents if he hits them on the backswing! Here's another quirk for you too - if he uses this close enough to a ledge, the initial swing will go over the ledge!

Aerial Attacks

Neutral Air - Primaerial Fire
Wrecking Ball lets loose with two quick shots of his primary fire, aimed at a slight upwards angle. These both carry the same properties as the primary shots from his jab, the 3% and 1.5% per shot depending on the distance, except for the inability to hold the fire down. This attack is incredibly quick on both ends, and quick fingers might be able to pop off two of these against opponents approaching from above, especially in the air. Wrecking Ball prefers his opponents below him while he's airborne and not swinging, ready to be knocked down. Note that the fire will continue even when landing the attack, making this a useful tool even out of a short hop. Also keep in mind that aerials used out of his ball form do have a brief bout of extra starting lag for him to come out of the ball - not a huge amount and knockback dealt from swinging in should cover you, but factor it in!

Forward Air - Spread Shot
Wrecking Ball fires off five primary shots in rapid succession, firing each shot at a different angle making a half circle, the middle of which is at a 45 degree angle above and away from himself. As with the other moves that use his primary shot, they carry the 3% up close, 1.5% at farther distances property, though the knockback is more upwards here, letting him hit multiple times. It's possible to hit with all five up close, though on average players can reliably hit 3 of them, especially after a forward tilt and a shorthop. Once again, this has very little lag on either side of the attack, especially when landing it - the attack will continue as normal even if the mech lands while mid-fire.

Down Air - The Claw
Wrecking Ball leans backwards as Hammond makes the bot's front two feet reach out and swing downward in a short arc, dealing 5% damage. This ends up pulling the opponent downwards and towards Wrecking Ball's bottom, usually putting them just to the side of his undercarriage. This has very low ending lag, but its starting lag - where the robotic legs extend outwards - is comparable to Mario's F-air and a relatively short range, making it most useful out of a swing - use it to set up a Piledriver! Note however this has very heavy landing lag, making it near useless if Wrecking Ball is close to the ground.

Back Air - The Turning Point
Wrecking Ball swings around mid-air his turrets acting as the hitbox, dealing a decent 6% damage and knocking foes away. This has a noticeable bit of starting lag, around 10 frames, though the ending lag isn't too terrible. Landing the attack during the startup animation is disastrous as the machine stumbles to regain its footing. Notably though, this fully turns him around in mid-air, which can lead to some fun situations like, say, launching yourself off of a swing, missing, turning around and hooking back on to the same anchor point to come right back, or misjudging a swing under a stage like Smashville, allowing you to turn and recover even if you misjudged your distance. Notably this does have a longer startup than his other aerials, so it's a bit dangerous against a foe coming in from above or below, or even keeping you at bay with projectiles.

Up Air - Falling Shot
Wrecking Ball aims his guns at an upwards angle and unleashes a quick volley of 4 shots. Nothing too fancy here, and thanks to the singular angle of the attack its relatively easy to land all four, each dealing that standard 1.5-3% damage per hit. As per usual with his gun-based attacks, it's very quick and doesn't suffer any landing lag as the shots just continue to come out

Smash Attacks

Forward Smash - Fling
Wrecking Ball pulls backwards before smashing his massive body forward, bashing into anyone unfortunate enough to get in his way. At no charge it'll deal a respectable 14% damage and can reliably KO in the mid 80 percents. It's one of his more straightforward attacks, and comes out fairly quickly out of his walking form, though all of his smashes suffer that extra 12 frames of starting lag before the charge even starts when used out of his ball form. These are far better for confirming kills in walking form while having an adaptive shield - especially with that extra touch of superarmor! Watch out for the extremely heavy ending lag on this one too, whiffing an FSmash can put him in a bad position, even with the adaptive shield up!

Down Smash - Premature Detonation
Hammond disappears into Wrecking Ball's depths, his hamster hind quarters wriggling out of the top as he digs, and emerges with that looks like 2 malfunctioning, sparking proximity mines. This takes as long as it sounds, making it easily the laggiest of his smash attacks on startup. However, as he tosses one to each side, he can move and attack as soon as they leave his hands. They will roll across the ground a short distance before detonating, dealing 10% damage and higher upwards knockback than their non-malfunctioning brothers. The charge doesn't increase the damage of the mines - instead, longer charge sends the mines out further: at no charge, they're barely roll at all before exploding, while a full charge rolls them out about a battlefield platform away before they blow their load.

Up Smash - The Stomp
Wrecking Ball crouches back on the hind legs for the charge animation before extending upwards, while also punching upwards with the front legs. This initial hit goes straight upwards, reaching slightly higher and having about the same horizontal range as Marth's USmash. This deals a respectable 14% damage at no charge and decent upwards knockback, KOing off the top of the stage reliably in the 80% range. The second hit has more utility in Wrecking Ball's up close game, however, as he ends the attack by swinging in a massive arc downwards from this extension.

Opponents caught in this downwards arc are knocked downwards into the ground and bounced. Opponents in contact with his body (not his legs) are buried for a brief moment. This slam deals 17% damage on impact. It's practically impossible to combo both hits together thanks to the upwards knockback of the first hit, though that first hit comes out quick enough to lead into the second that it's a viable horizontal option on the ground too. That being said, the second hit is telegraphed like crazy, and whiffing this hit puts Wrecking Ball into considerable ending lag and an unfavorable position.

Grab Game

Grab - Grabbling Hook
Wrecking Ball unsurprisingly launches that same grappling hook for his grab, this time extending about as far as Link's grab. It's a middling speed grab, but its range provides a decent cover for the starting lag. Whiffing it causes similar ending lag to Link's grab, so be careful. Unlike other tether grabs however, Wrecking Ball does NOT pull them into melee range, instead tensing up the wire and holding the foe in place at the distance the grab contacted. It has normal escape difficulty, and a fairly standard pummel, as the hooks squeezes rapidly for hits of 2% damage.

Forward Throw - Rolling in the Deep
Wrecking Ball jumps up before transitioning into ball form and cranking the wire, pulling himself towards his foe. He'll bash into them at this higher angle, bouncing them off the ground as he transitions back into his walking form. If he hits other opponents while pulling himself forward they'll get knocked away with some low fixed knockback diagonally away, taking the same amount of damage! The bash will deal 10% damage and at higher percents can confirm into the second hit of your up smash, though it'll most likely hit at the outer edges of that move's arc. Otherwise, if you can get the grab off, this can help in general to put him into a more favorable melee range to tap into his adaptive shield and get him close to tricky foes.

Back Throw - Reel them In
Similarly to his forward throw, Hammond cranks the wire, but this time pulls the opponent rapidly towards himself. Once the opponent is in range, he melees them, dealing 8% damage and knocking them slightly upwards. This can easily confirm into your FTilt, which itself is a decent confirm into some sweet little short hop aerials. It's also useful for just bringing a quick opponent in close, especially if you've laid some proximity mines around yourself.

Up Throw - Catapult
Hammond crawls out to latch onto the wire, then quickly pulls back with maximum effort, falling back into his mech butt first, pressing a button and releasing the hook midway through the swing and launching them in a diagonal right over his head. This deals a cursory 6% damage, and the launch angle varies slightly based on how far away the grab got them from. This won't be KOing foes any time soon, but can be used situationally to launch opponents directly into proximity mines!

Down Throw - Face to the Dirt
Hammond once again crawls out to grab the wire, this time using the momentum to drag the opponents down and slam them face first into the ground, dealing 12% damage and dragging them a short distance towards Wrecking Ball. This is far more useful the closer opponents are to Wrecking Ball, since it can put them in range of a quick down smash, or at the very least a quick down tilt. Wrecking Ball's grabs all have fantastic situational usefulness, though none of them have much KO potential - keep your position, their position, and any proximity mines in mind!

Final Smash

Minefield Barrage
Wrecking Ball spin dashes forward in an initial attack that covers almost the entire length of Final Destination. If he should hit the opponent, they're suddenly transported to the Junkertown arena, facing down Wrecking Ball! He unloads a huge field of his proximity mines and fires at the opponent, who sets them off as they try to run away. As they're launched upwards, Wrecking Ball suddenly swings in, hitting them in a hilarious freeze frame, and they're launched offscreen!


Now that you've won, enjoy his taunts!

(up)

(down)

(side)

And his win animations!



 
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Altais

Smash Champion
Joined
Nov 14, 2007
Messages
2,083
Location
Starbase, where no turtle has gone before.
Altais Altais Late to this one too, but finally read Revali. We rarely get an archer set, one of the only ones I can think of is Drow Ranger and I'm not sure that had as much of a focus on the bow and arrows. Revali's main playstyle mechanic is somewhat like Incineroar's Revenge just revealed in Smash Ultimate, a Counter that works against projectiles as well as melee moves. This lets Revali outcamp other long range projectiles. The side special, Wind Dive, is fairly important too besides the reflector interaction as it lets Revali cover ground and get past foes that get in close. The base of the set is one of your strongest as all the specials fulfil an important role, in a very self aware and intelligent approach.

The set doesn’t spare the projectiles as you’d expect out of an archer as all the smashes are dedicated to different ammo for the bow. This is good overall, the one I was least sure on was down smash. It’s just a bit of a challenge to play as a character that hasn’t got a good “get off me” smash, some characters do already have smashes that don’t hit behind them but usually they’re very strong or consistently hit a huge area in front of them to make sure no one can dodge if they’re there. The fsmash and usmash however I thought worked well on those inputs and there’s already plenty of characters who have projectile smashes.

The rest of the set is a surprising mix of Falco’s melee (of course) with Revali’s talons, and in the grab game reminds me somewhat of Robin. As Robin’s uses the Elwind tome and Falco I don’t think I have go over his similarities to Revali, it all feels very logical to use for inspiration. I do feel that Revali is on the underpowered side what with only his bair being a reliable melee KO move, and he doesn’t have a KO throw. When he’s so reliant on projectiles too he might get stone walled by characters that have a reflector or absorber, in spite of his anti-reflector move as that still has to connect to be useful. It surely wouldn’t hurt to have a few more direct KO moves here and there. The throws could’ve had a little more to them as well.

The main issue I have with the set balance wise is some of these moves that deal a very low amount of damage. For example the uair only deals 3% using a wind projectile hitbox, and compares itself to G&W's move. However G&W's uair deals 7%/9% depending on the exact hitbox, and in Smash Ultimate it creates a projectile on top of that. The fair is similarly underpowered dealing only 2% and the gust deals no damage. It'd be okay if he had one or two moves that were very fast and dealt little damage to compensate, like Ness' dtilt that deals 4% or 2%. Moves like uair, fair and ftilt don't seem impressively fast to make up for their tiny damage percents.

Outside of balance complaints this set was simple and effective in my opinion, and one of your stronger sets. I quite liked what Dante turned into and Gunvolt was improved too, but this set really feels like you were conscious of the playstyle all the way through. Besides the throws and a general underpowered balance, and maybe the dsmash, the set doesn’t have too much to complain about. Very nice work here.
Yikes, I was worried about the down-smash. Originally, I had Revali shoot two Fire Arrows on either side of him, creating an effective barrier that would punish rolls and aggressive opponents, as well as give him time to use Revali's Gale--but for some reason I changed it into what it is now. Apparently, that was not a good idea.

Was also worried Revali might not have enough raw power. That said, I've already buffed his aerials. This time, they deal multiple hits as well as push the opponent away. Also, I'm debating turning his neutral special, back throw, and up throw into kill moves.

Again, cheers for the input.
 

KafkaKomedy

Smash Cadet
Joined
May 13, 2018
Messages
69
Location
Florida
Switch FC
SW 8371 3981 5803
Rychu Rychu I have a comment for you, but take it with a grain of salt since I'm kinda new.

I've never played as this character; I lost interest in OW soon after Ana was released so I have no comment on his adherence to character and the integration of gameplay aspects from OW to Smash. I will be looking at this purely from the standpoint as a standalone character in Smash. And even when I do that, this character seems quite charming! A cute little animal you can see riding a giant Mech is fun, and the few attacks that feature Hammond have some fun personality. However, you don't describe Hammond's size. We know the Mech is as tall and wide as Bowser, but the hamster could be anywhere from Pichu's size to a pixel, this isn't described as far as I could tell and leads into set's major issue, in my eyes.

Wrecking Ball seems like hell to fight. With the highest weight in the game and a damage reduction bonus, you'll need to get him to around 150% with most characters before reliably killing him with even a laggy move. And I doubt you'll be hitting Hammond himself too much, even if he's Pichu's size because A, the Mech is so much bigger and grounded, unlike Hammond, and B, only 4-5 moves are stated to take him out of ball form, even though you mention tons do in the intro. It would not be a big issue to never even use these moves because they are not very powerful compared to his specials, all of which are amazing.

Adaptive Shield is great on everything except heavy zoners, halved damage for 7 full seconds with no drawbacks is way, way too much even if it has a 14 second cooldown. Shield Monado Art only reduces Shulk's damage by 33% and that comes with decreased knockback, jump height, speed, and power. Proximity mine is an amazing stage control tool-- 5 bombs can be placed on screen that last for 20 full seconds, and they allow him to use, in my opinion, his two best specials-- Grappling Hook and Piledriver. This makes Hammond a flying death meteor that can turn on a dime and flies across the stage easily with a constant hitbox that kills. This makes securing a stock with Hammond so easy that he really shouldn't be the hardest character to kill in the game. It doesn't matter if all of his other moves besides smashes and maybe grabs are useless (they are) because Hammond can just roll around wherever he wants, stick in ball, kill you at 90% and not die until 150%, if you can even hit him. And its not like that's hard, its just simple timing.

This set has tons of potential but his specials really need tuning down, and I really think either the Hammond gimmick should be scrapped or his weight reduced. I'd love to see a Zoner heavy, I just joined this MYM so I haven't really yet, but Hammond doesn't seem to really play like that, he seems to be a Bayonetta instead.
 

Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,439
Wrecking Ball
It’s nice to see you posting a moveset Ryan, and one for one of my favorite characters from Overwatch as well! Hamston may not be a great tank but he certainly is fun to swing around with. Let’s see if that translates into Smash.



The ball mechanic is a fun idea. I like that he has altered stats in this mode, and that stats section with the character icons as reference is always something I thought was a neat way of representing stats. How does one double tap a dash, however? Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t dashes initiated by double-tapping the control stick? I would like it more if he had more than two stats altered by this mode change as well, rather than just traction and ground speed. I would assume, for instance, that Wrecking Ball’s jumps would be affected by his mechanical legs retracting into the ball mech. Other stats that I would naturally assume are affected by ball form: rolls, dodges, get up options, differences between walking and running speed (rather than just one lumped “ground speed”), techs, and shielding.



This moveset could also do with some animation descriptions, especially the previously mentioned jumps. This helps the reader really get a feel for the character and gives the set some boosted personality. Overwatch characters are intentionally bursting with personality. Blizzard designs them in such a way, so they sell more merchandise. The set also lacks taunts and victory poses, and even alternate costumes which is a shame because Blizzard also provides those to you already made. Just include a screenshot of Wrecking Balls skins from Overwatch.



There're no technical problems with the ball form as you have it, and in fact it works just as well as I could imagine switching between the two could in Smash. Both transforming into ball mode and reverting to normal mode happen naturally and are balanced. I would have written it slightly differently, however, as you don’t describe the benefits of the special mechanic to get the reader excited but include the major drawback of extra lag. It’s hard to get excited for having 15 frames of lag on one’s attacks and having better speed but the worst traction in the game isn’t going to improve that disposition. When opening with the most important and exciting part of the moveset, hype it up as much as you can to make the reader excited to read more. This lesson can be learned from Cutesy Beau: really interesting mechanic but worded in such a way that it turns everyone off of being interested in it. That being said, I’m not most people, so I both get what you’re going for and do like it.



The second mechanic of the set is one I also approve of. It’s a mechanic I’m sure has been done before but no sets come to mind. The only one I can think of now that resembles it is Beezwax, and that mechanic operated differently. This mechanic fits Wrecking Ball’s character and playstyle quite nicely and gives more incentive to be excited for ball mode, so I approve. I don’t believe it’s too overpowered. A R.O.B. that has a bigger hitbox and takes 0.9% instead of 1% from hits on most of his body but 1.5% on a spot most aerials hit isn’t game-breaking. In fact, he has even worse matchups against some characters because of this. Can you imagine getting tipped in your soft hamster body by Marth, or perhaps every other Fox laser hit dealing double damage? With that being said, the armor is a nice passive boost that helps maintain his stability and play that tank-style character he was designed to be.



Now I’m moving on to the special attacks. Adaptive Shield is another translation from Overwatch and plays pretty much identically to how it does in his home game, even down to the shield duration and cooldown. The ability to turn it off to conserve cooldown time is a function I assume was inspired by D.VA’s defense matrix. Like the passive armor, this is an ability that Hamston needs to play that anchoring tank role, so I appreciate you making this the neutral special rather than the obvious route of his cannon fire. I’m totally down with the function here, the reduced damage and knockback functioning better up-close makes sense although more than likely if it was the same at any distance one would be using it up-close anyway due to the function the shield serves. Most projectiles, for instance, don’t do much damage or knockback.



One question I have that’s not clearly answered is if the shield’s damage reduction is fixed when he uses the move or if it gains or loses protection as he moves around with the shield active. This is important because it changes how one initiates the move due to the duration of the move and the lag frames at startup. If its fixed when he uses the move, this makes using it directly near the foe paramount and thus makes him vulnerable to punishment with the tradeoff of essentially having a second shield to absorb blows the foe throws out, such as a charged move. On the other hand, if the shield’s protection increases as he moves closer when he uses it far away, this lets Wrecking Ball use the move with relative safety and then have a safe approach to the foe to regain stage control and the neutral game. The drawback with this strategy is that approaching with the shield active means less time for it to actually absorb blows, thus causing longer cooldown times. There’re merits in either direction depending on how you intend for Wrecking Ball to play, so clarify this detail and you’re good on this move. As for the actual balance issues of the duration of the shield and the length of the cooldown, I can’t speak with certainty, but as of now that function of the move is fine with me.



Side special is an interesting inclusion to me, but not a bad one. It acts as a great stage control option, and he can have out three at a time? That’s pretty strong, imagine if Snake could have three C4 out at one time, but they don’t need to be manually detonated and only deal half damage. The enemy can take care of them if they have a projectile, of course, but not every character has one. The mines are also described as proximity mines but only detonate when in direct contact with a foe, rather than just proximity. You would have to dial down the strength of the knockback slightly if you increased their proximity radius, but it would fit the name more (and how they were in Overwatch). There’s no attack speed or lag description on this move, so with the assumption there is none this can become quite powerful. As soon as the enemy defuses one, Hamston can immediately replace it, giving him powerful stage control and the strongest anti-approach game in the roster. I would recommend making them detonate from being taken down with damage for flavor’s sake, rather than having them harmlessly vanish. Minesweeping is an extremely dangerous business, with the explosives being able to set off by a stray bullet at any time.



Without reading any other moves yet, how would I use the mines effectively? The first approach that comes to mind is spacing them apart in a horizontal line to make the ground level of a stage a minefield. This forces the foe to jump over them at least three times. I could also place them in a vertical line to wall off an approach. This is least likely to catch an opponent as they can simply avoid passing through that grid. The middle of these two approaches is perhaps a triangle formation or a diagonal line. I think you intend for something along these lines to be the way to use them. So how creative can we get with them? Placing them on ledges seems broken, as it prevents opponents’ recovery. They hang suspended in the air so you could actually edge guard even further by placing them horizontal to the ledge to prevent recoveries that go over it if the foe is close and below to the stage. This depends on what angle the mines deal knockback at. If its upward this makes edge guarding worse with them but if its below, sideways, or perhaps the opposite direction of the opponent’s approaching momentum then this could be seriously busted as I imagine the explosion spiking an opponent trying to recover. Well what about other placements? Wrecking Ball can place a mine behind him and behind a foe to make fighting claustrophobic or force an aerial game. Placing mines above the foe’s height forces ground fighting or sets the foe up for easy combos by knocking them back down unless they tech. You can predict techs by placing a mine in the direction the foe normally techs and techchase them for easy damage. I can also imagine placing this at a verticle blast zone and getting easy Star KOs. In conclusion, you’ve got a versatile trap that I can imagine can be a nuisance for the foe or just busted, and it’s entirely dependent on numbers. As the only way I can verify for sure the balance is to go into a game with Snake and test it out, I’m leaving it up to the masses to decide if it needs tweaking or not.



Seeing Grappling Hook on the up special made me very excited. This was the move I was looking forward to! And it almost functions exactly as I imagined. Almost, but not quite. First, what I love: using proximity mines as tether points. This is brilliant, a 200 IQ big brain moment to incorporate his wrecking ball momentum on a stage with no platforms. Move interactions like this make both moves better by association. The ability to recover with mines this way is also pure genius. Wrecking Ball is now what is known as a playground moveset, and as it should be. This fits how me and every other quick play bronze in Overwatch plays him. Why shoot the attackers when you can spin around Hanamura’s bell the entire round? The move has no significant balance issues that I can see, but I did have a few questions about the finer details. This is a rather facetious question, but can he be absorbed by Game & Watch’s Oil Panic? He is treated as a projectile during the fireball state, after all. Also, is the tether considered a grab hitbox or a disjointed hitbox? I am aware it can’t grab foes, but I’m wondering issues of priority. Can it even be clashed with an opponent? What happens if the foe is between the ledge and Wrecking Ball’s grappling hook? I assume it passes through them, latches on to the stage, then Wrecking Ball snaps to the ledge and deals some amount of knockback and damage to them. This would definitely come up in edge guarding wars so it is something that would be nice to know.



The way I’m currently interpreting Wrecking Ball’s wrecking ball is that a tap of the stick will send the hamster swinging in that direction at a fixed speed. What I’d love even more is if there was an adjustable momentum gain depending on how the player rotates the control stick, like how it is in Overwatch and like the game Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy. I know, it’s a strange game to correlate Wrecking Ball with, but bear with my logic here. In Getting Over It, the player doesn’t simply move in a direction by tapping a button. They must use the mouse’s movements to generate the momentum needed to move the player character forward. What I’m envisioning here for Wrecking Ball is hanging from a ledge, let’s say a mine placed in the middle of Final Destination in the air. In a state of no movement, Wrecking Ball is hanging from it, still, like a Christmas ornament. The player tilts the control stick left, and Wrecking Ball slowly swings left. Now, if they release the stick, Wrecking Ball would swing back to the right, missing the position he was originally in (at rest). He’d swing back to the left, but not go as far this time, then back right like a pendulum, and after a few swings of no input he’d end up at rest again. Now, say we have this scenario again, but instead of releasing the control stick, Wrecking Ball’s player applies a tilt to the right when Wrecking Ball swings left. Wrecking Ball then moves faster to the right, gaining more speed and momentum and carrying him further in his arc. Swinging back left with the same momentum will make him faster and somewhere in here we get his fireball state. This incredible speed and momentum would take longer to return to his rested state with no control stick input from the player. I just described grappling hook physics in a complicated way but that’s basically the gist of how I’d imagine it functioning if I wrote it. Now, this may just be a miscommunication error, and this is exactly how you intended it to work, but without clarity and detailed communication to the reader there’s not a definite way for them to know this. Describing things briefer is simpler and more elegant but the devil is in the details and the readers interested in the more technical details are often left in the dark and have to infer for themselves or probe for more.



Oh, and I’d love if Wrecking Ball could attach to walls, floors, or ceilings with this move. That would go against the snapping to the ledges which is honestly a much better feature when trying to recover but perhaps there could be an option to manually aim the grappling hook? Realistically you can’t swing in an arc if the tether is attached to a wall or the ground but tethering to the ground and flinging the hamster forward to approach or retreat could be a great option available, especially if he got the fire boost. Tethering to the side of Final Destination and throwing yourself up to possibly jump on to the stage is probably not something that can happen realistically because the opponent could just punish with a fully charged smash attack but could lead to some exciting moments where a greedy opponent gets smacked into the void. I love that he can keep foes sucked in to the hitbox with a windbox to smack-smack them around. The damage and knockback on this move are just right, so good job on that, and the two second cooldown is certainly balanced but seems a little too long for my tastes.



The down special rounds out his Overwatch ability kit translations nicely. Again, this move functions almost identically to how it is in the game, but it just works so naturally that readers unfamiliar with the game or the character would believe you came up with it. Everything about this attack is perfect, even the ground momentum burst that I described in just the last paragraph before reading this. It just now occurred to me that you could put the ability to transform into a ball on the shield special, or perhaps even from the conception you could have given his natural shield the mode switch ability. This does present the problem of forcing mode changes on the player, unless they toggle the option in a character menu. It’s so great how the move flows and interacts with the rest of his specials, you’ve done a really good job so far. I do find it odd that this does so little knockback since it should have the same force as a momentum-carried Wrecking Ball, but I suppose it is necessary to put them within melee range and that this would probably be too frustrating to play against with all of his mines, his high mobility, and his punishing options for foes that get near him. Also, what happens to foes who get caught by his hitbox while he’s in midair? Do they get knocked upwards as well as if they had been on the ground, or do they take a more natural angle to the side, down, or diagonally?



Time to move on to the standard attacks and see if the meat of the set holds up. I predicted the jab would be here after the absence of the cannons from the specials. Just like in Overwatch, it’s pretty weak, at least at a distance. Thank you for including bullet damage dropoff, that’s a detail that I often forget about when reading sets involving firearms (and some of you when writing it). To get further realism we’d include ballistics, but this is a hamster in a death mech we’re talking about here so that’s a non-issue. The ability to move while firing is something I never even thought of but honestly it just makes sense. You say he can fire off about two per second and I’m not sure if that’s too low or not, it seems a little slow to me but then again he has a projectile jab that can keep firing. I think it should be just a smidgeon quicker, like maybe three a second? It’s not overbearing because his jab would stale quicker, but one bullet every twenty frames seems right to me.



The forward tilt is so... boringly named. Come on Ryan, did you run out of name juice? It does an apt job of describing what the move does though, so okay, I guess? I like what you’ve got going here, the idea behind the move is fitting Wrecking Ball and actually fine. Some details bother me. For instance, you say it’s “essentially confirmed to hit” but ignore directional influence and air dodges from the opponent, unless Wrecking Ball’s cannons track foes. The next sentence also contradicts this as you state it can miss smaller targets. Next, I’m wondering what exactly is the ending lag and animation that moving negates, as you don’t describe it other than the fact you can take it away. On a similar note, why does moving while shooting give Wrecking Ball the ability to act sooner than not expending energy, making him unable to act? Moving during this attack is a really neat idea that I like, don’t get me wrong, but it seems sort of contrived for artificial flow, as perhaps an afterthought for needed move interactions. I also do realize that it follows the same logic as moving during the jab, so if that’s the reason you came up with it, then that’s reasonable. The only reason I’m on your ass about this is I like having a consistent logic in mechanics and attacks and this sort of breaks that logic (the idea that attack animations and lag frames that don’t explicitly move the player prevent other actions during their duration). Oh, and one last thing. If the opponent gets bounced from the down special, you wrote that the forward tilt’s shots should hit them. However, would Wrecking Ball realistically have enough time to come out of his impact (which takes 40 recovery frames), swipe with his arm, and then shoot them with the cannon while they’re still in the air?



Something that would be hilarious but go against the direct philosophy of the moveset would be for Hamston to be able to be grabbed or knocked out of his mech during the up tilt. I’m not saying do it, I’m saying it would just be funny. Perhaps a Zero Suit Hammond in the future? I digress. This move is still pretty cute. How is it possible for an Earth hamster to juggle Bowser? Or imagine Ridley getting wombo’d with this move like Hammond’s Kirby or something. Right, of course, rats piloting mechs, Piranha Plant is in Smash, we’ve had movesets for candy bars before, nothing is sacred, character’s strength and physics don’t matter, throw what’s possible or not out the window, etc.



Moving on to the down tilt, you’re right, shooting opponents in the foot can be useful. My teammates miss the head all the time. Also, if you shoot below the belt it’s not classified as attempted murder. This move is functionally perfect. It looks like a tilt, it plays like a tilt, and it feels like something Wrecking Ball would naturally do while following the logic of the jab and forward tilt. The speed of the shots wraps back around to my suggestion on the jab about it being too slow and bumping up to three shots per second. This tilt does three shots in a fraction of that time, so why not the jab? There are balance issues, sure, but one must also consider a continuous logic of moves. If someone sees Hammond’s down tilt shoot that fast, they’ll ask why his jab doesn’t shoot that fast. One can assume Hammond will fire just as fast for his jab as it’s a much more useful application of the cannons than aiming down, right? Eh, I’m ranting again.



Also, where is the dash attack?! Did you forget, or are you just going to use the excuse that the ball mode is his dash attack, huh? Here’s an idea: how about dashing while in a ball form causes Wrecking Ball to fire a tether to the stage to halt his forward momentum and reverse it in the opposite direction? One second he’s rolling forward and then, a twang. His grappling hook sticks into the stage and goes taut, pulling him quickly back while he is engulfed in flames and then detaching to release him in the opposite direction while maintaining his momentum. There, I did the work for you. You’re welcome. (You don’t actually have to use this, this is just an example of creating an input where one could easily use a mechanic as an excuse to get out of it, such as making ground attacks the aerials on a flight-based character or making a universal throw. It also solves the problem of having all that ground momentum but nothing to burn it on because you run out of stage.)



Now for the aerials after standards, because presumably they’re more important than smashes, due to his wrecking ball playground? I appreciate you keeping the bullet drop off logic consistent between the neutral air and the jab. I also like that it can still be used during a shorthop. I was about to write that I would be using this shorthopped to punish aerial approaches and win the neutral game but you’re already thinking along those lines. One of the best mindsets one can have when writing a moveset is that of an actual Smash player, thinking along the lines of how this would naturally be applied in game. The neutral air continues the idea of moving while firing, so I feel kind of bad for chewing you out about it in my forward tilt comment because I see that there’s a consistent logic to Hammond that you employ that breaks the normal rules. This is great, and totally fine! As long as the moveset itself operates under consistent logic you can break new ground while exploring Smash’s rules, especially if that logic makes sense to the character. Hammond’s mech can move and shoot at the same time, so it totally makes sense that he could move during the shooting animations of moves.



Your forward aerial naturally continues the logic we’ve been discussing, and since it's after the neutral aerial it’s fresh in the reader’s mind. Guiding the reader’s train of thought along like this is just an excellent writing technique and really helps build the moveset’s flow. The forward aerial itself is a solid attack and I can see the situations I’d rather be using it while shorthopping rather than the neutral aerial. They also hit in a similar area of effect, so one could reasonably mix-up the neutral game by switching between the two and punish opponents who get above him, which is what you profess you want to happen. Up tilt can also punish footstool-style assaults to help keep the foe in line. These moves are all great because Hamston’s soft, exposed little rat body is the most vulnerable part of him. You’re doing good so far as I’m reading.



Okay, the down air is worded hilariously because you write that Wrecking Ball leans forward and then Hammond does something. Now, I know the two can be used to refer to the same thing, as in the mech plus the hamster, but in this case I for some reason was thinking Hammond referred to the hamster part only, so I imagined Hammond’s furry little feet popping out to swing and kick the foe. Yeah. Then the move trips me up even further with its odd wording of “robotic arms extending outwards” when you refer to them as feet earlier in the move. I think you mean to write “robotic legs” here, just so you know. It’s a good move and I see why Wrecking Ball needs it to set up opponents where he wants them (underneath) and I like that you relate it back to Piledriver but since you didn’t express how Piledriver interacts with opponents in the air I’m skeptical of the combo potential this move should provide.



Turning Point USA is a fun move, in theory. I say in theory because it’s functionally broken for the function you and I both want it to preform, and that is chaining swings together. It has longer starting lag than the rest of his aerials and when combined with the two second cooldown on his up special, I don’t see how one could pull this off as feasibly as we want. With some cooldown/lag tweaking this could be the coolest aerial (and the coolest non-special) attack in the set, so unless I’m horribly misjudging it I’d love if you could make this work!



The last aerial to talk about, up aerial, is pretty much standard in what I expected, but now it’s four shots in quick succession. I assume they fire in a left-right-left-right pattern, or is it more like left-left and right-right at the same time? More detailed attack animations would help in this case, but considering the brevity of it I am just going to assume that you rushed it, which is a shame. I would have talked about the potiential for knocking the foe into mines with this to knock them off the top blast zone, but it probably doesn’t do that much knockback if the bullets follow the same knockback logic. I can see this as sort of an aerial juggle while Hamston repositions himself on the ground after shorthopping. There’s quite an interesting aerial game going on here but there’s not much touched on it.



The smashes are pretty brief so I don’t know how brief my comments will be. First things first: the forward smash is great, but why does it deal more damage and knockback uncharged than Wrecking Ball speeding at the opponent like a bat out of hell? I mean, surely there’s more power in the forward momentum gained from swinging than just shoving forward with a flick of the c-stick, right? Also, why is it twenty frames of extra lag out of ball mode now, rather than fifteen? I mean, you did say “about fifteen” so you’re right, but that tripped me up because I had to go back to the mechanic section to reread that data point. Adaptive shield also increases priority now? Well, sure, one hitbox hitting an opponent’s hurtbox before they hit the other’s is how overriding priority works (I think) but still this was something I think should have been mentioned in the neutral special. Other than all of that, I like what you’ve got here. The move feels natural, just right, even if we have that end lag.



I really like the down smash. It’s super cute just imagining Hammond shooting down into the mech, perhaps even bending down and leaving his fuzzy little tail and legs wiggling in the air as he digs up some faulty mines and tosses them out. Cute, chittering death. The function of the moves is great and fits in to his playstyle of heavy stage control. It’s a kind of move we see all the time in MYM but it feels right at home here, especially with his other mines. You even describe them as sparking to indicate they’re defects. Attention to detail with the little moves like that is something that shines through briefly with your set and others I read that I want to see more of in general, so thank you! The only real problem I see here is chaining c-sticked down smashes together. The first one is laggy but the explosions cover you and the subsequent lag on the spammed move as you move after using it and can pop more out as soon as those detonate. Also, Hammond blowing a load is not something I want to read in a sentence ever again.



Up smash has pretty good utility if you can ever pull the second hit off. I think the juice is definitely worth the squeeze here, since the payoff of planting a mine and a down smash while they’re pitfalled is strong enough to offset what happens usually half the time you’ll use this, and that is the opponent DIs out of the first hit or just dodges then punishes Wrecking Ball with their most powerful move due to those overbearing lag frames. All in all, a decent and balanced move. It does make me think that it along with his forward smash are pretty... tame, I guess, compared to the interesting ideas you present in the rest of his moves. It surprises me because MYM often treats smashes as pseudo-specials. Not that having moves like this is a bad thing, don’t get me wrong. I’d rather have balanced but tame smashes rather than three extra specials. The smashes slot into Wrecking Ball’s playstyle very nicely: a much-needed power smash in the forward smash for KOing foes; a stage control smash that punishes ground approaches in the down smash; and a variable up smash that has the possibility of a great payoff to set up interactions with other moves in his set. Nicely done here.



The end is in sight now, so it’s time to knock out these throws. I’d like to let you know that the grab subverted my expectations pleasantly, that’s really cool! I’ve never seen a tether grab that doesn’t pull the characters into melee range, so I’m trying to come up with the implications this has. Obviously having a long-range grab and long-range throws is a very defensive strategy, rather than the usually aggressive grab games of other characters, especially heavyweights. I’d be interested to know what Warlord thinks of this. This could potentially set up some situations where the foe is in harm’s way and Wrecking Ball is not. Obviously in a free for all this could be the case, but what about traps and stage hazards that would damage Wrecking Ball as well? I mean, this is almost a trap itself, as when you boil it down the Hamston player presses a button and the foe gets locked in place. I know proximity mines don’t damage Wrecking Ball but there is some play to be had there. Not just his special mines, could one use a fully charged down smash then snap the foe in place to make them get hit by it? They could always dodge, sure, but when they come out of dodge frames they’ll have to deal with the explosives.



Anyway, the throws. I really like Adele’s forward throw. The most logical idea to follow up “What can I do with a grab that keeps foes at range?”. It even functions as a throw because it bounces foes up, although I don’t quite know what you mean by “higher angle”. What I’m assuming here is that Wrecking Ball kind of hops up when he snaps to the foe and bops them from like a position like... Sonic’s down special, if you know what I mean here? Hop up then bounce off the foe? Yeah, that’s what I think’s going on here, except the purpose is to position them where they get hit by his non-specials. I like the callback to the adaptive shield, very good job of keeping what’s important in focus and reminding the readers of interactions, because the lack of a playstyle section here means readers will have to forge these in their mind manually, and not everyone has the best reading comprehension and move flow envisioning. Reminding the reader of move interactions may be patronizing to some but I think hand holding should be encouraged, even down to the deepest details. If the reader can’t see it’s there, they’ll often think it’s not there.



Back throw is also a great continuation of the train of thought and a perfect inverse of the forward throw. Oh, this reminds me, in both the forward and backward throw, is the character who is being reeled in (Adele in the forward throw, the foe in the back) a hitbox? If another foe gets hit by the one in motion, do they take any damage or knockback? I know it’s a bit silly to ask, but I can’t reasonably assume that if a character is in the path of another character zipping by as the effect of a move they won’t at least take some light upwards knockback. Good job talking about move interactions here, again. Like I said, it helps guide the reader along and sometimes help clarify parts of the move. For instance, you telling that it confirms into forward tilt helps one note where the foe is positioned by the move.



Up throw is also hilarious, I can just imagine it right now. Well, most of it. I’m struggling with the angles and form of this move a little bit, so bear with me. My first thought is Hammond yanks them in an arc above him, sort of like how a sword user will swing their sword in an arc from one side of them to the other for an up tilt or smash. Then I realized he releases the hook, so now I’m imagining him launching them at a strictly diagonal angle upward? I know this is just a complaint reliant on my reading comprehension, but I still thought I’d point that out. I do find it a little detrimental to Wrecking Ball to put foes above him where he’s most vulnerable. Personally, I’d focus on fighting the foes on the ground and minimizing risk of getting Ganondorf Stomped or any other powerful down aerial. Not that it’s too much of a burden on Wrecking Ball. Move inputs are ultimately up to the player to do, and they can decide whether they want to use up throw and other upward attacks to fight the opponent on that axis or just keep them horizontal. He also needs weaknesses, of course, and this can be seen as one of them.



While I’ve got that on my mind, I’m curious as to whether or not up tilt, up throw, and down throw make the hamster hurtbox larger since he crawls out of his mech to perform these moves. On the throws it doesn’t matter in a duel since there’s no one to hit him during the move but this could come up in an FFA situation. I like the down throw, by the way, as it is perfectly logical to use after the grab and sets up the foe where Hammond likes to have them. Like you wrote, great situational usefulness but no KO power. I’d assume the foe sets off the mines in their path if they’re dragged in like this, as well as in the back throw. Does this interrupt the throw, if this is the case? It would be awesome if they do. All in all, the throws are done pretty well, and I have only minor complaints about them.



As for the final smash, I like that you’re following Smash Ultimate’s final smash trends. Keeping logic consistent with other fighters in Smash, not just MYM, is important. You could have just directly implemented Wrecking Ball’s ultimate from Overwatch and this would have been an awesome final smash that both meets expectations for anyone who has played Overwatch and also fit his playstyle with what is already established in his moveset. As it is now, I really dislike the whole “going to Junkertown” part, especially since you have no Junkertown stage extra. This is not really a problem with you, it’s a problem with the philosophy behind final smashes that Ultimate introduced that I dislike. Other final smashes also do a cinematic stage change and an instant KO, and I admit that I do not like that at all. This is only just personal preference- the move itself is a perfect final smash.



So, now to close with my thoughts on this moveset. You’ve got a great anchoring stage-control playground set that’s implemented smoothly and elegantly. It’s not clunky except in a few spots, it has good flow and an obvious playstyle for anyone who read along. There’s wiggle room in here to play Wrecking Ball in different ways against different characters, and there is also plenty of room for character and stage counterpicks. Wrecking Ball players will obviously want to prioritize picking certain stages over others, and in fact his up special encourages picking stages that aren’t commonly picked and some that are even considered bad. I could see a Wrecking Ball player actually learning these stages and having an upper hand against people who usually shrug them off and thus aren’t acquainted with them as personally. The up special is my favorite move I’ve read this contest because of how excellently it plays with stages and the rest of his kit. Side special was a move that grew on me as I read the set and holds the set together like a bonding agent. I love the reduced FAF on Wrecking Ball’s cannon moves, which would be really interesting to use especially when chaining together attacks and zoning out the foe. There are a few flaws here, certainly, but I pointed out all I could think of and they can simply be fixed in a matter of minutes with edits to numbers and some added detail. Nothing is horribly balanced and everything is communicated well. It’s a smooth reading experience that’s not a headache to work through and can be read in one sitting, so I don’t see a reason not to read this set! Some things I would like to see more to just flesh it out are some extras like taunts, animations, costumes, and maybe even a Junkertown stage. You’ve done a great job translating Hamston from Overwatch to Smash so this would be a breeze for you as you have so much source material to work with. For example, his skins from Overwatch, his voice lines, and his taunts are already provided by Blizzard, just insert a few GIFs. A playstyle section detailing move flow and strategy would be nice as well, but not necessary. Good job Ryan, I’ll be keeping an eye on more activity from you.


Creativity [The moveset's creative use of the grappling hook, proximity mines, and FAF get this moveset a high rating.]
Originality [There are definitely a lot of unique ideas here, even though some of the core ones have been done before.]
Writing [Wrecking Ball's ideas are presented and communicated clearly enough for the reader to grok his intentions most of the time, but there are spots that made me stop due to lack of communication.]
Presentation [The moveset is very clean and pleasant to look at. An average score here is actually quite good, but more flair could raise its score higher. Consider adding more images.]
Characterization [Again, an average score here isn't a bad thing. There were no out of character parts of the set, but there were also minimal details that expressed the character of Wrecking Ball himself.]
Detail [You nail the necessary details, most of the time. Consider what I pointed out was missing that was required for understanding the set and this score will be higher.]
Learning Curve [Wrecking Ball looks to be a low skill floor, high skill ceiling character. This is what we need in a moveset. It doesn't get the highest score due to that a Wrecking Ball player will still have to practice in training for hours mastering stages, zoner matchups, and mine positioning.]
Playstyle [Wrecking Ball's playstyle is great. It fits him well as the concept behind his inception, as a good translation of his Overwatch kit, and how a character like him should play in Smash. Sometimes in the set it does seem like it wants to pull in a different direction, though, so not every move slots perfectly with the rest.]
Balance [Aside from a couple of moves, the set seems perfectly balanced, as all things should be. Some times it feels overbearing but other times I read moves that felt like they should be stronger.]
Extras [There are no extras to speak of, so consider adding some, or at least the ones that are easiest for you to port into his moveset.]
 
Last edited:

WeirdChillFever

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It’s nice to see you posting a moveset Ryan, and one for one of my favorite characters from Overwatch as well! Hamston may not be a great tank but he certainly is fun to swing around with. Let’s see if that translates into Smash.



The ball mechanic is a fun idea. I like that he has altered stats in this mode, and that stats section with the character icons as reference is always something I thought was a neat way of representing stats. How does one double tap a dash, however? Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t dashes initiated by double-tapping the control stick? I would like it more if he had more than two stats altered by this mode change as well, rather than just traction and ground speed. I would assume, for instance, that Wrecking Ball’s jumps would be affected by his mechanical legs retracting into the ball mech. Other stats that I would naturally assume are affected by ball form: rolls, dodges, get up options, differences between walking and running speed (rather than just one lumped “ground speed”), techs, and shielding.



This moveset could also do with some animation descriptions, especially the previously mentioned jumps. This helps the reader really get a feel for the character and gives the set some boosted personality. Overwatch characters are intentionally bursting with personality. Blizzard designs them in such a way, so they sell more merchandise. The set also lacks taunts and victory poses, and even alternate costumes which is a shame because Blizzard also provides those to you already made. Just include a screenshot of Wrecking Balls skins from Overwatch.



There're no technical problems with the ball form as you have it, and in fact it works just as well as I could imagine switching between the two could in Smash. Both transforming into ball mode and reverting to normal mode happen naturally and are balanced. I would have written it slightly differently, however, as you don’t describe the benefits of the special mechanic to get the reader excited but include the major drawback of extra lag. It’s hard to get excited for having 15 frames of lag on one’s attacks and having better speed but the worst traction in the game isn’t going to improve that disposition. When opening with the most important and exciting part of the moveset, hype it up as much as you can to make the reader excited to read more. This lesson can be learned from Cutesy Beau: really interesting mechanic but worded in such a way that it turns everyone off of being interested in it. That being said, I’m not most people, so I both get what you’re going for and do like it.



The second mechanic of the set is one I also approve of. It’s a mechanic I’m sure has been done before but no sets come to mind. The only one I can think of now that resembles it is Beezwax, and that mechanic operated differently. This mechanic fits Wrecking Ball’s character and playstyle quite nicely and gives more incentive to be excited for ball mode, so I approve. I don’t believe it’s too overpowered. A R.O.B. that has a bigger hitbox and takes 0.9% instead of 1% from hits on most of his body but 1.5% on a spot most aerials hit isn’t game-breaking. In fact, he has even worse matchups against some characters because of this. Can you imagine getting tipped in your soft hamster body by Marth, or perhaps every other Fox laser hit dealing double damage? With that being said, the armor is a nice passive boost that helps maintain his stability and play that tank-style character he was designed to be.



Now I’m moving on to the special attacks. Adaptive Shield is another translation from Overwatch and plays pretty much identically to how it does in his home game, even down to the shield duration and cooldown. The ability to turn it off to conserve cooldown time is a function I assume was inspired by D.VA’s defense matrix. Like the passive armor, this is an ability that Hamston needs to play that anchoring tank role, so I appreciate you making this the neutral special rather than the obvious route of his cannon fire. I’m totally down with the function here, the reduced damage and knockback functioning better up-close makes sense although more than likely if it was the same at any distance one would be using it up-close anyway due to the function the shield serves. Most projectiles, for instance, don’t do much damage or knockback.



One question I have that’s not clearly answered is if the shield’s damage reduction is fixed when he uses the move or if it gains or loses protection as he moves around with the shield active. This is important because it changes how one initiates the move due to the duration of the move and the lag frames at startup. If its fixed when he uses the move, this makes using it directly near the foe paramount and thus makes him vulnerable to punishment with the tradeoff of essentially having a second shield to absorb blows the foe throws out, such as a charged move. On the other hand, if the shield’s protection increases as he moves closer when he uses it far away, this lets Wrecking Ball use the move with relative safety and then have a safe approach to the foe to regain stage control and the neutral game. The drawback with this strategy is that approaching with the shield active means less time for it to actually absorb blows, thus causing longer cooldown times. There’re merits in either direction depending on how you intend for Wrecking Ball to play, so clarify this detail and you’re good on this move. As for the actual balance issues of the duration of the shield and the length of the cooldown, I can’t speak with certainty, but as of now that function of the move is fine with me.



Side special is an interesting inclusion to me, but not a bad one. It acts as a great stage control option, and he can have out three at a time? That’s pretty strong, imagine if Snake could have three C4 out at one time, but they don’t need to be manually detonated and only deal half damage. The enemy can take care of them if they have a projectile, of course, but not every character has one. The mines are also described as proximity mines but only detonate when in direct contact with a foe, rather than just proximity. You would have to dial down the strength of the knockback slightly if you increased their proximity radius, but it would fit the name more (and how they were in Overwatch). There’s no attack speed or lag description on this move, so with the assumption there is none this can become quite powerful. As soon as the enemy defuses one, Hamston can immediately replace it, giving him powerful stage control and the strongest anti-approach game in the roster. I would recommend making them detonate from being taken down with damage for flavor’s sake, rather than having them harmlessly vanish. Minesweeping is an extremely dangerous business, with the explosives being able to set off by a stray bullet at any time.



Without reading any other moves yet, how would I use the mines effectively? The first approach that comes to mind is spacing them apart in a horizontal line to make the ground level of a stage a minefield. This forces the foe to jump over them at least three times. I could also place them in a vertical line to wall off an approach. This is least likely to catch an opponent as they can simply avoid passing through that grid. The middle of these two approaches is perhaps a triangle formation or a diagonal line. I think you intend for something along these lines to be the way to use them. So how creative can we get with them? Placing them on ledges seems broken, as it prevents opponents’ recovery. They hang suspended in the air so you could actually edge guard even further by placing them horizontal to the ledge to prevent recoveries that go over it if the foe is close and below to the stage. This depends on what angle the mines deal knockback at. If its upward this makes edge guarding worse with them but if its below, sideways, or perhaps the opposite direction of the opponent’s approaching momentum then this could be seriously busted as I imagine the explosion spiking an opponent trying to recover. Well what about other placements? Wrecking Ball can place a mine behind him and behind a foe to make fighting claustrophobic or force an aerial game. Placing mines above the foe’s height forces ground fighting or sets the foe up for easy combos by knocking them back down unless they tech. You can predict techs by placing a mine in the direction the foe normally techs and techchase them for easy damage. I can also imagine placing this at a verticle blast zone and getting easy Star KOs. In conclusion, you’ve got a versatile trap that I can imagine can be a nuisance for the foe or just busted, and it’s entirely dependent on numbers. As the only way I can verify for sure the balance is to go into a game with Snake and test it out, I’m leaving it up to the masses to decide if it needs tweaking or not.



Seeing Grappling Hook on the up special made me very excited. This was the move I was looking forward to! And it almost functions exactly as I imagined. Almost, but not quite. First, what I love: using proximity mines as tether points. This is brilliant, a 200 IQ big brain moment to incorporate his wrecking ball momentum on a stage with no platforms. Move interactions like this make both moves better by association. The ability to recover with mines this way is also pure genius. Wrecking Ball is now what is known as a playground moveset, and as it should be. This fits how me and every other quick play bronze in Overwatch plays him. Why shoot the attackers when you can spin around Hanamura’s bell the entire round? The move has no significant balance issues that I can see, but I did have a few questions about the finer details. This is a rather facetious question, but can he be absorbed by Game & Watch’s Oil Panic? He is treated as a projectile during the fireball state, after all. Also, is the tether considered a grab hitbox or a disjointed hitbox? I am aware it can’t grab foes, but I’m wondering issues of priority. Can it even be clashed with an opponent? What happens if the foe is between the ledge and Wrecking Ball’s grappling hook? I assume it passes through them, latches on to the stage, then Wrecking Ball snaps to the ledge and deals some amount of knockback and damage to them. This would definitely come up in edge guarding wars so it is something that would be nice to know.



The way I’m currently interpreting Wrecking Ball’s wrecking ball is that a tap of the stick will send the hamster swinging in that direction at a fixed speed. What I’d love even more is if there was an adjustable momentum gain depending on how the player rotates the control stick, like how it is in Overwatch and like the game Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy. I know, it’s a strange game to correlate Wrecking Ball with, but bear with my logic here. In Getting Over It, the player doesn’t simply move in a direction by tapping a button. They must use the mouse’s movements to generate the momentum needed to move the player character forward. What I’m envisioning here for Wrecking Ball is hanging from a ledge, let’s say a mine placed in the middle of Final Destination in the air. In a state of no movement, Wrecking Ball is hanging from it, still, like a Christmas ornament. The player tilts the control stick left, and Wrecking Ball slowly swings left. Now, if they release the stick, Wrecking Ball would swing back to the right, missing the position he was originally in (at rest). He’d swing back to the left, but not go as far this time, then back right like a pendulum, and after a few swings of no input he’d end up at rest again. Now, say we have this scenario again, but instead of releasing the control stick, Wrecking Ball’s player applies a tilt to the right when Wrecking Ball swings left. Wrecking Ball then moves faster to the right, gaining more speed and momentum and carrying him further in his arc. Swinging back left with the same momentum will make him faster and somewhere in here we get his fireball state. This incredible speed and momentum would take longer to return to his rested state with no control stick input from the player. I just described grappling hook physics in a complicated way but that’s basically the gist of how I’d imagine it functioning if I wrote it. Now, this may just be a miscommunication error, and this is exactly how you intended it to work, but without clarity and detailed communication to the reader there’s not a definite way for them to know this. Describing things briefer is simpler and more elegant but the devil is in the details and the readers interested in the more technical details are often left in the dark and have to infer for themselves or probe for more.



Oh, and I’d love if Wrecking Ball could attach to walls, floors, or ceilings with this move. That would go against the snapping to the ledges which is honestly a much better feature when trying to recover but perhaps there could be an option to manually aim the grappling hook? Realistically you can’t swing in an arc if the tether is attached to a wall or the ground but tethering to the ground and flinging the hamster forward to approach or retreat could be a great option available, especially if he got the fire boost. Tethering to the side of Final Destination and throwing yourself up to possibly jump on to the stage is probably not something that can happen realistically because the opponent could just punish with a fully charged smash attack but could lead to some exciting moments where a greedy opponent gets smacked into the void. I love that he can keep foes sucked in to the hitbox with a windbox to smack-smack them around. The damage and knockback on this move are just right, so good job on that, and the two second cooldown is certainly balanced but seems a little too long for my tastes.



The down special rounds out his Overwatch ability kit translations nicely. Again, this move functions almost identically to how it is in the game, but it just works so naturally that readers unfamiliar with the game or the character would believe you came up with it. Everything about this attack is perfect, even the ground momentum burst that I described in just the last paragraph before reading this. It just now occurred to me that you could put the ability to transform into a ball on the shield special, or perhaps even from the conception you could have given his natural shield the mode switch ability. This does present the problem of forcing mode changes on the player, unless they toggle the option in a character menu. It’s so great how the move flows and interacts with the rest of his specials, you’ve done a really good job so far. I do find it odd that this does so little knockback since it should have the same force as a momentum-carried Wrecking Ball, but I suppose it is necessary to put them within melee range and that this would probably be too frustrating to play against with all of his mines, his high mobility, and his punishing options for foes that get near him. Also, what happens to foes who get caught by his hitbox while he’s in midair? Do they get knocked upwards as well as if they had been on the ground, or do they take a more natural angle to the side, down, or diagonally?



Time to move on to the standard attacks and see if the meat of the set holds up. I predicted the jab would be here after the absence of the cannons from the specials. Just like in Overwatch, it’s pretty weak, at least at a distance. Thank you for including bullet damage dropoff, that’s a detail that I often forget about when reading sets involving firearms (and some of you when writing it). To get further realism we’d include ballistics, but this is a hamster in a death mech we’re talking about here so that’s a non-issue. The ability to move while firing is something I never even thought of but honestly it just makes sense. You say he can fire off about two per second and I’m not sure if that’s too low or not, it seems a little slow to me but then again he has a projectile jab that can keep firing. I think it should be just a smidgeon quicker, like maybe three a second? It’s not overbearing because his jab would stale quicker, but one bullet every twenty frames seems right to me.



The forward tilt is so... boringly named. Come on Ryan, did you run out of name juice? It does an apt job of describing what the move does though, so okay, I guess? I like what you’ve got going here, the idea behind the move is fitting Wrecking Ball and actually fine. Some details bother me. For instance, you say it’s “essentially confirmed to hit” but ignore directional influence and air dodges from the opponent, unless Wrecking Ball’s cannons track foes. The next sentence also contradicts this as you state it can miss smaller targets. Next, I’m wondering what exactly is the ending lag and animation that moving negates, as you don’t describe it other than the fact you can take it away. On a similar note, why does moving while shooting give Wrecking Ball the ability to act sooner than not expending energy, making him unable to act? Moving during this attack is a really neat idea that I like, don’t get me wrong, but it seems sort of contrived for artificial flow, as perhaps an afterthought for needed move interactions. I also do realize that it follows the same logic as moving during the jab, so if that’s the reason you came up with it, then that’s reasonable. The only reason I’m on your *** about this is I like having a consistent logic in mechanics and attacks and this sort of breaks that logic (the idea that attack animations and lag frames that don’t explicitly move the player prevent other actions during their duration). Oh, and one last thing. If the opponent gets bounced from the down special, you wrote that the forward tilt’s shots should hit them. However, would Wrecking Ball realistically have enough time to come out of his impact (which takes 40 recovery frames), swipe with his arm, and then shoot them with the cannon while they’re still in the air?



Something that would be hilarious but go against the direct philosophy of the moveset would be for Hamston to be able to be grabbed or knocked out of his mech during the up tilt. I’m not saying do it, I’m saying it would just be funny. Perhaps a Zero Suit Hammond in the future? I digress. This move is still pretty cute. How is it possible for an Earth hamster to juggle Bowser? Or imagine Ridley getting wombo’d with this move like Hammond’s Kirby or something. Right, of course, rats piloting mechs, Piranha Plant is in Smash, we’ve had movesets for candy bars before, nothing is sacred, character’s strength and physics don’t matter, throw what’s possible or not out the window, etc.



Moving on to the down tilt, you’re right, shooting opponents in the foot can be useful. My teammates miss the head all the time. Also, if you shoot below the belt it’s not classified as attempted murder. This move is functionally perfect. It looks like a tilt, it plays like a tilt, and it feels like something Wrecking Ball would naturally do while following the logic of the jab and forward tilt. The speed of the shots wraps back around to my suggestion on the jab about it being too slow and bumping up to three shots per second. This tilt does three shots in a fraction of that time, so why not the jab? There are balance issues, sure, but one must also consider a continuous logic of moves. If someone sees Hammond’s down tilt shoot that fast, they’ll ask why his jab doesn’t shoot that fast. One can assume Hammond will fire just as fast for his jab as it’s a much more useful application of the cannons than aiming down, right? Eh, I’m ranting again.



Also, where is the dash attack?! Did you forget, or are you just going to use the excuse that the ball mode is his dash attack, huh? Here’s an idea: how about dashing while in a ball form causes Wrecking Ball to fire a tether to the stage to halt his forward momentum and reverse it in the opposite direction? One second he’s rolling forward and then, a twang. His grappling hook sticks into the stage and goes taut, pulling him quickly back while he is engulfed in flames and then detaching to release him in the opposite direction while maintaining his momentum. There, I did the work for you. You’re welcome. (You don’t actually have to use this, this is just an example of creating an input where one could easily use a mechanic as an excuse to get out of it, such as making ground attacks the aerials on a flight-based character or making a universal throw. It also solves the problem of having all that ground momentum but nothing to burn it on because you run out of stage.)



Now for the aerials after standards, because presumably they’re more important than smashes, due to his wrecking ball playground? I appreciate you keeping the bullet drop off logic consistent between the neutral air and the jab. I also like that it can still be used during a shorthop. I was about to write that I would be using this shorthopped to punish aerial approaches and win the neutral game but you’re already thinking along those lines. One of the best mindsets one can have when writing a moveset is that of an actual Smash player, thinking along the lines of how this would naturally be applied in game. The neutral air continues the idea of moving while firing, so I feel kind of bad for chewing you out about it in my forward tilt comment because I see that there’s a consistent logic to Hammond that you employ that breaks the normal rules. This is great, and totally fine! As long as the moveset itself operates under consistent logic you can break new ground while exploring Smash’s rules, especially if that logic makes sense to the character. Hammond’s mech can move and shoot at the same time, so it totally makes sense that he could move during the shooting animations of moves.



Your forward aerial naturally continues the logic we’ve been discussing, and since it's after the neutral aerial it’s fresh in the reader’s mind. Guiding the reader’s train of thought along like this is just an excellent writing technique and really helps build the moveset’s flow. The forward aerial itself is a solid attack and I can see the situations I’d rather be using it while shorthopping rather than the neutral aerial. They also hit in a similar area of effect, so one could reasonably mix-up the neutral game by switching between the two and punish opponents who get above him, which is what you profess you want to happen. Up tilt can also punish footstool-style assaults to help keep the foe in line. These moves are all great because Hamston’s soft, exposed little rat body is the most vulnerable part of him. You’re doing good so far as I’m reading.



Okay, the down air is worded hilariously because you write that Wrecking Ball leans forward and then Hammond does something. Now, I know the two can be used to refer to the same thing, as in the mech plus the hamster, but in this case I for some reason was thinking Hammond referred to the hamster part only, so I imagined Hammond’s furry little feet popping out to swing and kick the foe. Yeah. Then the move trips me up even further with its odd wording of “robotic arms extending outwards” when you refer to them as feet earlier in the move. I think you mean to write “robotic legs” here, just so you know. It’s a good move and I see why Wrecking Ball needs it to set up opponents where he wants them (underneath) and I like that you relate it back to Piledriver but since you didn’t express how Piledriver interacts with opponents in the air I’m skeptical of the combo potential this move should provide.



Turning Point USA is a fun move, in theory. I say in theory because it’s functionally broken for the function you and I both want it to preform, and that is chaining swings together. It has longer starting lag than the rest of his aerials and when combined with the two second cooldown on his up special, I don’t see how one could pull this off as feasibly as we want. With some cooldown/lag tweaking this could be the coolest aerial (and the coolest non-special) attack in the set, so unless I’m horribly misjudging it I’d love if you could make this work!



The last aerial to talk about, up aerial, is pretty much standard in what I expected, but now it’s four shots in quick succession. I assume they fire in a left-right-left-right pattern, or is it more like left-left and right-right at the same time? More detailed attack animations would help in this case, but considering the brevity of it I am just going to assume that you rushed it, which is a shame. I would have talked about the potiential for knocking the foe into mines with this to knock them off the top blast zone, but it probably doesn’t do that much knockback if the bullets follow the same knockback logic. I can see this as sort of an aerial juggle while Hamston repositions himself on the ground after shorthopping. There’s quite an interesting aerial game going on here but there’s not much touched on it.



The smashes are pretty brief so I don’t know how brief my comments will be. First things first: the forward smash is great, but why does it deal more damage and knockback uncharged than Wrecking Ball speeding at the opponent like a bat out of hell? I mean, surely there’s more power in the forward momentum gained from swinging than just shoving forward with a flick of the c-stick, right? Also, why is it twenty frames of extra lag out of ball mode now, rather than fifteen? I mean, you did say “about fifteen” so you’re right, but that tripped me up because I had to go back to the mechanic section to reread that data point. Adaptive shield also increases priority now? Well, sure, one hitbox hitting an opponent’s hurtbox before they hit the other’s is how overriding priority works (I think) but still this was something I think should have been mentioned in the neutral special. Other than all of that, I like what you’ve got here. The move feels natural, just right, even if we have that end lag.



I really like the down smash. It’s super cute just imagining Hammond shooting down into the mech, perhaps even bending down and leaving his fuzzy little tail and legs wiggling in the air as he digs up some faulty mines and tosses them out. Cute, chittering death. The function of the moves is great and fits in to his playstyle of heavy stage control. It’s a kind of move we see all the time in MYM but it feels right at home here, especially with his other mines. You even describe them as sparking to indicate they’re defects. Attention to detail with the little moves like that is something that shines through briefly with your set and others I read that I want to see more of in general, so thank you! The only real problem I see here is chaining c-sticked down smashes together. The first one is laggy but the explosions cover you and the subsequent lag on the spammed move as you move after using it and can pop more out as soon as those detonate. Also, Hammond blowing a load is not something I want to read in a sentence ever again.



Up smash has pretty good utility if you can ever pull the second hit off. I think the juice is definitely worth the squeeze here, since the payoff of planting a mine and a down smash while they’re pitfalled is strong enough to offset what happens usually half the time you’ll use this, and that is the opponent DIs out of the first hit or just dodges then punishes Wrecking Ball with their most powerful move due to those overbearing lag frames. All in all, a decent and balanced move. It does make me think that it along with his forward smash are pretty... tame, I guess, compared to the interesting ideas you present in the rest of his moves. It surprises me because MYM often treats smashes as pseudo-specials. Not that having moves like this is a bad thing, don’t get me wrong. I’d rather have balanced but tame smashes rather than three extra specials. The smashes slot into Wrecking Ball’s playstyle very nicely: a much-needed power smash in the forward smash for KOing foes; a stage control smash that punishes ground approaches in the down smash; and a variable up smash that has the possibility of a great payoff to set up interactions with other moves in his set. Nicely done here.



The end is in sight now, so it’s time to knock out these throws. I’d like to let you know that the grab subverted my expectations pleasantly, that’s really cool! I’ve never seen a tether grab that doesn’t pull the characters into melee range, so I’m trying to come up with the implications this has. Obviously having a long-range grab and long-range throws is a very defensive strategy, rather than the usually aggressive grab games of other characters, especially heavyweights. I’d be interested to know what Warlord thinks of this. This could potentially set up some situations where the foe is in harm’s way and Wrecking Ball is not. Obviously in a free for all this could be the case, but what about traps and stage hazards that would damage Wrecking Ball as well? I mean, this is almost a trap itself, as when you boil it down the Hamston player presses a button and the foe gets locked in place. I know proximity mines don’t damage Wrecking Ball but there is some play to be had there. Not just his special mines, could one use a fully charged down smash then snap the foe in place to make them get hit by it? They could always dodge, sure, but when they come out of dodge frames they’ll have to deal with the explosives.



Anyway, the throws. I really like Adele’s forward throw. The most logical idea to follow up “What can I do with a grab that keeps foes at range?”. It even functions as a throw because it bounces foes up, although I don’t quite know what you mean by “higher angle”. What I’m assuming here is that Wrecking Ball kind of hops up when he snaps to the foe and bops them from like a position like... Sonic’s down special, if you know what I mean here? Hop up then bounce off the foe? Yeah, that’s what I think’s going on here, except the purpose is to position them where they get hit by his non-specials. I like the callback to the adaptive shield, very good job of keeping what’s important in focus and reminding the readers of interactions, because the lack of a playstyle section here means readers will have to forge these in their mind manually, and not everyone has the best reading comprehension and move flow envisioning. Reminding the reader of move interactions may be patronizing to some but I think hand holding should be encouraged, even down to the deepest details. If the reader can’t see it’s there, they’ll often think it’s not there.



Back throw is also a great continuation of the train of thought and a perfect inverse of the forward throw. Oh, this reminds me, in both the forward and backward throw, is the character who is being reeled in (Adele in the forward throw, the foe in the back) a hitbox? If another foe gets hit by the one in motion, do they take any damage or knockback? I know it’s a bit silly to ask, but I can’t reasonably assume that if a character is in the path of another character zipping by as the effect of a move they won’t at least take some light upwards knockback. Good job talking about move interactions here, again. Like I said, it helps guide the reader along and sometimes help clarify parts of the move. For instance, you telling that it confirms into forward tilt helps one note where the foe is positioned by the move.



Up throw is also hilarious, I can just imagine it right now. Well, most of it. I’m struggling with the angles and form of this move a little bit, so bear with me. My first thought is Hammond yanks them in an arc above him, sort of like how a sword user will swing their sword in an arc from one side of them to the other for an up tilt or smash. Then I realized he releases the hook, so now I’m imagining him launching them at a strictly diagonal angle upward? I know this is just a complaint reliant on my reading comprehension, but I still thought I’d point that out. I do find it a little detrimental to Wrecking Ball to put foes above him where he’s most vulnerable. Personally, I’d focus on fighting the foes on the ground and minimizing risk of getting Ganondorf Stomped or any other powerful down aerial. Not that it’s too much of a burden on Wrecking Ball. Move inputs are ultimately up to the player to do, and they can decide whether they want to use up throw and other upward attacks to fight the opponent on that axis or just keep them horizontal. He also needs weaknesses, of course, and this can be seen as one of them.



While I’ve got that on my mind, I’m curious as to whether or not up tilt, up throw, and down throw make the hamster hurtbox larger since he crawls out of his mech to perform these moves. On the throws it doesn’t matter in a duel since there’s no one to hit him during the move but this could come up in an FFA situation. I like the down throw, by the way, as it is perfectly logical to use after the grab and sets up the foe where Hammond likes to have them. Like you wrote, great situational usefulness but no KO power. I’d assume the foe sets off the mines in their path if they’re dragged in like this, as well as in the back throw. Does this interrupt the throw, if this is the case? It would be awesome if they do. All in all, the throws are done pretty well, and I have only minor complaints about them.



As for the final smash, I like that you’re following Smash Ultimate’s final smash trends. Keeping logic consistent with other fighters in Smash, not just MYM, is important. You could have just directly implemented Wrecking Ball’s ultimate from Overwatch and this would have been an awesome final smash that both meets expectations for anyone who has played Overwatch and also fit his playstyle with what is already established in his moveset. As it is now, I really dislike the whole “going to Junkertown” part, especially since you have no Junkertown stage extra. This is not really a problem with you, it’s a problem with the philosophy behind final smashes that Ultimate introduced that I dislike. Other final smashes also do a cinematic stage change and an instant KO, and I admit that I do not like that at all. This is only just personal preference- the move itself is a perfect final smash.



So, now to close with my thoughts on this moveset. You’ve got a great anchoring stage-control playground set that’s implemented smoothly and elegantly. It’s not clunky except in a few spots, it has good flow and an obvious playstyle for anyone who read along. There’s wiggle room in here to play Wrecking Ball in different ways against different characters, and there is also plenty of room for character and stage counterpicks. Wrecking Ball players will obviously want to prioritize picking certain stages over others, and in fact his up special encourages picking stages that aren’t commonly picked and some that are even considered bad. I could see a Wrecking Ball player actually learning these stages and having an upper hand against people who usually shrug them off and thus aren’t acquainted with them as personally. The up special is my favorite move I’ve read this contest because of how excellently it plays with stages and the rest of his kit. Side special was a move that grew on me as I read the set and holds the set together like a bonding agent. I love the reduced FAF on Wrecking Ball’s cannon moves, which would be really interesting to use especially when chaining together attacks and zoning out the foe. There are a few flaws here, certainly, but I pointed out all I could think of and they can simply be fixed in a matter of minutes with edits to numbers and some added detail. Nothing is horribly balanced and everything is communicated well. It’s a smooth reading experience that’s not a headache to work through and can be read in one sitting, so I don’t see a reason not to read this set! Some things I would like to see more to just flesh it out are some extras like taunts, animations, costumes, and maybe even a Junkertown stage. You’ve done a great job translating Hamston from Overwatch to Smash so this would be a breeze for you as you have so much source material to work with. For example, his skins from Overwatch, his voice lines, and his taunts are already provided by Blizzard, just insert a few GIFs. A playstyle section detailing move flow and strategy would be nice as well, but not necessary. Good job Ryan, I’ll be keeping an eye on more activity from you.


Creativity [The moveset's creative use of the grappling hook, proximity mines, and FAF get this moveset a high rating.]
Originality [There are definitely a lot of unique ideas here, even though some of the core ones have been done before.]
Writing [Wrecking Ball's ideas are presented and communicated clearly enough for the reader to grok his intentions most of the time, but there are spots that made me stop due to lack of communication.]
Presentation [The moveset is very clean and pleasant to look at. An average score here is actually quite good, but more flair could raise its score higher. Consider adding more images.]
Characterization [Again, an average score here isn't a bad thing. There were no out of character parts of the set, but there were also minimal details that expressed the character of Wrecking Ball himself.]
Detail [You nail the necessary details, most of the time. Consider what I pointed out was missing that was required for understanding the set and this score will be higher.]
Learning Curve [Wrecking Ball looks to be a low skill floor, high skill ceiling character. This is what we need in a moveset. It doesn't get the highest score due to that a Wrecking Ball player will still have to practice in training for hours mastering stages, zoner matchups, and mine positioning.]
Playstyle [Wrecking Ball's playstyle is great. It fits him well as the concept behind his inception, as a good translation of his Overwatch kit, and how a character like him should play in Smash. Sometimes in the set it does seem like it wants to pull in a different direction, though, so not every move slots perfectly with the rest.]
Balance [Aside from a couple of moves, the set seems perfectly balanced, as all things should be. Some times it feels overbearing but other times I read moves that felt like they should be stronger.]
Extras [There are no extras to speak of, so consider adding some, or at least the ones that are easiest for you to port into his moveset.]
This stuff's longer than some of my sets. Outstanding work!
 

Rychu

Thane of Smashville
Joined
Jul 5, 2010
Messages
810
3DS FC
1908-0105-4965
For those that haven't seen, I've made some changes to Wrecking Ball based on the feedback! Thanks to Kafka and Khold so far!
 

FrozenRoy

Smash Lord
Joined
Apr 26, 2007
Messages
1,260
Location
Las Vegas, Nevada
Switch FC
SW-1325-2408-7513
"If light and darkness are eternal, then surely we nothings must be the same...



...Eternal."


In the universe of Kingdom Hearts, every person is composed of the body, the soul and the heart. When a heart is consumed by darkness, it splits off and becomes a creature of darkness, creatures known as the Heartless.

The body and soul left over, however, becomes something else entirely: a Nobody. Without a heart, a Nobody is a mere emotionless vassal of memories, defying all laws of existence with its very presence. Most Nobodies are contorted shells of their old forms, with little to do but live aimlessly under the guidance of greater powers.

Some, however, retained their human appearances thanks the strength of their former hearts. Some chose to instead seek out a way to regain their lost hearts, with the goal of completing themselves. These few yet powerful and undeterred Nobodies are known as Organization XIII.

Each member is a unique entity, wielding a distinct weapon and elemental power. Each is capable of upsetting the balance of whole worlds, if it would further the Organization's goals. And each lack the ability to feel empathy, regret, and fear - not until they find the hearts that they seek.

Organization XIII has joined the battle…for what purpose, no one knows...


Battle Xemnas again, but be warned--this time he is stronger.

No. I XEMNAS
Organization XIII's leader.
Through power over nothing, he seeks power over everything.
Weapon: Ethereal Blades


"Anger and hate...are supreme..."

TBA


Battle Xigbar again, but be warned--this time he is stronger.

No. II XIGBAR
Founding member.
He keeps an ear to the ground and a finger on the trigger. Manipulates space.
Weapon: Arrowguns


"Today you get to work with me, tiger."

TBA


Battle Xaldin again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. III XALDIN
Founding member.
A warrior with a silver tongue. He carries six lances and can harness the wind.
Weapon: Lances


"I'd only waste my time attempting to explain it to you."

TBA


Battle Vexen again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. IV VEXEN
Founding member.
A brilliant scientist with dominion over ice...and a personality to match.
Weapon: Shield


"Pity to be so ignorant. As you're only able to see the surface of things, I should not expect you to appreciate my true might."

TBA


Battle Lexaeus again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. V LEXAEUS
Founding member.
Tremendously strong, but surprisingly quiet---stalwart as the earth itself.
Weapon: Tomahawk


"Let us bide our time and see what develops."

TBA


Battle Zexion again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. VI ZEXION
Founding member.
An intellectual with no room for feelings. He can create illusions at will.
Weapon: Lexicon


"The Organization used to be the rope that binds us. And now it's full of kinks."

TBA


Battle Saix again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. VII SAIX
Second in command who longs for the heart he does not have.
Only the moon breaks his icy calm.
Weapon: Claymore


""A heart... if I had a heart..."

TBA


Battle Axel again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. VIII AXEL
An assassin who puts his agenda first, and everything else on the backburner.
Wields fire.
Weapon: Chakrams


"Think I'll pass. My heart just wouldn't be in it, you know? Haven't got one."

TBA


Battle Demyx again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. IX DEMYX
Prefers to kick back with his sitar, and leave the dirty work to the water under his command.
Weapon: Sitar


"Oh, we do too have hearts! Don't be mad..."

TBA


Battle Luxord again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. X LUXORD
Life, to him, is just a game to be won...
And he has all the time in the world to do it.
Weapon: Cards


"The fun is in not knowing, isn't it? What is the point of betting on something when you already know the outcome?"

TBA


Battle Marluxia again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. XI MARLUXIA
In the arc of his scythe, flowers grow and all also perishes.
His pretty face hides ugly motives.
Weapon: Scythe


"This castle and the girl Naminé have been entrusted to ME. Defy me, and you defy the Organization."

TBA


Battle Larxene again, but be warned--This time she is stronger.

No. XII LARXENE
Wields sharp knives and a sharper tongue.
Her lightning strikes as quick as her temper.
Weapon: Knives


"All right, have it your way. It'll kill you to hear this — but I can live with that."

TBA


Battle Roxas again, but be warned--This time he is stronger.

No. XIII ROXAS
A boy, newly aware of himself.
His light shines as bright and brief as the setting sun.
Weapon: Keyblades


"How many times do I have to beat you?"

TBA
 

FrozenRoy

Smash Lord
Joined
Apr 26, 2007
Messages
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Location
Las Vegas, Nevada
Switch FC
SW-1325-2408-7513
"Where's the fun in this?"

No. III
Xaldin, the Whirlwind Lancer

#3 in the Organization, Xaldin is one of the founding 6 members of it and one of the disciples of Xehanort from when he was a normal person (well...that's complicated, haha, but you know what I mean) doing experiments on the heart. His original name was Dilan. Of all of the original 6 members of Organization XIII, Xaldin gets the least to him (except arguably Lexaeus): Xemnas of course is the main villain, while Xigbar ends up incredinly relevant to his plans (and got a lot more screen time to begin with). Vexen, Lexaeus and Zexion all appeared in Chain of Memories with Vexen in particular playing a large role and so were more memorable. Xaldin mostly is remembered for his boss fight being a very tough one (especially for new players) and having very large sideburns. He doesn't get a ton in 358/2 Days either, although there he is shown to be rather a jerk...but also a pretty competent jerk: He insults Roxas quite a bit, but his advice is pretty much always sound and useful. Given that the height of the Organization's thrones is based on how many missions they've successfully completed (...yes, really. Kingdom Hearts is a hell of a drug, okay?) and Xaldin's is the 2nd highest, he must have done a good deal of missions...then again, seeing as he has mostly been seen doing recruitment and blatantly has an implicit insult hurled at him he totally missed maybe he just has gotten gluttonous on the easy missions.

Personality-wise, Xaldin is ruthless and somewhat of an emotional sadist whose primary role in Kingdom Hearts II is to attempt to break The Beast and have control him using his anger to turn him into a Heartless and thus a Nobody (which leaves open the possibility one of Xehanort's vessels was going to, in fact, be The Beast from Beauty and the Beast). Personal diary entries suggest he is envious and vexed by The Beast, as he has a strong heart yet squanders it on "love" and impractical matters. He meets his end when he gets socked in the gut by Belle and Sora kicks his ass. This is rather ironic: Xaldin earlier lectures Luxord on not being overconfident against Sora, lest he die like Demyx did...and yet it is Xaldin who dies from overconfidence which Luxord at least makes it to the end game.

Oh, and he's british for some reason. I guess if Xigbar can be a Californian Surfer, this works too. Why does Organization XIII have two brits?

Xaldin is if nothing else an intimidating foe. His elemental power is over wind, which he uses in much more of a power manner than the common "gentle" or "finesse" focused wind user. He also wields six lances collectively known as "Lindworm": While he wields 2-3 at one time in his hands, the rest hover around him on his wind powers, giving him impressive coverage by spreading them out...or he can combine the lances together for extremely wide sweeping attacks instead. He can leap onto opponents in the style of a Dragoon (His Nobodies are even based on the Dragoon class!), crashing down onto them with his lances: A powerful ability, but also a downside, as Sora can mimic the attack and leap onto him for large damage. He can shoot out strong balls of pure wind, create a wind shield to defend himself and constantly walks on the air slightly above the ground. His ultimate technique is to fuse his lances into a huge dragon, which shoots out a devastating gale vortex that obliterates those who fail to dodge it.


+================> \ \ \ Statistics / / / <================+



Xaldin is one of the heaviest members of the organization, built quite large with the weight to match. His size might best be compared to a larger Ike or a more broad Ganondorf: The swirling lances around him may make him appear larger and more intimidating, but they are naturally not hurtboxes. His weight is tied with Charizard (116), leaving him the 4th heaviest character in the game. While Xaldin's ground speed is not poor, it is rather underwhelming: It is tied with Ike (and 4 other characters) for the 38th-42nd spot. His walk speed is an intimidating slow walk, which means he only walks as fast as Robin (47th). Xaldin always walks or dashes forward just above the ground, which like Meta Knight's dash has no purpose other to be aesthetically cool. When he crouches, he brings his knee to the ground. He has high traction on par with Rosalina and Palutena.

Xaldin prefers the unconstrained movement offered by the air to the ground, where his mediocre ground speed offers him few benefits. Xaldin moves through the air with grace: His air control is high, he moves through the air as fast as Wario (5th) while being as floaty as the Hero of Winds (Toon Link, 52nd). You can imagine how well he weaves in and out as being close to Wario, as well. Xaldin's wind manipulation gives him a strong first jump, a strong second jump and additionally has a third jump which is not incredibly high but is a lot more height-y than something like a Kirby.

In battle, Xaldin wields two of his lances in his hands at all times, while he wields 4 lances in the air behind him: This is rather important, for reasons we will soon get to. Just like Smash Ultimate, the number of lances Xaldin is wielding is kept track of next to his character portrait.


+================> \ \ \ Specials / / / <================+


+=============> \ \ \ Down Special: Lindworm / / / <==============+


Xaldin tilts his head, commanding one of the four lances in front of him to strike down in front of him as a piercing strike. This strike deals 12% damage and is a moderately strong spike: Off stage, it can certainly kill...but do not expect it to do so especially early. The strike is somewhat laggy, but not terribly so, and the ending lag is moderate. Xaldin can tap B more times to strike again with somewhat reduced starting lag, although it is too slow to frame trap air dodges and opponents can rather easily escape. Xaldin briefly stalls his aerial descent when using this move in the air. After the move is over, the lance Xaldin used to strike will stay floating in place in front of him: If Xaldin used this move multiple times, all of the lances used will stay there. Lances stay in the air vertically aligned while idle, just like they were stabbed down. They float slightly above the ground while on the ground and in place in the air. Lances are not at all solid: Objects, opponents, projectiles and so on pass by them harmlessly.

Xaldin can still make use of these lances when they are on the field. They will mimic some of his attacks: Most prominently, they will mimic all of his Smash Attacks in varying ways. Xaldin can use his Shield Special to command his lances to strike at opponents, allowing him to perform unique combos and kills off the sides or top of the stage. Some of his attacks instead interact with his lances, such as picking them up for additional assaults. Xaldin gains a once-per-air-trp directional air dodge in the direction of his lances when he is close to them (about half a Smart Bomb Blast radius). This does not mean placing Xaldin's lances is strictly something he should do mindlessly or that it is always beneficial. Various attacks of Xaldin's gain additional benefits the more lances he has on him at the time, including his smashes, for example. Xaldin should consider not only where he places his lances, but how many lances he wants to invest and how many he wishes to keep on his person.

If you want to easily get a lance back, simply use this move while holding down B in front of a lance. Xaldin will seamlessly add the lance back onto his person. It is quite low lag. Good for if you simply want to alter your setup quickly. Tapping B only places another lance the same way as above. A note, as well: Placing lances in the same spot bundles the lances up. For moves they mimic which give benefits the more lances you have, the bundled lances count as all of the lances. So if you bundle two lances together, that counts as two lances. This reduces the amount of stage control you have, but can make your attacks more important. As with many things in Xaldin's set, it comes down to a tradeoff.


+=============> \ \ \ Shield Special: Lindworm / / / <==============+


Xaldin's Shield Special ties directly into his Down Special. Specifically, Xaldin's Shield Special allows him to control one of his lances. By default, the first lance you place is the one you "control", but you can change that. Which lance you control at any time is surrounded by a light blue aura.

Alright. So here's how the Shield Special works. Press B and you enter Lance Control Mode. While you're in lance control mode, your shield remains up, which means it will drain. You can think of that as a bit of a time limit, even outside of the opponent hitting you. It also means you can utilize this move during shield stun, and the opponent can't shield stun you out of it (they CAN grab you out of it, though!). While Xaldin is in lance control mode, he has a pondering look on his face and scratches his chin while in shield and the lance's aura flares more to life. From here, Xaldin can do one of three commands.

The most obvious is simply that Xaldin can move the control stick without pressing any additional buttons to switch control to whatever lance is in that direction. The aura goes with where you move. Simply move the control stick again to get to the next lance that way if there's, say, a bunch in a line or whatnot. Bundles are all controlled at once. This is near lagless, allowing Xaldin to seamlessly control whatever lance he needs to at a moment's notice.

If Xaldin holds down B, he will command the lance to head right towards him. Naturally, the lance is a hitbox as it travels back to Xaldin. It deals 8% damage and decent knockback in the direction the lance is flying. Seeing as how the lance is flying straight towards Xaldin, this inevitably will knock the opponent towards Xaldin himself. The lance travels fairly fast. Once the lance has been recalled to him, it cannot be stopped: Lance control shifts to the lance nearest to the opponent. The lance rejoins the lances in Xaldin's posession. You need to hold down B a bit to get this move to happen, so as to prevent accidental mis-inputs with the last command.

If you hold down B + a direction, Xaldin will instead command the lance to perform a stronger thrust in the chosen direction. It travels one Battlefield Platform while dealing 12% damage: It kills at around 160%. Xaldin is not limited in the direction he can fire the lance, just like Fire Fox. The knockback is in the direction the lance travels: You are free to try to set it up in the air, then spike opponents into oblivion or back into your heartless clutches. The lance cannot be commanded again until it reaches its destination and travels a bit faster than the version towards Xaldin. Xaldin can change what lance he controls while the lance travels, if he so desires. The lance remains wherever it travels to once it reaches the end of its journey. One note about lances hitting opponents in general: If the opponent is on their regrab timer, it refreshes said timer. This is simply to prevent any uncouth infinites that remain unforeseen. If the opponent is not on their regrab timer, there is no issue.

To exit this move, Xaldin simply must drop his shield. Xaldin suffers considerable lag when dropping his shield after commanding his lances, a price to pay for an incredible combo tool and defensive ability. Xaldin can jump or perform a grab to end this state instead, but this too has additional lag at the start of the action. Put simply, Xaldin must suffer some kind of penalty to his speed in order to command his lances. On the other hand, it is an out of shield option that functions perfectly as an IN shield option that offers combo and kill potential when used to its fullest: The price for power is well worth the cost.


+=============> \ \ \ Up Special: Dragoon Reign / / / <==============+


Xaldin throws one of his lances extremely high before crouching down, his other hand against the ground (or air if he is in the air) while his body shudders with power and the wind around him grows more intense. The lance is thrown very high, and by very high, I mean absurdly high: 5 Ganondorfs into the air, barely out-touching King Dedede's own Up Special which is 4.5 Ganondorfs. Xaldin then leaps to catch the lance Ike-style, rising at an absurdly fast pace. Note that the lance can be thrown left/right with more range than Ike's Aether, but it still is not ultra impressive horizontal range. Xaldin is super armored after he throws the lance, but throwing the lance does have some lag attached to it. The lance rising into the air deals 9% damage and moderate upwards knockback, Xaldin himself is not a hitbox on the way up. Once he is up there, Xaldin has two options. If he does nothing, he simply enters helpless: Given how high he goes, it can be quite a while before he lands, so it is pretty dangerous.

Pressing B will allow Xaldin to instead dive straight down, pointing his lance downwards. It takes a moment for Xaldin to re-orient himself, but he drops extremely quickly: It is not trivial to stop this dragoon's dive, and steps need to be taken before he drops (even if it is as simple as putting up shield). This move has two hitboxes: One for hitting aerial opponents, one for hitting grounded opponents. If Xaldin hits an aerial opponent, they are spiked while taking 10% damage with moderate strength. Xaldin himself will stop where he hits the foe in midair, with all of the jumps he had before leaping up and not in helpless. Note that Xaldin cannot stop diving aside from hitting the foe or the ground: It is quite risky to use this as an off stage gimp, although it is possible.

Grounded foes take more damage, 12%, but the knockback is rather weak: It sets up pretty nicely for combos, although given this is a high leaping attack with a (very fast, admittedly) drop you aren't going to be catching out grounded opponents all that easily or often. Still, it can lead into quite a bit of damage, and the fast drop can make it difficult to avoid despite the notable starting lag. This is especially notable when combined with another aspect of Xaldin's Up Special.

See, I mentioned what happens when you press B, but holding B at the start of the move changes things up. Xaldin throws his lance above his currently selected lance, rushing to it with the normal speed. Both the lance and Xaldin will go through solid objects during this time, with Xaldin and the lance being cloaked in the same darkness-teleporting effects of an Organization member using the Corridors of Darkness (thus explaining how they can). Xaldin then descends downward with the normal effects (he cannot end the move without falling with this variant), stopping once he reaches the current lance (even in midair) and not in helpless. Xaldin picks up the placed lance at the end of the move: His controlled lance becomes the closest lance to the opponent.

Xaldin can cancel this variation into another Dragoon Reign, which he can do up to the number of lances he has out. In short, Xaldin can leap across the entire battlefield as long as he has placed lances appropriately: Alternately, he can place lances in such a way that if he drops on the foe he can combo multiple Dragoon Reigns into the foe for extremely high damage at the cost of investing his lances somewhat inefficiently. Xaldin cannot Up Special without landing unless he cancels and since he picks up his lances he cannot simply infinitely cancel the move so no worries there. Given this move has low landing lag, it can also simply serve as a massive mobility tool and make camping against Xaldin a bit more of a pain if he sets lances around the stage. Keep all of this in mind: Xaldin's Up Special is far from a mere recovery!


+=============> \ \ \ Side Special: Zephyr / / / <==============+


Xaldin's lances spin rapidly in front of him, collecting air in the middle of their spin before launching it out as a maelstrom of slicing, deadly wind! The properties of this move depend heavily on how many lances Xaldin has on his person, including even the starting lag. One thing that stays the same is the behavoir: The ball of wind goes in an up-and-down pattern, kind of like Dr. Mario's Megavitamins but without ever touching the ground and a bit less pure vertical (and no change based on where the move was launched). With only two lances, this move deals only 6% damage, is a bit larger than Mario's fireball, deals minor knockback (the hitstun isn't too bad, tho) and travels only one Battlefield Platform. This comes out pretty fast. With all six lances, this projectile deals 14% damage, is about 3/4ths the size of a Samus Charge Shot, deals solid although not amazing knockback (Lets say it kills at...170%?) and travels up to 3.5 Battlefield Platforms. This comes out on the slow end, however. With 4 lances (the middle) it deals 11% damage, is more around half a Samus' Charge Shot size, deals mediocre knockback and travels 2.75 Battlefield Platforms with average starting lag. 3/5 Lances are in the middle of 2/4 and 4/6 respectively. All of the Zephyr variations have the same rather low ending lag.

Xaldin can only have one of these projectiles out, but this is not due to some arbitrary limit: Side Special is instead used to manipulate this move when it is out. Side Specialling back causes the projectile to seamlessly begin travelling the other way after a brief command by Xaldin, adding 0.5 Battlefield Platforms to its range. Pressing forward causes it to briefly speed up to 1.5x its normal speed while also adding 0.5 Battlefield Platforms of range to the move: Perfect for catching out people who love to live on the edge or are especially far away. For either of these commands, Xaldin can angle the control stick up or down to adjust the trajectory of his projectile (he can also do this when first firing it). This causes the projectile's "middle", the part it swerves up and down from, to adjust diagonally along that path. It, however, adjusts this relative to how the projectile is moving at that time. So if the projectile was moving up and you manipulated it up diagonally for example, you could make the projectile start almost straight-up instead. Utilizing this technique ultimately allows Xaldin to send this projectile in almost any direction. Xaldin can command his wind once if it was made with 2 lances, twice if it was made with 4 lances and three times if it was made with 6 lances.

This is Xaldin's primary projectile option. He can't spam it, but the ways he can move it will keep his opponents on his toes and allow him to better corrall them: This move is one of Xaldin's better reasons NOT to spread all his lances, able to keep his projectile out for up to a gross 5 Battlefield Platforms and zig-zag it back and forth during all this time. Alternately, having some lances out means Xaldin can use a more mid power wind ball while having lances out and use his impressive range control to try and make people either dodge towards the lances or take an unwanted hit: Threaten them with a Dragoon Reign or a smash attack from there and they'll be feeling pinched. If you have almost no lances this move is not especially good, but it is far from useless: The starting lag is quite low with two lances, for example, and Xaldin can quickly launch it simply to try and force a quick reaction or surprise the opponent, then follow up with a move like a grab. It is simply a useful move, albeit somewhat specific in each incarnation, no matter the situation...but you'll almost always like it better with more lances on you.


+=============> \ \ \ Neutral Special: Wind Shield / / / <==============+


Xaldin's Neutral Special is his wind shield: With a press of B, Xaldin commands the wind to defend him, forming a turmuluous gust around him stronger than normal that appears as a circular shield of wind. Xaldin can hold down B to keep this shield up until he counters an attack or is grabbed out of it: Xaldin cannot attack during his wind shield, but he can input attack commands to cause his lances to mimic what those attacks would be doing. The wind shield itself functions somewhat as a counter. If the shield is struck, a large gust of wind pushes away anyone who is near Xaldin and the shield drops with minimal lag meaning Xaldin usually gets to retaliate with a move of his own. How much the foe is blown away depend son the strength of the countered move. The gust does not interrupt the rest of the foe's move and ending lag, so exactly how punishable the foe is depends on those factors. Xaldin can walk at his walk speed while the shield is up along with using his first jump. Putting the shield up is somewhat laggy, but dropping the shield is quite a low commitment.

Xaldin's wind shield becomes energized when it counters an opponent's attack, as seen by Xaldin being surrounded by a green aura (like he does when using some moves in his Kingdom Hearts II fight). This changes the Neutral Special on its next usages, with no time limit on how long. The charge can be used in one of two ways. The first is to simply pull up the "shield", which pulses with energy and has a segmented look to it akin to the Reflect spell in the Kingdom Hearts series, and then release the B button to fire off an area of effect attack that sends out blasts of wind all around Xaldin. This deals 1.2x the damage of the countered attack in a moderate-small area around Xaldin. It is fairly fast to come out if Xaldin wishes, so it can be utilized as a get off me move, a threat to approaching opponents or potentially as part of a combo. Of course, most counters are a 100% strike, so in that regard Xaldin is at a disadvantage...but you can get an attack off the foe getting countered while saving this for a potential 2-fer.

Xaldin can hold this out just like his counter version, although the shield can no longer, well, shield Xaldin while holding a charge: It will crack, harmlessly break and leave Xaldin to be hit in the face if he is struck. It does mean Xaldin can move with it, and it also opens Xaldin to utilizing it another way. Holding down B and double tapping a direction causes Xaldin to instead rush 1.5 Battlefield Platforms in a chosen direction as the wind shield "breaks" into a huge wind boost to move him along: The speed at which he rushes is determined by the countered move. More power, higher speed. Xaldin suffers ending lag only at the end of the dash and it is minimal: Xaldin can input any attack he wants to move while dashing from this command dash and will use it while dashing, allowing Xaldin to use almost anything as a movement option. Xaldin can use his smashes in the air by dashing in the air with this move, opening up entirely new ways to eviscerate your opponents.

While the counter is the direct way of utilizing this, in some ways the command dash is the more powerful tool: It allows a burst mobility option to the normally slower Xaldin that must be respected due to low end lag commitment and the number of options he has while performing it. It can be used as a recovery aid: It does not put Xaldin into helpless. After using either of the powered up wind shield options, he must block another attack to power it up again. It fits perfectly into Xaldin's more defensive playstyle and can be quite a move to deal with when getting past his lances and Zephyr to actually deal with him up close. The command dash when combined with Dragoon Reign offer Xaldin impressive mobility for someone who is normally quite slow on the ground: Xaldin's "burst mobility" is key to the offensive part of a defensive character.


+================> \ \ \ Standards / / / <================+


+=============> \ \ \ Jab: Dragoon's Maw / / / <==============+


Xaldin performs a simple thrust with a Lindworm lance. Press A again and he does it again. This can be repeated over and over again: The more lances Xaldin has on him, the faster he can do so as he can command one of the waiting lances to stab forward. Or, to put it most simply: More lances on Xaldin's person, faster rate ofjab spamming. The thrust itself has two hitboxes as a sourspot and a sweetspot, but it is a bit of a misnomer: It'd be more accurate to say the sourspot is for damage racking/combos and the sweetspot is for getting space. The large handle is the sourspot and deals 4% damage while pretty lightly knocking the opponent forward. The sweetspot instead deals 8% damage and gets opponents out of Xaldin's face, at some percentages it can force a tech but the knockback doesn't really offer Xaldin a "tech chase" normal...if there is a lance where the opponent is prone, however, he could potentially tech chase with that. The first hit of this attack can combo into itself. How long depends on the opponent's damage percentage and how many lances Xaldin has on him. With full lances on a 0% opponent you can get quite a high amount of damage indeed before the opponent either escapes or is pushed to the sweetspot. The higher the foe's damage %, the sooner they will escape or be pushed into the sweetspot before Xaldin can utilize all of his lances. Starting lag on this jab is kinda slow, with subsequent thrusts taking less time to come out. When Xaldin runs out of all lances on hand (IE has jabbed 6 times with all 6 lances), he has to go through the longer starting lag again to use this. Ending lag is average.

All of Xaldin's lances that are out will mimic this move, thrusting themselves forward as a hitbox when Xaldin uses this move. This is potentially rather dangerous: The lances mimic every time Xaldin uses it, so the faster Xaldin can use it the more hits he will get off of it. Xaldin could potentially set up a lance facing him in front of himself and jab to hit the opponent from both sides, although this is A. predictable and B. Not as useful as it sounds because it'll usually get the opponent launched away via sweetspot easier + is pretty easily DI'd out of by DIing up. It is still solid damage racking, though. The more important part is it allows Xaldin a relatively quick (slightly laggy for a jab is still pretty quick!) way for Xaldin to poke at far away foes...and he can potentially damage rack them sourspot to sweetspot on the far away lances if he has enough on him. This move has some careful lance management aspects to it: The more lances you have on you, the faster you can jab and so the more you can get off a set lance. Of course, more set lances allows more setups, allows you to start the damage racking from more positions and so on. For the jab, it usually comes down to the foe's damage percentage: As the percentage climbs, you can't combo more lances into the attack no matter how many you have on you and thus investing them elsewhere for this move becomes stronger.


+=============> \ \ \ Forward Tilt: Scorpio Strike / / / <==============+


Xaldin brings the two lances he holds in his hands back, then strikes them forward in a pincer-style attack: The two lances meet and cross at their pointed tips. This move has two hitboxes. Most of the attack is a rather useless sourspot: It deals 6% damage, it knocks opponent's away with horribly mediocre knockback, it is safe on hit but unsafe on shield and it leads into absolutely nothing. It is basically just there for safety and you should almost never intentionally try to hit the sourspot. The sweetspot deals 12% damage and strong knockback that either creates a lot of space for Xaldin or can be used as a kill move. It kills at 155%. The sweetspot, of course, is where the tips of the lances meet. The starting lag is somewhat higher than average, while the ending lag is pretty much just average.

This move gains additional functionality with more lances on Xaldin. With 4 lances on him, the other two lances will mimic this move but vertically aligned (IE going upwards) above Xaldin. It has the same stats, except the knockback now goes predominately up. And with 6 lances, the other two lances perform the same move but striking behind Xaldin, with the knockback going that way now if it hits as well. Put simply, this becomes one of Xaldin's strongest tools for his defensive playstyle: Xaldin can use this move and cover in front of him, above him and behind him all in one move. You can sweetspot for strong knockback on someone in the air, you can strike at someone shorthopping towards you while covering higher aerial options, and so on and so forth. This is one of Xaldin's stronger tools that he loses utility from when placing his lances down and is one of the bigger plusses for keeping them on him.

Xaldin's lances will not mimic this move alone. However, a lance bundled with another lance will mimic it. It is reasonably strong to mimic, but also means that Xaldin can invest his lances in covering other areas instead of around his body. It is not the most useful of Xaldin's lance-setting options: It is usually better to, for example, utilize one of Xaldin's smash attacks. But it can still be ocassionally useful.


+=============> \ \ \ Up Tilt: Eye of the Storm / / / <==============+


One of Xaldin's simpler moves, Xaldin takes one of the lances in his hand and horizontally spins it above him. This deals three hits of 2.5% damage each (so 7.5% total) and lightly knocks opponents into the air: It is fast for Xaldin to pull this move out and it has quite low lag while the horizontal spin offers a little bit of horizontal coverage. Because of this, it can serve as a bit of a panic button move. The knockback is premium for starting an aerial combo and is the move's main purpose. Can't be too surprised a wind elementalist likes the air, can you? This can combo into either hit of Forward Aerial (we'll get to that) at lower percentages, combos into Up Aerial at basically any percentage and Xaldin can situationally go for a read with his Up Smash for a trio of examples.

Xaldin spinning the lance creates a pretty weak wind hitbox above him that can drag people down. Every lance Xaldin has on him increases the windbox's strength, essentially helping to shore up one of the moves primary weaknesses: It has pretty lacking vertical range for an Up Tilt. Another reason that up hit on Forward Tilt looks juicy, huh? The wind hitbox is actually pretty strong with 6 lances, so Xaldin can drag people pretty well into the hit, and potentially chain Up Tilt into Up Tilt once at lower percentages. The windbox has a vertical range of 1 Ganondorf and the width is equal to the width of the spinning lance.


+=============> \ \ \ Down Tilt: Aero-Reverse / / / <==============+


Xaldin swipes the palm of his hand across the ground, sending out a forceful gale of wind that travels across the ground. It has a kind of wedge shape. (Think like this: _\) The gale itself is rather weak: It only deals 5% damage. However, the weak knockback it has is actually towards Xaldin, and combined with the pretty short ending lag this is one of the primary moves Xaldin has for bring opponents towards him and enabling a combo. Up Tilt is good for air combos, but Down Tilt is stronger for ground combos: Spacing/percentange dependant it leads into Forward Tilt's sweetspot for example, you could go for a Jab for damage racking, you get the idea. The starting lag for this move is more average. The projectile travels one Battlefield Platform and is pretty fast. The low to the ground nature of the hitbox allows it to shieldpoke, but it also means it is very easily jumped over. Then again, Xaldin can perhaps make use of them being in the air, attempting to intercept with an aerial, Up Tilt, Forward Tilt or perhaps even a smash.

If this gust passes over one of Xaldin's placed lances, the lance will begin spinning (still vertically aligned) and moving towards the direction the gust came from. It is a hitbox during this time and deals rapid hits of 1% each that can add up to 8% as it travels back about half of a Battlefield Platform at a slow pace. Multiple lances can in fact be spinning due to this move and can overlap their damage. This can, therefor, become a brutal damage racker. Although if you're placing a bunch of lances in a row on the ground, the opponent should really know something is up, and you are giving up a lot of space control consolidating it that way. Even just once lance opens the opponen up to more combos than just hitting them with the gale, and the gale hitting them INTO the lance is an even better enabler. This is important as it does potentially allow Xaldin to setup into his kill moves, albeit it tends to be rather specific (too high of damage, for example, and the opponents will escape the multihit too fast).


+=============> \ \ \ Dash Attack: Solemn Sweep / / / <==============+



Xaldin rushes forward, performing a sweeping attack with all of his lances on hand as he does so: Xaldin deals 4% damage per lance on hand, so a minimum of 8% damage and a maximum of a whopping 24% (assuming they don't fall out, of course: Each hit is a seperate hit in this move). Xaldin will grab any lances outside of himself, AKA the ones he set out, as he rushes and sweeps outwards. Xaldin ends this move with a dramatic arm sweep forward, throwing out any of the lances he collects out in a fan pattern. The lances he used for the initial sweep are too out of position to be used for this. Each lance thrown out in this manner has additional power and thrust to it, dealing 5% damage each: If Xaldin set as many lances as possible and struck them out with this, it would deal 20% damage and also be highly predictable. Knockback from the first hit is combo-able with minimum lances, a space creator for most lance amounts, but does kill at 165% with full lances. The secondary hit is more powerful and kills at 135% if Xaldin picked up 4 lances with the move. How well the two hits combo into each other heavily depends on the number of lances Xaldin is using, with less lances on the first hit being preferred. However for the most part the two hits will generally combo. Once the move ends, Xaldin returns all lances he picked up onto his person.

Xaldin can use this move to threaten opponents near his lances, especially if he bundles them. The timing of the secondary sweep allows it to catch out spot dodges and the length of his lances means he can catch out back rolls, although if an opponent is close enough they can roll BEHIND Xaldin and punish him! The move also does have some notable starting lag to it, making it easy to see coming: The ending lag isn't awful nor is it quick, so Xaldin can definitely get punished, although the ending lag is shorter if Xaldin has no lances fo the 2nd hit (because he won't perform it with no picked up lances, obviously). Consider it a situational yet dangerous move, really.


+================> \ \ \ Smashes / / / <================+


+=============> \ \ \ Forward Smash: Heartpiercer / / / <==============+



Xaldin strikes forward with both of his lances on hand, commanding every other lance to strike forward as well! This piercing blow is Xaldin's strongest move, if you hit the sweetspot anyway. The sweetspot is actually CLOSE to Xaldin as well, where the force of the lance's piercing is strongest: It deals 5%-7% for every lance on him, meaning it deals 10%-14% minimum...and 30%-42% at maximum! That's incredibly potent and while the lowest hit is weak, the strongest hit kills at an awesome 85%-62%. This is a very good reason for Xaldin to keep his lances on him! It is, however, only the sweetspot. A sweetspot that isn't too big and rather close to him. The rest of the lance is a sourspot that only adds 3.5% damage per lance, making a minimum strike of 7%-9.8% and a maximum strike of 21%-29.4%. The sourspot is unsafe on hit until medium percentages unless Xaldin has additional lances on him (4 lances makes it safe at any percent, 3 makes it safe past early percents) and even the all-lance version only kills at 133%-111% although this can still be reasonable given the range or at the ledge.

Because this move has low starting lag, it is a constant threat to do a ton of damage and knock the opponent out while Xaldin has all of his lances on him. This threat will likely make opponents play more afraid and that allows Xaldin to better punish them or react to them. And if opponents do not give it at least some respect, then he should throw it out and show them how damaging it can be. Beware, however, of this move's large amount of ending lag: Should Xaldin fail to hit his opponent, he will eat a hefty punish indeed.

This should be balanced with spreading your lances, which will replicate this move. A single lance replicating this move is all but useless, but bundling your lances together allows them to perform this move as one as if they were on Xaldin. Xaldin could bundle 4 of his lances together and attempt to hit the opponent into the resulting hitbox, for example: This would deal 20%-28% damage at the sweetspot that kills at 113%-97%. The sourspot would deal 14%-19.6% and kill at 134%-113%. This is not without its own risks or downsides for Xaldin, however, such as the fact it means putting all of his spatial control in a single spot or that he has no actual threatening Forward Smash on his person. Perhaps his Forward Smash should be saved for specific situations, despite it's immense power.


+=============> \ \ \ Up Smash: Dragoon's Fan / / / <==============+


Xaldin thrusts his lances straight above him, dealing a consistant 15%-21% damage no matter where he hits on his lance. Additional lances do not add damage, but range, "fanning" out from the middle and striking at diagonal angles. With all six lances, this fanning out in addition to their length allows Xaldin to cover almost all the reasonable air space around him and makes this move a premium anti-air move. If Xaldin has an uneven number of lances, the extra lance will prioritize the direction Xaldin is facing. Knockback is mediocre, killing at 155%-135% with almost pure vertical knockback. The starting lag on this is pretty much average, perhaps a touch shorter, while the ending lag is only a touch longer than average. This means it is one of Xaldin's less punishable smash attacks overall.

Xaldin's lances will mimic this move, including fanning out if you bundle more than 2 lances together. The lances rise up to strike and then float down to their previous position. This is one of Xaldin's better moves to use with lances out in fact, becauase the power is rather strong for a single lance to use. And placing lances in the air allows Xaldin to potentially "ladder" the opponent up: Knock the opponent into the air where your lance is, then Up Smash them (possibly 50/50ing with an air dodge) to kill them earlier than a grounded strike! Using this technique allows Xaldin to potentially score an earlier kill than the mediocre knockback on this move, but it requires setup and the proper damage percent on the foe to hit them into the lance. Rarely, Xaldin can hit the opponent UNDER an aerial lance (likely one high in the sky) and then Up Special to said lance and drop down on the opponent. A reasonable combination.


+=============> \ \ \ Down Smash: Vortex / / / <==============+



Xaldin links his lances together, end-to-end, and begins rapidly spinning them around him and forming the dreaded blender of death. The range of this move is highly dependant on the number of lances Xaldin has on him at the moment, with only the base two forming a very average reach and all six making a gross 1 Battlefield Platforms of reach...to each side of him! Sit in the middle of Battlefield and let it rip if you want to really dominate some space, although this is dangerous itself. This move has two types of hitboxes on it: For most of the lance, it is a multi-hit hitbox that deals 11%-15.4% damage if the opponent is in it for the entire attack, although this is unlikely because the opponent should either DI out of it first or be forced into the sweetspot of the attack.

The lance's head, on the other hand, is a sweetspot that deals 17%-23.8% damage and will kill at 110%-90%. Now, as you may remember, the lances are aligned tip-to-tip. So when you're spinning, ALL of their handles are the multi-hits and ALL of their tips are sweetspots, essentially making alternating hitboxes of sweet and sourspots. The multi-hit hitboxes will lead opponents towards the sweetspots, forcing opponents to either DI away from it (such as by DIing up) or get hit by it. The closer the opponent starts to the tip, the easier it will be to ride them towards it. The multiple layers of danger are something for the foe to keep in mind, since getting hit with the multi-hit can either be more damaging or allow an opponent to escape a more deadly kill option.

This is another move which is a larger incentive to keep the lances stuck together, especially because it "rounds down" for odd lances: The extra lance won't be added to the spin if you have 3 or 5 lances on you. Granted, four lances still provides a pretty wide ranging attack, and so can be a pretty good midpoint as well. While this move has plenty of good, it does have some notable negatives: The long duration is a plus for catching out rolls, spot-dodges, stage control and so on but leaves Xaldin potentially punishable, especially because this move doesn't really have vertical coverage. It has long and punishable ending lag, leaving Xaldin to get struck by quite potent attacks if he does fail to slay his opposition. Finally, the starting lag while not awful is still longer than average as well. This happens to go down with less lances on Xaldin's person, since he has less lances that need to go into place: 4 lances is still somewhat laggy and punishable, but not hard punishable, and 2 lances is reasonably fast ending lag for reference points.

The range of this move is especially gross when paired with Xaldin's Neutral Special to perform a command dash: Being able to move while going crazy with this move makes the range more obscene. On top of that, though, it allows Xaldin to utilize his Down Smash in the air, requiring some precise air dodges to try and avoid the move. Xaldin can also potentially use Neutral Special to just rush off the side of the stage while Down Smashing, which can be a pretty scary edgeguarding option as well! Finally, Neutral Special's command dash makes the version of this move with less lances stronger since he can combine the long duration with movement. Do note that the movement can potentially cause your opponent to fall out of the multi-hit, so it does also have some downsides (you'll also miss out on the sweetspot they may have been hit into if they drop out!).

Any of Xaldin's lances that are out will spin in place, replicating this move: If they are bundled together, they will spin to both sides like Xaldin's lances, and they will connect tip-to-tip if Xaldin bundles 4 up. While this move is more useful personally for Xaldin while keeping all lances on him, the fact he can spread around a long lasting and rather strong multi-hit and sweetspot is actually pretty useful and can become quite strong as a kill option or spacial control option. In particular, proper lance placement and long duration makes this a good edgeguarding tool. Of course, fail and you still have that long punishing period...


+================> \ \ \ Grab Game / / / <================+


+=============> \ \ \ Grab: Scoff / / / <==============+


Xaldin scoffs, waving his hand and lance dismissively as wind swirls in front of him, forming a grab hitbox. This is reasonably average in terms of starting lag, with somewhat above average range on the actual grab, and low ending lag. Xaldin doesn't physically hold his opponents, the wind holding them up in front of him as he smirks with faux-sadistic glee at the enemy struggles in his clutches.

+=============> \ \ \ Pummel: Constellation / / / <==============+


Xaldin commands one of his lances to pierce the opponent, dealing 2.3% damage to the opponent. The more lances Xaldin has on him, the faster he can pummel: It's rather slow with only 2, a bit faster than average with 4 and surprisingly fast with 6 as an example of three possibilities.

+=============> \ \ \ Down Throw: Wind Shear / / / <==============+


Xaldin flicks one of his lances up, causing the gale surrounding the opponent to lift them up and begin slicing into them for 3 hits of 1% damage, before flicking the lance down and having the wind slam the opponent into the ground for 3% damage. The knockback on this is rather low, making it mostly good for combos. Some notable combos include a sweetspot Forward Tilt at mid percentages, Down Tilt situationally, shorthop Forward Aerial, and what have you. The amount of combos Xaldin can potentially perform increases with proper lance placement, of course.

The wind that slices into the opponent will swirl around them for 3 seconds after being thrown, which causes placed lances nearby the foe to be drawn in by it tip-first as a hitbox that deals 6% damage and light knockback in the direction the lance was moving. If Xaldin commands his lances during this time, they will continue to follow the opponent as they perform their action. This is particularly useful if you use a move such as, say, Down Smash which has a long duration. They don't move especially fast, but it does keep the opponent moving, and essentially turns Xaldin's placed lances into traps for 3 seconds. If Xaldin uses his Up Special on a lance that is following the foe, the area he drops onto will follow the lance, allowing Xaldin to essentially "track" the opponent's reaction like a twisted homing attack. This allows Xaldin some rather nice pressure without even doing anything by simply threatening it!

Lances dissolve into Xaldin's normal blue and purple look and teleport back to where they started 1 second after the status effect ends, meaning you don't wreck your setup to use this. Isn't it nice to have weapons like that?


+=============> \ \ \ Up Throw: Travelling Light / / / <==============+


Xaldin lets go of the two lances in his hands, which float and follow him, and grips the opponent in an almost suplex-esque manner as he leaps into the air like Kirby and Meta Knight's Up Throws. Xaldin naturally travels quite fast and falls very fast as well. Unlike those two, however, as Xaldin instead whips the opponent around his body and throws them to the ground 1.3 Ganondorfs above it, causing them to slam into the ground for 7% damage and be bounced into the air with fairly high knockback. The throw itself deals 3% damage, as well, for a total of 10% damage. While a combo throw at very low percentages, it largely serves as a way to hit opponents into the air and start a juggle from an aerial position. With proper lance placement, it can become a deadly kill confirm with Up Smash, but it doesn't really have any killing power on its own.

Xaldin can move somewhat left or right while he rises and falls, which allows him to reposition himself some for his lances and is generally useful. More interestingly Xaldin can continue to hold left or right (or switch to holding the other way!) in order to throw the opponent at a diagonal angle: The opponent will then bounce at a diagonal as well instead of straight up (IE they will bounce further left if you threw them left), as well. This also means you can, for example, drift left and then throw the opponent to the right, mixing up what side your opponent will be thrown at!

In addition to generally positioning with a lance, Xaldin can use this for other tricks. If he is near a ledge, this allows him to spike opponents: This loses out on 7% damage and the 3% toss is too light to kill at any reasonable percentage, but it will nonetheless put the opponent in a "recovering low" style situation at the ledge, which is a good situation for the aerially inclined lancer. You can throw opponents past the edge of a platform, for example on Battlefield, and use it to in turn change the vertical height the opponent is out, or depending on percentage bounce them clear from one battlefield platform to the platform on the other side, perhaps into the waiting jaws of a lance which the opponent felt they were safe from?


+=============> \ \ \ Forward Throw: Dragoon's Eulogy / / / <==============+


Xaldin pierces the opponent's chest with both of his in-hand lances for a total of 8% damage, sending them rocketing forward for reasonable knockback. As they rocket forward, all of Xaldin's lances (both on hand and placed) point their tips at the opponent and lunge towards him at rather fast speeds. Lances on Xaldin's person will NOT true combo from this throw: The opponent always has an opportunity to air dodge it and simply avoid them, although at higher percentages they will need to delay the air dodge a moment due to the increased distance. Each lance deals 4% damage, meaning a total of 24% damage if every lance hit, and adds a little bit of knockback in the direction the lance is flying. The lances have very light homing capability: They will turn slightly and veer a touch off course if the opponent, say, gets knocked in a different direction by another lance but otherwise stay true. Lances return to where they started either when they hit the opponent or slightly after missing in their usual teleportation flourish.

The key to this move is properly utilizing placed lances, primarily in order to hit the opponent before they can air dodge. It is the travel time that allows them to air dodge, so a sufficiently close lance will hit the opponent before they can, and depending on lance setup can allow more lances to hit: It only takes one lance behind the foe to hit into the rest of the lances if they are all on your person, for example. The more lances the place, the more complexity you need in placing them to combine them. At the same time, this will also leave the opponent in hitstun longer and allow Xaldin to play off of it more. It can even situationally lead into one of Xaldin's smashes for something like a kill confirm! In short, a situational throw that can either by a 8% damage spacer or a 24% damage racker that can add more. Important to keep in mind.


+=============> \ \ \ Back Throw: Hurricane Blast / / / <==============+


Xaldin quickly floats behind the opponent, removing his hands from his lances to free them up, opening both of his palms and blasting his opponent's back with a powerful gust of wind from them! This deals 9% damage and high knockback, enough to kill at 160%: The highest of any of Xaldin's at a base and Xaldin's only true "kill throw" outside of some kind of set up. That is this move's primary utility, killing the opponent, and Xaldin will usually want to instead utilize another throw unless he has another aim. It IS also good for setting up edgeguard situations or reversing them and he can use it to gain space if he wants. But use his other throws for things like damage racking!

+================> \ \ \ Aerials / / / <================+


+=============> \ \ \ Forward Aerial: Turbulent Duality / / / <==============+


Xaldin thrusts one of the lances on his person in front of him, while at the same time taking the other one and spinning it (vertically aligned) behind him, causing him to cover both sides of his hitbox! Naturally, the two hits are quite different: The thrust deals a single hit of 11% damage and kills at a reasonable-but-not-amazing 155%. The back hit deals 3 hits of 3% damage, with the last hit launching the opponent away lightly. The thrust has long horizontal range but is a rather thing hitbox, while the spinning hitbox covers most of Xaldin vertically and behind him but has rather poor horizontal reach. The single hitbox ends before the multi-spinning hitbox does, which can lead to somewhat awkward ending lag especially because said ending lag is kinda long. This leaves Xaldin oddly punishable. However, there are autocancel frames after the single hitbox ends but while the multi-hitbox is happening which allow Xaldin more safety and make this a good shorthop move. Starting lag is around average, really.

This move is also interesting for lance interaction, as what hitbox the lances manipulate depends on if they are in front of or behind Xaldin. Lances in front of Xaldin perform the thrusting attack, while lances behind Xaldin perform the multi-hit attack, which allows Xaldin to create variety in his lance hitboxes in one move. It's also nice since the multi-hit hitbox can catch out air dodges!


+=============> \ \ \ Neutral Aerial: Nescience / / / <==============+


Xaldin's lances on him, including the ones in his hands, spread out around him before stabbing inwards: With all six lances, the six-sided coverage is quite good, while two-lance coverage is rather poor. The attack deals 10% damage and mediocre knockback, best suited to getting the opponent off of him than any other uses. Starting lag is rather average, while the ending lag is slightly long but has lower landing lag which makes it a more reasonable shorthop option along with Forward Aerial.

More interesting is how it interacts with Xaldin's placed lances, specifically his selected lance. His selected lance will point his tip at Xaldin and rush at him with reasonable speed, reaching him and going around him before racing back to where it started. This gives it a boomerang-esque motion, dealing the same hitbox as the NAir the entire time. How far the lance is from Xaldin determines it's travel time, so Xaldin can really control space if it is far away. If something is in the way of the lance and Xaldin, such as a wall, it will teleport past the wall if possible. If it is not possible for it to get to Xaldin even with that, it will teleport back home.

Xaldin's ending lag can be less than the time it takes the lance to travel back, especially when shorthopping. If Xaldin uses a NAir while it is returning, it will stop trying to return and try to boomerang around Xaldin again. One strategy Xaldin can therefor perform is repeated shorthop NAirs, repeatedly boomeranging his lance in front of him like a meat grinder. It's punishable if predictable, but can be great at creating a wall for Xaldin and he can fake out if he will let the lance continue to travel or return or what have you as well.


+=============> \ \ \ Up Aerial: Silent Sweep / / / <==============+


A simple and effective part of Xaldin's game, Xaldin takes one of his lances and sweeps it above his head in a rather long motion, with the length of his lance giving it quite some range. Most of the hit is rather lacking in damage, with everything save for the tip dealing 7% damage and knockback best suited to juggling or keeping opponents airborne than anything. The tip is a sweetspot that deals 10% damage and knockback that won't kill normally but can be a good killing choice with the opponent in the air. The starting lag is solid and nice, but the ending lag is a bit long. The move's slowness allows it to control space above Xaldin well and thus be quite good at opponents stuck in landing situations but also can make the more more punishable as well. Your Up Throw can combo into this at a lot of percents, but comboing into the sweetspot tends to be more specific to percentage.

+=============> \ \ \ Down Aerial: Cynosura / / / <==============+


Leaving one of the lances in his hand floating in the air, Xaldin thrusts his now free hand downwards and creates a sphere of air under him. The sphere then explodes, dealing 12% damage and radial knockback that is good for knocking opponents around and reasonably strong. Xaldin will bounce into the air slightly the first time that he uses this move in the air. The better Xaldin's vertical momentum, the stronger the boost: If Xaldin uses it near the height of a second or third jump, it allows him to gain height that is almost like a fourth jump! It also means that if his momentum is particularly small, he won't barely get popped into the air at all. The move actually has fairly low starting lag, but the ending lag is fairly long and therefor Xaldin needs to be rather careful when utilizing this movement option.

His Down Aerial can be very interesting when combined with Xaldin's Neutral Special command dash, since it can potentially go quite fast AND Xaldin can aim it in so many ways. Slightly up plus a lot of horizontal movement for example can allow Xaldin to pop up somewhat at any point during an advancing or retreating dash. If Xaldin countered an especially strong move, a much more upwards vertical dash can allow Xaldin to reach incredible heights, and if he counters a strong enough move and goes basically straight up the height he gains can go beyond any of his midair jumps...and he'll still have them to utilize!


+=============> \ \ \ Back Aerial: Scission Sky / / / <==============+


Xaldin spins his two lances in his hand for some rather lengthy starting lag, before putting his whole body into a backwards double-thrust with them that forms an X shape. While laggy, this is Xaldin's high prediction kill move that deals a meaty 16% damage and kills at 115%! Combined with high ending lag, this move leaves Xaldin open to punishment and basically can't be used out of a shorthop...but given Xaldin's coverage, you should have other options to handle your back, right?

Xaldin's placed lances will copy this move, but will only deal 9% damage and meh knockback on their own. Bundle two together and they perform the full power and X-shaped version, which can be pretty good for catching out far away opponents. If three or more are bundled together, then excess lances will perform the attack in the opposite direction, so with a full for you can have a full XX pattern that covers a lot of area given its power!

This is a move Xaldin should be looking for when things like his placed lances or projectiles, Up Aerial, Up Tilt or what have you open the opponent up to air dodge reads. This also means Xaldin will sometimes wish to position his back to the opponent, so that he can effectively perform this read. This is another bonus his Neutral Special affords him: IT allows him to do things like threaten behind him, then quite suddenly reverse his direction with a Neutral Special instead and threaten a ton of moves, including his Specials...which can actually lead to an opponent trying to stop a Back Aerial read and Xaldin rushing at them for a Forward Smash read! Do be careful if the opponent is throwing out a move, though, since that'll beat that kind of dash in strike. But that is what your disjointed back aerial is for, is it not?


+================> \ \ \ Final Smash: You Will Wear The Face of Despair! / / / <================+



Glowing a periwinkle blue, Xaldin combines his six lances into a FREAKING DRAGON (no matter if they are seperated from him), proclaiming that "You will wear the face of despair!". If it is a 1v1 match or only one opponent remains, then Xaldin will add the foe's name to the start of the quote like he did in the KH2 boss fight ("Jigglypuff! You will wear the face of despair!"). Xaldin then gets up on the dragon's back as it enters the background, opening it's mouth into three segments which glow with powerful and turbulent wind!


The resulting tornado breath of the lance dragon sweeps a Final Destination back and forth three times, dealing 5 hits of 3% every time it does so which will repeatedly combo the opponent: An opponent caught at the start takes an easy 45%, but if they aren't caught there's more time to dodge and avoid it. Every time it sweeps back and forth, it gets faster the next time it does. The move ends with Xaldin commanding the dragon to do two diagonal tornado strikes, forming a single X shaped hitbox over the screen ala Bowser Jr's Final Smash that deals 20% damage and kills at 130% if anyone is caught in it. Xaldin then returns to where he started the Final Smash with a confident grin, his lances seperating and returning to where they started.


+================> \ \ \ Playstyle: The Six Lances of the Whirlwind / / / <================+



"That's exactly what I wanted to hear. It's not in my nature to hold back."

Xaldin is a defensive, heavyweight juggernaut who utilizes surprising burst mobility to transition into his offensive game. He can both invest his lances into specific parts of the stage as a spacial control tactic or can instead keep them on his person to increase his personal power and follow-up options. In general, Xaldin is a tactical and smart character who wants to plan out his responses carefully and adapt to changing situations. While Xaldin has powerful tools, most come with drawbacks or are punishable and additionally can be rather specific or situational and thus require high awareness to make full use of.

How to invest Xaldin's lances is one of the primary questions in any Xaldin game. In very broad terms, investing Xaldin's lances outside of him is going to be better for damage potential due to longer combos and his grab game. In addition, it increases his longer range stage control, as it allows Xaldin to threaten areas he is not even close to. Keeping Xaldin's lances on him increases his raw power thanks to moves like Forward Smash and gives him higher range immediately around him with moves like Down Smash, Up Smash and Forward Tilt. It is rare that Xaldin won't want to at least switch up his investments some during a match, so part of the learning curve of playing him is figuring out what you can do with different lance counts and situations.

While this is broad, it is the kind of system that has a lot of situationals. For example in edgeguarding situations, you will likely want to at least temporarily place a lance if able near the ledge or high to help restrict how an opponent can recover. Against lighter opponents, keeping more lances on you can be a strong play in order to threaten more with Forward Smash and gain a lot of space. If an opponent likes to run away or is seeking to get a mechanic, placing lances across the stage can restrict how safely they can set up and help control the pace. It is a flexible system which depends on both Xaldin and the opponent's style of play.

Xaldin's defensive prowess comes in a few areas. First off, he is a heavyweight with a strong recovery and as a floaty character is not quite as much of combo food. With his 116 weight, Xaldin can take a beating and keep coming back, allowing him to trade blows and come out ahead. Secondly, Xaldin's lances simply give him a lot of range, which can naturally make approaching difficult. But it is his Shield Special and Neutral Special that really help him out in this department: His Shield Special offers him unique defensive options that he can use in shield, allowing him to start combos off of it and command his lances even on the back heel as long as he places him out. This forces Xaldin's opponents to play a different, and usually more safe and less rewarding, dynamic when forcing against Xaldin's shield.

His Neutral Special is unique as far as counters go in many ways. First off, Xaldin has the ability to hold it out while moving which means he can advance while protected. This might mean he can't attack directly, but placing lances around the field and commanding them allows him to circumvent them, not to mention Xaldin can always just use it as a traditional counter. And second of all, Xaldin not only has the ability to use it as a damaging counter, but instead in a more devious and offensive way as a command dash he can act during and which allows him to use his Smashes in the air: Just as often as the actual counter, Xaldin will appreciate using this boost to get in offense as he does to just utilize damage. A sneaky benefit of his Neutral Special is that by "saving" the counter hit he can potentially add it to a combo or other more valuable situation than just hitting the opponent at the time of the countered move!

Xaldin's powerful burst mobility in his Neutral Special and Up Special are both highly beneficial to him, but are also both a downside in a way. They are situational, Xaldin needing to bait the opponent with his Neutral Special to gain a charge on it and placing lances in proper locations for Up Special. Since the lance placement is predictable, as are what he can do with snap movements, this means the opponent should be aware of how Xaldin can move, and playing carefully can deprive Xaldin of valuable movement tools. Xaldin's ground movement is otherwise rather poor and he cannot use his powerful array of smashes outside of the ground without a Neutral Special. Limiting Xaldin to his shorthop options more makes him significantly more predictable and eases the opponent up.

Another downside Xaldin faces is that while he has many powerful option, the nature of his lance system means he cannot have all of them at the same time: No matter how many ways Xaldin protects himself, he always has something to exploit. For example if Xaldin invests many of his lances, his smashes are quite underwhelming and his anti-air options in particular take a dive thanks to his Forward Tilt and Up Smash taking some notable hits from it. Xaldin with all of his lances might find trouble opening the opponent up, primarily relying on his Side Special and having to wait more for the perfect moment to pierce the opponent. He is also much more reliant on a game of prediction and solid hits rather than combos when it comes to his all-lance state, especially air dodge reads.

Finally, while Xaldin has incredible self range, the potential for spacial control, combos and kill moves, he does suffer in the fact that many of his options are of the slower sort. His smashes are by and large unsafe, he has multiple multihit moves with longer durations that he can be punished during if the foe isn't caught and the ending lag on his aerials can be awkward without autocancels or movement tricks. The slowness of needing to counter hits with Neutral Special or set up lances for options means he cannot pull them out on a whim, putting him at a disadvantage against characters who can do so. In short, Xaldin is a character with incredible benefits who must play a measured game that pressures the opponent but does not overcommit due to his ability to be strongly punished and utilize his plethora of strengths that he performs in the correct situation. A strong, thinking man's character.


"Hmph... Things have taken a vexing turn of late."

+================> \ \ \ Animations / / / <================+


Entrance





Xaldin's entrance is a massively abbreviated form of his Kingdom Hearts II entrance: The tornados stick around for way less time, crackling with electricity, there aren't the numerous midair shots, and Xaldin grabs the lances directly instead of them shooting up and him catching them as they fall. Also, Xaldin only grabs two lances instead of three. Definitely one of the longest entrance animations.

Walk

Xaldin slowly walks forward on air, using a walk cycle like his intimidating wind shield walk from Kingdom Hearts II. Use if you want to use badass.

Dash

Xaldin glides forward in the air, all of his non-held lances gliding along with him. Xaldin's lances floating alongside him may spin ocassionally as a dashing animation.

Prone

Xaldin lies back/face down on the ground in dismay, his floating lances that are on him scattered to the ground as he is. The lances rise to the ground just as Xaldin does when he gets up and float around him as he is hit away and so on.

Sleep

Xaldin's head tilts down and he slumps down, but does remain in midair. His lances float much more lazily as he snoozes away.

Down Taunt

Xaldin lets out a mirthless chuckle, questioning "Where's the fun in this?"

Side Taunt

Xaldin points all of the lances on his person towards the nearest opponent, with any placed lances not performing an action doing the same, and proclaiming "It's not in my nature to hold back."

Up Taunt

Xaldin's lances spin around him like they spin above the ground when he is about to drop from the sky in his Kingdom Hearts II fight, Xaldin leaning back like when he summons his lances and releasing a strong gale around him as he power-grunts.

Win Animation 1

Xaldin's lances fall from the sky in beams of periwinkle light one at a time, forming a circle. Xaldin then drops down from the top of the screen with a gust of wind. As he looks upwards, the victory splash/stats/etc occur.

Win Animation 2



Based on Xaldin's face reveal in Kingdom Hearts II. Xaldin floats into the victory screen with his hood covering his face, flicking it off dramatically and giving a sadistic grin at the screen as the victory splash happens.

Win Animation 3

Xaldin rides into the victory screen on his lance-dragon, posing with an arm-crossed pose as it ascends skywards and roars at the screen for the victory splash.

Win Animation vs. The Beast or Belle

Xaldin holds a rose in his hand, quite possibly The Beast's rose, and crushes it in his hands, letting the petals scatter to the winds. As he does this, he says "You think the power of love will save you? That's the stuff of poetry, not practicality.", a slightly altered (you vs. them) quote of his about The Beast and Belle.

Loss Animation

Xaldin glares as he lets out slow, large and booming claps. He is clearly disgruntled by the loss, or the closest thing a Nobody can be at least.
 
Last edited:

FrozenRoy

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"I, Lexaeus, will not yield to the frail heart of an infantile coward!"

No. V
Lexaeus, the Taciturn Stalwart

#5 in the Organization, Lexaeus was one of the traitorous disciplines of Ansem the Wise who studied under Xehanort and delved into the forbidden sides of the heart. The name of his original self was Aeleus. His title was originally translated as "The Silent Hero", but later releases retitled it to the perhaps more apt "Taciturn Stalwart". Lexaeus is part of the elder group of Organization members in Chain of Memories, being the most level headed and physically powerful next to the scheming Zexion and scientific Vexen. Alas, Lexaeus is probably the least developed member of the entire Organization, with most of his scenes being general group scenes and a single (if fairly cool) fight scene.

What we do see of Lexaeus shows him to be an intelligent, if cautious warrior who highly values strength. He often takes a "wait and see" approach to the events of Chain of Memories, preferring to react to the opponent with thought out action rather than quick responses. This eventually leads him to deciding to attempt to confront and help control Riku in order to counterbalance Marluxia's potentially successful control of Sora, seeking to balance his darkness with light and, perhaps unsurprisingly for a disciple of a man who studied darkness so intensely, seeing darkness as strength equal to light. This mis-step also costs Lexaeus his non-existance: Ansem (Heartless Xehanort Ansem, not DiZ Ansem) is trying to control Riku once more, as established earlier, and Lexaeus' attempt to end Riku only succeeds in awakening him when Lexaeus is about to finish him off. Lexaeus, weakened by the intense battle with Riku, is destroyed in one single quick blow by Ansem-Riku, realizing it is the heartless of their Superior and lamenting that it was a fight he should not have taken.

Lexaeus' personality is fitting for his control over the silent Earth. He wields a massive weapon named Skysplitter: The weapon type was originally titled as a "Tomahawk", but later games instead called it an "Axe Sword"...but there's only like one game that does and, frankly, I think Axe Sword sounds kind of dumb so I'm going to continue to call it a tomahawk. Lexaeus is all about his overwhelming strength, with both of his battles involving Lexaeus powering up DBZ-style: Chain of Memories has him continually get stronger with power-up sleights, including the ability to become invincible to almost everything Riku can go, and then later invest them into powerful sleights or a single attack that 100% hits in return for bringing him down to no power level. His Kingdom Hearts II refight instead utilizes an interesting power charge mechanic, where Lexaeus will continually power up (up to a maximum of POWER LEVEL 99999) and not only become stronger but get continually larger hitboxes, with an ultimate attack able to cover the field in rocky hitboxes, and Lexaeus taking less hitstun. However Sora can use the Action Command Mega Impact to counter some of Lexaeus strikes and temporarily absorb his power: The more powered up Lexaeus is, the longer this stuns him and so the longer Sora can combo him!

On top of that, Lexaeus has crushing blows with Skysplitter and can do things like create giant pillars, create rocks he explodes, ripple his sword through the earth, create shockwaves and has two command grabs that unlike many of this type are not able to be reacted to with Action Commands: He's just too strong! A formidable foe, indeed.


Silent Statistics


Xaldin may have been big, but Lexaeus is more in the traditional heavyweight mold: Slow, heavy and powerful. Lexaeus' 119 weight ties him with King Dedede as the third heaviest character in the game. He is very large, being a more broad and somewhat taller Ganondorf. He is slow, like a rolling stone: His 1.24 Dash Speed makes him the 4th slowest character in the game, faster than only Ganondorf (1.218), Jigglypuff (1.155) and Robin (1.5). His walk speed isn't any better, with his 0.80 walk speed making him the 4th slowest and only beating out Ryu (0.75), Ganondorf (0.73) and Jigglypuff (0.7). This is of no concern to Lexaeus: Does he really not care that he has extremely slow ground speed within the game, and thus will have to chase after his foes? Perhaps he does not have to.

I am sure it will surprise you, but Lexaeus is also slow in the air. tied for 52nd in air speed with Link and Donkey Kong. His fall speed and gravity are equal to Mega Man. Interestingly, Lexaeus has two of the largest jumps in the game. I suppose the force of those legs allows him to get some hang time, even if he quickly returns to his native ground. Lexaeus lacks Smash specialities such as a float or crawl, but more than makes up for it in unmatched power and survivability.


Silent Specials

Neutral Special: Reticence

Lexaeus' entire body shakes as he crouches down slightly, seismic energy forming behind him as he lets out a loud grunt and yell that would make DBZ fans blush with pride. After an entire two seconds of this, Lexaeus leaps up slightly with a yell and Skysplitter aloft as energy bursts out of him, signalling that he has gone to a power level even further beyond!


When the move ends, a massive burst of dark energy exudes from him briefly, pushing away anyone near him with an extremely strong windbox. Given the two seconds of starting lag no sane human being should ever be actually gimped by this. The actual purpose of this move is to allow Lexaeus to power himself up! Leaving aside him before any charges, he has two levels of power. After one use of the move, Lexaeus has constant 4% armor that keeps him from flinching against these weak blows, especially useful for countering jabs, and all of his attacks gain a 1.2x damage buff (with knockback going up to match). Go to a second level of charge and Lexaeus' passive armor is now 8%, with many tilts now being little more than glancing blows, and the damage buff is now a pretty obscene 1.4x which makes even small hits of Lexaeus into crushing blows. Lexaeus is already a powerhouse, so these buffs push him to break the absolute limit of what he can do!

The downside, of course, has been well documented. Two seconds of starting lag make this quite difficult to actually pull off! Perhaps he should send the foe far away before attempting so. But there is another use to this. This buff is obviously strong, so opponents will be inclined to approach Lexaeus and stop him. Lexaeus himself has difficulty approaching opponents, so this allows him to shore up a weakness. You may believe that this would merely get Lexaeus whacked, but this leads to one other important point of this move's existance.

You see, Lexaeus can cancel this move's long starting lag into another attack. He cannot cancel it into a non-attack, such as shielding or dodging, but he still has full access to his moveset (aerials in the air, ground set on the ground). Lexaeus still has to go through the attack's full lag, of course, and given Lexaeus is a very slow character it means he has to be rather predictive and careful with this. And of course he doesn't get any additional power when he cancels, no matter how far he was in when he did so. When people talk about "Fear" and "Respect", this is where it comes into play. If the opponent is too afraid to stop Lexaeus because they might be punished, then he is going to just power up and wreck them. And if Lexaeus is too much of a coward when the opponent is able to interrupt them, then an opponent who respects his options will be able to punish his options. Whatever the case, opponents need to be aware if Lexaeus tries to power up, and not make it easy for him whenever they can!

Once you've powered up fully, this move can't be used to power up any more and now has a different use. Lexaeus simply performs a much faster yell and tomahawk raising as darkness rushes out. This, essentially, is a significantly faster but also less powerful version of the hitbox he has when he finishes charging. The windbox is not super powerful, but it is still pretty useful as an edgeguarding tool and is actually one of Lexaeus' faster options if, for whatever reason, Lexaeus should want the opponent away from him once he is fully powered. The ending lag is still somewhat long, so do be careful of getting punished. A final note: Lexaeus loses all of his power charges are lost when he is KO'd, so you'll need to get them back after you are. My recommendation? Don't die!


Side Special: Monolith

Lexaeus raises a mighty right leg and crashes it into the ground, causing a large pillar of earth to burst out of the ground in the moment (if used on the ground or he lands on the air during the starting lag). Lexaeus' stomping deals only 6% damage despite the mighty motion, but it combos directly into the pillar at almost any percentage. The pillar itself deals 14% damage and TREMENDOUS base vertical knockback, sending opponents flying sky high into the air even at low percentages. The knockback growth by comparison is almost non-existant, so it won't kill until around 160%. This isn't ultra laggy to start, but it is slower than average: The ending lag is reasonably punishable but also not too sluggish. In the air, this move becomes a spike that deals 13% and is above average in strength, but it has more starting lag.

The pillar stays around after Lexaeus creates it, being slightly wider than Lexaeus. The height of the pillar depends on Lexaeus' power level: At its base, it is slightly taller than Lexaeus. At full power, it will be just a bit under the top platform of Battlefield if used on the main platform. The pillar is a solid that cannot be dodged through, walked through, and so on. You'll need to, for example, jump over it to pass it. Alternately, it is destructable with an HP of 40. Lexaeus can only have one pillar up at a time: Using this move while one is out gives you the stomping hitbox, but no pillar. When the pillar is destroyed, it breaks into a number of flying jagged rocks/boulders which follow the knockback if it is reasonably strong or simply fall to the ground if something like, say, Pikachu's jab deals the last blow. 3 rocks for base pillar, 4 for one power up and 5 for max power. A very weak attack such as the aforementioned jab will cause the rocks to fall so weakly they deal merely 1% damage and no hitstun. They have a maximum power of 18% damage that kills at 92%, which can be achieved with things like powerful smash attacks. And of course stuff like tilts will go somewhere in between and so on. The rocks follow the general trajectory of the attack that broke the pillar, so an upwards attack will send them flying up and a diagonally upwards-forwards attack will send them upwards-forward. Note that rocks do not count as a pillar, so Lexaeus can create a pillar while they fly away.

Because it takes so much damage to launch these rocks, especially since the opponent can potentially beat you to the punch, Lexaeus is rather poor at playing away from the foe in a "camping" style. It is instead the "wall" portion of the pillar that is particularly important and it forms a 1-2 punch of making the foe play honest with you. If they start camping you and playing away from you, you threat to put up a pillar, and now the opponent has to get around them to stop Lexaeus from powering up. And because the route to get to Lexaeus is now longer, it allows Lexaeus to have an easier time predicting the opponent if he wants to cancel it and lowers the number of options the opponent has to stop his charge. Finally, while it is difficult to break and send flying at a base the 1.4x damage buff allows Lexaeus to much more easily shatter the pillar (especially compared to his puny opponent), which helps give him another tool to stop people from staying away from him once he cannot bait with a power up any more.

The solution to this is usually to stay in range to be able to stop Lexaeus from creating a pillar in neutral, given it is a somewhat laggy process that can be punished correctly. But staying in this range will usually mean staying in Lexaeus range given his massive tomahawk, making it a win-win situation for Lexaeus. This also means actually getting the pillar up can be a challenge for Lexaeus. Persistance and patience is key.

This wall has an additional use, however, once it is up, which is hitting the opponent into the wall. Opponents who are flung againt the wall during hitstun that would be strong enough to cause a tumble state are instead smashed against it and take the rest of the hitstun in place which allows Lexaeus to combo/punish opponents better. The pillar also takes damage from this: If it is the start of the hitstun, it takes the full damage of the move which launched the opponent. For almost all of the rest of the knockback, it is instead 50% of the damage. Finally, the tail end of the hitstun deals no damage to the pillar. If the pillar breaks, then the opponent will take 5% damage and be sent flying through it without their knockback being interrupted and rocks being thrown in the direction of the foe's movement. Normally, the rocks will trail the opponent, and thus force the opponent to do something such as an air dodge or double jump to avoid them. In some circumstances however the rocks will flatout combo, usually halfway through powerful knockback or so. Opponents can only be smashed against a pillar this way once in a 4 second period and will bounce off of it with their knockback.


Up Special: Skysplitter

Lexaeus heaves Skysplitter absurdly high into the sky in a rather Aetheresque manner, sending it 3 Ganondorfs (no power), 4 Ganondorfs (1 Power) or 5 Ganondorfs (2 power) into the air as a multi-hit hitbox. It hits 3 times on the way up for a total of 6% damage. The Skysplitter stays in the air for 4 seconds while dealing multiple hits of 1% (Someone who sat into it for the full duration would take 16%, but you'd have to be actively trying to get hit for this to happen), during which time Lexaeus is free to move and attack as he wishes. Attacks which do not use the tomahawk remain unchanged, Neutral Special and Side Special included (For Neutral Special, his sword aloft finishing animation is changed to an arms to the side yell). Using a sword move causes Skysplitter to disappear and re-appear in Lexaeus' hands with a few frames of additional starting lag. Weapons, including Lexaeus', do this all the damn time in Kingdom Hearts after all.

If you instead input Up Special again, Lexaeus will suddenly leap to the tomahawk's position! Lexaeus gains total super armor during this time, allowing him to tank hits just like Ike when he rises for his Up Special. Lexaeus then drops to the ground, dealing 7% damage and a spike as he does so. Lexaeus has more horizontal movement than, say, Ike during this time but it still isn't amazing. Above ground, the spike will almost always combo into the 7% damage landing hit of the move. This landing hit deals fairly high hitstun, but has low knockback. In other words, it is one of Lexaeus' rare combo starters and a strong one at that...which is always dangerous given Lexaeus' extreme strength. Of course, the starting lag of this move is kinda long and the fact Lexaeus needs to leap up and crash back down makes it fairly predictable.

You can, however, combine this with your Neutral Special and Side Special to add some fear. By having Up Special set up before a Neutral Special charge, Lexaeus can threaten to super armor through a move and crash onto the offending opponent before opening up a combo on them! This is one of Lexaeus' better defensive minded options out of Neutral Special and makes the cancel abilities more difficult to deal with. Setting it up next to a pillar allows Lexaeus to not only cover some aerial space above the pillar and make it more annoying to approach but create quite a hazardous position for opponents to try and get to Lexaeus with. If the opponent backs off? That's fine, you get a power charge. You don't need to make the first move. You just need to remain stalwart.

Of course, the fact that you can move during it can also mean things as simple as preparing to hit the opponent towards it and combo them, or to threaten to nope out of situations you don't like with a well timed up Special. The downside is about 3 frames of starting lag on multiple attacks, which can make Lexaeus less safe than he already is. It is a recovery which covers a lot of space but is rather linear and predictable, although Lexaeus ability to vary his timing and super armor do afford him a bit more protection than normal. Use it well!


Down Special: Hypocenter

Lexaeus points Skysplitter downwards and thrusts it into the ground, causing the ground to crack and rumble briefly before Lexaeus hefts it out. Opponents struck by Lexaeus thrusting it down are dealt 6% damage and reasonably high knockback that keeps people off of him. The earth shake is brief, but deals 9% damage to people around Lexaeus and pop them fairly high into the air which makes follow-ups impossible. Starting lag is actually not that bad, but the ending lagis a bit on the long side. In the air, Lexaeus instead drops to the ground in stall-than-fall manner with his sword sticking down. This takes a good deal longer than the grounded version, but Lexaeus deals 15% damage on the way down and smashes people skywards: Grounded opponents die at 180%. When Lexaeus hits the ground the earth shaking hitbox happens as normal, as does ending lag. Note that because it is a tomahawk using move, it will recall the tomahawk during Up Special.

The cracked ground serves as a "focal point" of Lexaeus' earth energy which he has forced into the ground. When Lexaeus strikes this cracked ground, it sends out a shockwave along the ground (following left/right if the attack hits that way or just going forward if, say, the attack hits up). By default, essentially every attack sends out a shockwave that trips opponents if they are performing any action save for staying still. The stronger the attack, the faster and further the shockwave goes. However multiple attacks of Lexaeus will do more with this focus point than a mere sometimes-tripping shockwave once he begins to power up, so this gets progressively more dangerous as the match goes on. Speaking of that: If the move does NOT gain a special effect when hitting a focal point after being charged, the shockwave is upgraded to trip even if the opponent is standing still. A minor change, to be sure, but a welcome one.

If Lexaeus hits the focal point with the straight down spike of his aerial Side Special, which requires some tricky timing, then said spiking knockback will instead cause a minor earthshaking effect over the focal point for 3/4ths of a second which has the tripping properties of the shockwave due to its purely downwards knockback. The side special is usually too laggy to use this to much effectiveness, but it is something to bring up and also important to bring up simply for how Hypocenter interacts with a spike.

If Lexaeus creates one of his monolithic earth pillars on top of a focal point, then it will cause the earth shaking effect around the pillar for 1.5 seconds as it rises, extending the potential hitbox of the pillar range-wise and making it more dangerous. Because the pillar now rests on top of the focal point, attacks against the pillar will now send out shockwaves as if Lexaeus hit the focal point and thus allow Lexaeus to chip away at both the pillar's HP and send out at least some kind of stage presence. Lexaeus can only have 1 focal point out at a time, making a new one causes the second one to vanish, and the ground will heal itself up after 8 seconds of time. While its effects are not as dramatic as Lexaeus' other specials, the Hypocenter is nonetheless a valuable addition to his rock solid arsenal.


Silent Smashes

Up Smash: Crushing Blow


Lexaeus leans down with his mighty tomahawk, before releasing it in a mighty, upwards smashing blow! This brutal blow looks akin to Ike's Up Smash, with the blade ripping into the ground at the tip before he slams it upwards (which means he has a brief hitbox under and in front of him, although this is for a short period). Note that this move is even laggier than Ike's already laggy Up Smash on both ends, making it difficult to hit with and easily punishable by basically whatever your opponent has in mind. It's a high risk move. The reward, fittingly, is massive: 29%-40.6% damage will absolutely crush opponents and kill them at 70%-40%! Remember that Lexaeus can buff his damage by up to 1.4x with two power charge levels. If that happens, Lexaeus' Up Smash can potentially deal 40.6%-56.8% damage, a completely absurd number that will have enough knockback behind it to finish off people absurdly early. A fully charged Up Smash can even flatout OHKO a fair amount of characters...but given this move is slow and you'll have to take a second to charge it, plus gotten two charges, well the opponent kind of deserves it really.

Straightforward and raw in power, Up Smash is more one note...but it does have some other uses. The massive damage it deals allows it to shatter Lexaeus' pillars easily (In fact, it shatters them in one hit with two power charges!) and send them flying sky high with maximum power. The vertical orientation of the attack means it is good to hit people jumping off of the pillar...but this is pretty predictable given the lag and how obvious of an option it is. Opponents can 100% air dodge it and punish Lexaeus for it! This makes it more of a "hard read" option.

The other thing is that this attack is so thunderous that it does more than one mere shockwave on the ground with a Hypocenter: 2 seconds after the initial shockwave, a second identical shockwave occurs! For every power level Lexaeus has, another shockwave is fired off after another 2 seconds, so a full power Lexaeus has 3 shockwaves over 6 seconds! Now, Lexaeus won't usually use this raw given the lagginess of this move, but it does have some niche options. One of the most obvious is it can provide some play at the ledge if the opponent is launched particularly far in order to cover some ledge options more. The other use it has is it DOES keep Lexaeus more safe from the front (even if it is minor) and so can get a slightly lesser punishment. It is more of a minor options for Lexaeus overall, however.


Forward Smash: Devastation


Lexaeus raises his Tomahawk behind him and above his head as it drips with blood red energy, before slamming it down in front of him. This is a laggy move, but not as much of Up Smash and so is a bit more standard and less risky. It still deals brutal damage, dealing 20%-28% damage that will kill at 85%-60%: You're still fighting an absolute unit here after all. The lag is more front loaded than back loaded: It can be a bit difficult to get off, but it is less punishable than you would expect. This is particularly good as Lexaeus gets armor level from his power charges, perhaps tanking a hit or forcing the opponent into an awkward situation where various quick options are unavailable to them. With a full power charge, this move deals 28%-39.2% damage and so can break a pillar in all but one hit if the move is fully charged (but this makes it pretty obvious still).

This move has some interesting interactions with his Hypocenter focal point. Striking it causes the shockwave to go even faster and further than one would expect, travelling all of Final Destination at a lightning speed. This allows Lexaeus to, potentially, trip far off opponents suddenly or to cover backrolls. More powerful is with one power charge: The range is reduced to 1.5 Battlefield Platforms and the speed is reduced to merely "very fast", but now small spires and spines of rocks are what ripple forward. Each one does only a mediocre 6% damage, but has fairly high hitstun and hits opponents TOWARDS Lexaeus: with proper spacing, this actually sets Lexaeus up to potentially get a combo despite this move's laggy nature! Early and mid-way you'll need to use a fast attack to 100% anything, but higher damaged opponents' increased hitstun makes them more vulnerable to more crushing combinations of attacks.


Power level two is the most demanding of the abilities. The rocks jutting out now are significantly tall, Lexaeus' height, and reasonably wide. Most importantly, they now deal damage equal to the non-power charged version of Forward Smash. This does account for charge, so a fully charged F-Smash sends forth a 1.5 Battlefield Long and quick hitbox that deals 28% damage and kills at 60%. You do not want to mess with a Lexaeus who properly thinks through an encounter. Of course, one could still strike him before he unleashes his furious blow. But his 8% armor would make it more difficult! And by making the opponent afraid of what you can do with a Hypocenter, you can take advantage of that fear to open up with other devastation moves. A technique of raw, earthen power.


Down Smash: Earthen Ripples


The quickest of Lexaeus' most powerful options, Lexaeus drags his tomahawk into the ground hard enough to send debris and rubble visibly flying everywhere, before performing a forward and upward slash that deals a single hit of powerful damage. The first hit comes out behind Lexaeus and is actually pretty fast to start (ending lag is still reasonably lagging, but not as high as any of the other two smashes), dealing 5 hits of 1-1.4% (for 5%-7% total) and directly comboing the opponent into the second hit via the last hit. The long and multihitting nature of this hitbox makes it ideal for catching out rolls behind and spot-dodges, with the quick back hit helping allow Lexaeus to cover his back hastily. This is important as between Lexaeus' pillar allowing him to keep one side protected and his to-be-seen Forward Tilt single side protection is pretty solid for Lexaeus. Also good against cross-ups!

The single slash itself is hard to hit with raw and is powerful but not nearly as potent as Lexaeus' other smashes, dealing 17%-23.8% damage and not killing until 105%-85%. These are of course still good numbers that only grow as Lexaeus powers up and the move in turn is easier to strike with thanks to the faster back hitbox. The first multi-hitting attack sends out constant tripping shockwaves when over a focal point, while the slash sends out a reasonably fast tripping shockwave forward. With one power level, the slash's shockwave instead deals 5% damage and some moderate away knockback, With max power, the shockwave deals 10% damage and kills at 160%. The multi-hit attack is always just tripping shockwaves, but there is a light suction effect on them added with each power charge towards the focal point (and, thus, the multihit attack) as if the earth itself is swallowing you up. Spooky.


Silent Standards

Jab: Stalwart Strike

Probably the most simple move in Lexaeus' arsenal aside from his pummel, Lexaeus' jab is a simple move for checking the opponent and getting out of sticky situations. Lexaeus simply performs a forward punch, which is actually quite fast to come out and surprisingly one of the faster jabs in the game. Considering it does a strong 10% damage, although the knockback is rather mediocre for the power and only kills at 231%. While it comes out very fast, it is also undeniably slow in the end lag department and thus actually rather punishable: You need to space riiiight on the edge of the hitbox against a shield for it to be safe, for example. Thus it is a good panic button but it WILL mess you up to rely on it too hard. Power charge doesn't add anything special to this attack, but the increased damage does make it progressively more safe on shield: You can space more around the mid point with one and it is safe pretty much anywhere with both. So, keep that in mind.

As your quickest attack but still dealing plenty of damage, Lexaeus can use this to snipe the last hit on a pillar ot to kill one with a quicker and weaker attack if he must make haste. The rocks made this way, which launch mostly forward, are not particularly strong. They only deal 5% damage and don't go especially far at a meh speed. But when it comes to that or letting the opponent have it or nothing, it is better to have it: The speed can also be a timing mixup and it does still give Lexaeus a spacial and frame advantage to utilize.


Forward Tilt: Rigorous Rush

Lexaeus' Forward Tilt is, perhaps surprisingly, one of his most important moves! Lexaeus holds Skysplitter in front of him, blocking with the giant and solid Tomahawk. While this gives the move rather long starting lag, it also protects Lexaeus: Attacks which deal less than twice the damage of the attack are blocked entirely if they hit where the tomahawk defends (his back is entirely exposed, as is the top of his head!). Lexaeus then rushes forward with the Tomahawk in his same defensive posture, although the lesser footing means it only blocks attacks which deal damage equal or less than the damage it deals. The attack deals 8% damage, which means it deals 11.2% with max power level. That means 16%/8% defense for base and 22.4%/11.2% defense for full power. Needless to say, this can stop a lot. The ending lag of this attack is mediocre, the knockback is unimpressive but is not small enough to combo and Lexaeus travels half a Battlefield Platform with the rush down.

This move combines with Down Smash as Lexaeus' primary defensive tools when he is powering up: Forward Tilt allows him to block incoming strikes from the front, while the quick back hit of Down Smash can allow him to scoop up enemies who go to the back to avoid his defensive front, and he can potentially use Up Special to snag people going straight above. All of these techniques have their own weaknesses, especially lag-wise, but they put the opponent in quite a bind when Lexaeus dares them to fight him. Note that Forward Tilt offers no protection against grabs, which beat it out no matter what: Consider a faster input such as Jab in order to stuff Grabs, or mix it up with other options which can do so. Also note that this is Lexaeus' only option out of power charge which truly "defends" him as such, so foes will likely be looking out for it, and heavy starting lag is punishable!

If Lexaeus breaks a pillar with this move, the rocks will be sent almost straight horizontally, which with the pillar's vertical size can control a lot of space. The rocks don't fly especially fast or far, although power charge defensively helps, but Lexaeus has low enough lag he can situationally play off of the opponent's reaction.


Dash Attack: Crushing Power


Lexaeus leaps from his run and crashes down with his tomahawk, crushing anyone beneath him with a terrible blow. The power of this move is more akin to another smash attack, brutalizing the opponent for 16% damage damage and killing at 115%. The starting lag for this attack is also quite long, making it a Dash Attack best suited to savagely punish an opponent who is not in range of your other strong options. Forward Tilt can actually be a faster option to hit someone in a Dash Attack's punish range, but has significantly less reward. While the starting lag of this attack is awful, the ending lag is merely "somewhat laggy". This move can be a good option once Lexaeus powers up, as you can rush in and tank a weaker hit and then slam the opponent for a strong punish (while your other strong moves lack such movement). Again, Forward Tilt is an alternate option there: Forward Tilt offers a lot less reward, but may simply block the attack insteas of tanking it.

Lexaeus creates a shockwave from this move regardless of if he hits a Hypocenter: With no charge, it is merely a small shockwave around him that trips opponents. 1 level of power charge and the earth cracks around Lexaeus some, dealing 4% and light knockback that pops opponents up and towards Lexaeus. And with two levels of power charge, the range and intensity of the earth's breaking increases, causing it to deal 8% damage and knocking opponents towards Lexaeus and somewhat up. The 1st and moreso the 2nd power of shockwave can potentially lead into a small combo despite the move having longer than normal ending lag.

If Lexaeus lands on a Hypocenter with this move, it will create a fast and range-y shockwave from it (it IS a strong move after all) in addition to the one it normally makes, allowing Lexaeus to double up on the post-move power. So while this move is risky to start up, it can be rather safe on the back end.


Down Tilt: Power Rush


Lexaeus raises up one arm, holding Skyspliter firmly with the other, and then brings it crashing down against the ground, creating a small earth pillar in front of himself. This is a rare Down Tilt that can be repeated like a jab: A second input has Lexaeus repeat the motion, while a third has him grab Skysplitter with both hands and stab it blade-first into the ground, each one creating a temporary earthen pillar bigger than the last. The ending lag of the attack depends on what hit is ended on with the first hit being on the lower end, which depending on where you stop means a potential combo or mixup, but the starting lag is on the longer end. Each pillar goes in front of the last and so this move has some impressive range, especially as the pillars slightly increased in size as Lexaeus powers up, although the initial pillar strike is actually rather small unless Lexaeus powers up.

The first pillar deals 5% damage and light knockback that will combo into the second pillar attack at almost any percentage, with the option to mix up the attack with a slower option or combo into another fast option. The second pillar deals 8% damage and will hit the opponent too high to combo into the second pillar IF the opponent got hit by the first or they are at too high of a percent, otherwise it can combo into the third pillar which deals 13% damage and rather high knockback. While it isn't enough to kill much at a base, the scaling from powering up is nice and it can kill at 145% if Lexaeus has two power levels. Of course, the additional damage and subsequent knockback applying to earlier hits makes it more difficult to combo INTO the third hit as well.

All three hits will pretty much always combo into each other on a shield, unless the opponent is at the very edge of the hitbox and Lexaeus has powered up. This means Lexaeus can potentially deal huge shield damage if he hits someone with this and of course it is very safe on shield. It would serve opponents best to dodge Lexaeus or bait the attack out and then punish. They should, however, be careful when doing so: A back roll gives Lexaeus valuable space with his large weapon reach and an inward roll can be punished by Down Smash if Lexaeus predicts this although it is a hard read. Dash Attack and Forward Tilt also serve as hard reads to back rolls and spot dodges. Although, of course, the long starting lag does make the move rather interruptable regardless.

Hypocenter does not make shockwaves from this, but instead increases the size of the pillars, as if they were one power level higher. At max charge this means their size goes A LEVEL EVEN FURTHER BEYOND as they gain a notable size increase beyond max power's. This can allow Lexaeus to catch out opponents not considering the position of a Hypocenter aside from trying to avoid being tripped.


Up Tilt: Skyward Earth

Lexaeus takes a nice, solid upward swing of his fist, allowing the opponent to feel his raw power. This move deals a meaty 11% damage and is actually reasonably fast to come out, although the ending lag is less than stellar. The knockback is pretty good, but mostly base with little knockback growth and so very poor killing power. It would be more apt to make the opponent leave the ground, so that Lexaeus can hold it firm and prevent them from returning to it. Lexaeus can attempt to create a pillar under the opponent and send them even further sky high, for example. If Lexaeus is feeling risky, he could try and just start charging off of this move and dare the opponent to approach him after being knocked into the air and risk a retalitory strike: Perhaps, even, another Up Tilt to force them into the bind again. Note that the move is a bit forward in it's hitbox, so opponents behind Lexaeus can avoid it better.

Since this move does not use Lexaeus' tomahawk, it is a good move to combine with his Up SPecial: Send Skysplitter into the air, smack the opponent into the air, then leap to Skysplitter and slam it atop the opponent's cranium. Since the scaling on this move is so poor, this will work at a lot of damage percentages, so enjoy using it to your non-existant heart's desire. If the Up Tilt breaks a pillar, it sends rocks upwards and somewhat forwards, and can add to the pressure of the Skysplitter scenario.


Silent Throws

Grab: Advancing Grip

Lexaeus takes a rather large step forward, holding Skysplitter with one hand as his free hand grasps forwards for the opponent. Although slow, as befitting someone of Lexaeus' stature, this grab has intense range that allows him to grab at quite long distances indeed. These distances only improve with pivot or dash grabs, making Lexaeus' threat range intimidating when it comes to grabs. And the armor Lexaeus gains is quite useful for the slowness of his grab: The amount of moves that beat the grab get lower as they require, say, 8% damage to break through and stop it.

Oh, and a note: Lexaeus might not be able to shield out of his power charge, but he can sitll grab from it.


Pummel: Headstrong

Lexaeus smashes the temple of his forehead into the opponent for a mighty 3.1% damage. The pummel may be slow, but it is meaty, and Lexaeus can potentially damage rack the opponent quite a bit as he powers up with this.

Down Throw: Meteoric Impact


Lexaeus slams his fist into the opponent for 5% damage, bouncing them against the ground as he leaps into the air and slams the notch in his tomahawk against the foe, which has plenty of dramatic impact frames to show how painful it is, which adds 8% damage for a total of 13%. The opponent ends the throw below Lexaeus, who has frame advantage as they smash against the ground and may need to make a tech to avoid bouncing against it or entering prone. Essentially, Lexaeus gets to transition into a shorthop advantage state and deal lots of damage to the opponent. Good deal!


Using this over a Hypocenter causes a stronger effect, pillars bursting out from under the opponent for 6.5% damage and pretty high upwards knockback. This won't kill until 175% (which can end up fairly early with power charge!), but 19.5% damage is quite high for a throw and Lexaeus now ends in a really good position under the opponent with larger frame advantage. Lexaeus generally prefers being under the opponent instead of above him, so this suits him just fine. It is also rather situational, of course.


Back Throw: Mighty Toss


Lexaeus lifts the opponent back and throws them REALLY HARD behind him, turning around as he does so. This 11% damage attack has very high base knockback, although poor growth, and so can serve as an ideal move to begin a Power Charge over or set up a pillar in order to power charge. Lexaeus doesn't get anything off of this except space and damage, so you'll generally want to consider other options as you power up in order to get in your stronger hits.

If the opponent hits a solid object, for example Lexaeus' pillars or a wall, then Lexaeus will rush to them with blinding speed and impact his tomahawk against them, dealing 9% damage to them. If the object is breakable, such as Lexaeus' pillars, it will break instantly from absorbing the blow: In the case of Lexaeus' pillars, this will send them forward and slightly up with the rocks following them and force an instant reaction from the opponent in order to not take more damage. Especially with higher power, this is a good way to threaten the opponent. If it is non-breakable, the opponent is sent straight up. Keep your pillar placement in mind when the opponent is grabbed!


Forward Throw: Mega Impact

Lexaeus grabs the opponent and turns them around, by the shoulder if they have a body type that allows for that, as his aura surges even stronger than normal: At max power level, it surges strong enough to look close to his absurd max power from his Kingdom Hearts II fight! Once the opponent is turned around, he grips Skysplitter with both hands as it glows a murderous red and rips it through the opponent's back, bottom-to-top. Visually, it looks similar to the action command Sora uses on Lexaeus, actually...but a lot more powerful rather than agile.

This move is highly variable based on his power charge, and it is actually quite weak without any given the move is more designed for maximum power output than actual slicing: 5% damage and weak knockback. This isn't bad for Lexaeus, though, as it serves as Lexaeus' ONLY true combo throw! Even without power ups, combo starters are a powerful and rather rare tool in Lexaeus' kit. It is also one of the benefits Lexaeus' actually has for having low power, as later levels of this throw are anything but a combo throw.

That is because, you see, this move gets three times the power bonus from Lexaeus' power charge as normal! That's right, 1.6x and 2.4x power right there! Good thing it isn't on a move that's too broken for it, right? So with power level two it deals 8% damage and becomes a strong spacer, along with being good but setting up edgeguarding situations but still not killing until 190%. All things considered it is probably the worst of Lexaeus' options, but the additional spacing potential does mean Lexaeus can try and start a power charge with the large knockback!

And with full power, this move deals 12% damage and is a deadly early killer that slaughters opponents at 90%, becoming Lexaeus' kill throw. It loses all other utility other than killing or otherwise getting the opponent off stage, but becomes extremely potent in that area. Raw strength in it's purest form. Use it in the situation it is amazing for and do not lament the fact it means you have no combo throw with your ultra-powered-up moves.


Up Throw: Skyward Bound

A very simple throw, Lexaeus grips the opponent firmly and tosses them into the air. It deals good damage for a base throw, 11%, and sends the opponents pretty high: It is a better kill throw with no power than Forward Throw but still only kills at like 215% and is surpassed by Forward Throw later. It is good at setting up aerial landing situations which Lexaeus enjoys due to the solid base knockback or can be used as a solid spacer for any of Lexaeus' few purposes of that. It sends opponents straight up, so it can be useful whe next to a pillar to throw an opponent near the top but not, say, activate the effect of hitting an opponent into a pillar. That's basically it's utility, just kind of being big and strong aside from that.

Silent Aerials

Up Aerial: Darkened Strength

Lexaeus hefts Skysplitter above him, performing a slow 'n' heavy slash above him. Laggy to come out with a long duration and long ending lag, Lexaeus puts a lot of power into this meaty Up Aerial: With 17% damage attached and enough power to knock someone out off the top at 105%, this Up Aerial is a force to be reckoned with. The downsides to this move should be obvious: It is laggy through and through, leaving Lexaeus heavily punishable and making it difficult to actually hit the opponent. The primary use of this is air dodge reads, with the somewhat long (although not especially long) duration helps it along.

Shorthopping this and using it is actually faster than an Up Smash, despite the long landing lag, and so Lexaeus can use it as an alternative punish/catch out move to the even RISKIER Up Smash, although this is still...pretty risky. You can use this to hit your pillar up and only slightly forward, which can be a good way to cover yourself to the ground as you fall with this move. In general, treat it like a risky kill option for hard reads.


Forward Aerial: Skyshatter

Lexaeus raises his tomahawk high above his head, before slamming it down front of him in an animation which can be compared to Cloud's Forward Aerial. This move has two different hitboxes to it. The one that deals more damage is the majority of the tomahawk, which deals 14% damage but actually rather middling knockback, although it scales to kill at around 135% with two levels of power charge. The second hit is at the middle of skysplitter and only deals 10% damage but is a spike. While the spike is rather mediocre it scales quite hard, being stronger than Ganondorf's Down Aerial with max power charge (albeit barely stronger). It should also be noted it isn't quite a full down spike, but instead very distinctly diagonally down-and-forward. The lag on this move is rather poor on both ends, with it being worse on the ending side and better on the starting side.

In addition to big hits, this move can be pretty useful when crushing pillars, as Lexaeus can either send the pillar forward and up or sharply down and forward depending on what hitbox he breaks the pillar with (or potentiall drift back during the longer starting lag and miss the pillar at all for fakeouts!), which can put foes in a bit of a bind. This is especially true with the spiking hitbox, since the rocks will be quite fast once Lexaeus powers himself up. This can even be mixed up with his aerial Side Special spike, which will instead send the rocks straight down without the forward angle.

The spike also produces some oddities with the Hypocenter, with the downward knockback shockwave being notably slow if it hits with the spiking hitbox, thanks to the very same spiking properties it has! You can mix this up with the non-spiking hitbox to make opponents worry if it will be a fast or slow shockwave and the slow shockwave will usually stay out long enough Lexaeus can advance behind it briefly (especially as more power is gained). With at least one level of power charge, the shockwaves from this attack deal 5% damage.


Down Aerial: Earthshine

With one hand gripping his tomahawk, Lexaeus flicks it downwards and slashes under him, a surprisingly fast and nimble movement for the giant Nobody. This looks akin to Marth's Down Aerial, although far more visually impressive with Lexaeus' massive tomahawk. Quick to start up, although the swing itself has a reasonable amount of active frames, it deals 8% damage across the entire strike but the knockback is dependant on where the opponent is hit. The middle of the blade knocks opponents above Lexaeus with mediocre strength, while the sides hit opponents rather lightly in the same direction as the blade (IE get hit on the left and sent left). Ending lag is somewhat above average, but Lexaeus does have autocancel frames on the latter half of it. The primary purpose for this move is simply to cover Lexaeus big, heavy hitbox when landing: Throw this out, clear out the space under you and land in the autocancel frames if you're feeling extra spicy for a clean landing. It's also one of Lexaeus' faster moves, giving it some utility there.

Neutral Aerial: Iron Black

Lexaeus takes Skysplitter and swings it around him, looking akin to a mix of Cloud's Neutral Aerial and Ike's Neutral Aerial. This is one of Lexaeus' faster moves to come out, although certainly slower than Cloud, and covers Lexaeus' entire body with a hitbox that deals 8% for most of the hitbox but degrades to 6% near the tail end. Knockback is pretty standard overall, with Lexaeus lacking combo potential due to a lack of autocancel frames on the ending and fairly meh to bad ending lag, although it can situationally combo.

This move isn't really about comboing, though. This move is important for giving Lexaeus some additional safety and fast options and is a much less risky and in turn much less rewarding way to catch out air dodges. It's still reasonably good to shorthop out and is safe on shield when spaced properly, with higher power levels allowing Lexaeus to be more aggressive with how he spaces it and remain safe. It is more a tool of neutral than anything to do with interactions, essentially. Still, utilize responsibly.


Back Aerial: Turnabout Stalwart

Lexaeus hefts Skysplitter in front of him, before very suddenly striking behind him with tremendous ease, a show of his power to swing such a large weapon with such speed! The end result is speed slightly slower than Ike's Back Aerial for starting lag (which is still quite fast), with fairly solid range to it, although Lexaeus swings it without as much force as his meatier attacks and thus it deals about 8% damage. In the air this leaves Lexaeus still with his back turned to the foe and moderate ending lag: Not spectacularly punishable, but it isn't the fastest move ever. Knockback is a bit shallow and horizontal, being rather weak. You could string two of these together a low percents, or maybe threaten the foe with some other moves anyway.

This move is most excellent when used on the ground, because it has autocancel frames that allow Lexaeus to combo well out of it. A quick and lower knockback option for Lexaeus is pretty nice, allowing him to better land his stronger options in confirm-esque scenarios he otherwise not be able to. This combos into a Forward Tilt, a move forward Jab, or he can do something like mixup with a Dash Attack, Forward Smash which can be especially tricky with a properly placed Hypocenter to fire off a Forward Smash projectile. You could potentially kill confirm into various less laggy kill moves out of this, basically. With your pillar out, some of these mixups can actually end up becoming true combos, especially dangerous with Lexaeus' very powerful Forward Smash and Up Smash!

The money move with this is Down Smash, however: While it doesn't kill at the ludicrously easy amounts that the other smashes do, it combos without a monolithic pillar out most of the time and thus functions as a more consistent kill confirm compared to them, although it can still be tricky at times especially with max power.

The shallow horizontal knockback on this move is a good angle for sending your pillar pieces flying. This move is too weak for them to do a lot of damage, but it can cover good horizontal range when you use it near a ledge to ledgeguard the opponent. The actual move's knockback is good to send people off stage too with its shallow horizontal knockback, which can let Lexaeus set up some sick edgeguarding chances with stuff like his lingering Neutral Aerial and spiking Forward Aerial.


Final Smash: Ayers Rock


Lexaeus laughs as he flies into the background with a mighty leap, his power aura surging to 3x its current size. Lexaeus then crashes into the stage where he started, although he can steer himself left or right to a large degree. Getting hit by this crash deals 40% with no power charge that kills at 100%-ish, 80% that kills at like 50% with one and 120% damage that for all intents and purposes should be a OHKO if the opponent is struck while Lexaeus has max power. Of course, the dive is quite well telegraphed and so opponents have a reasonable chance to avoid it.

That is hardly the only effect of this Final Smash, however: Once Lexaeus impacts the ground, it will erupt all around him with MASSIVE range for 5 entire seconds, dealing multiple hits of 20% damage over that time period with TREMENDOUS range: A full Final Destination with no power charge, 2 Final Destinations snd THREE Final Destinations at max power! This is split in half to each side of Lexaeus (IE max power is 1.5 Final Destinations to each side) and it won't go off of ledges.

Opponents do have one recourse from this assault, however, and that's the fact that there's a long delay between each strike of this. One can, in theory, constantly roll or sidestep with perfect or near perfect timing to avoid it, akin to one perfect dodging Ganondorf's Final Smash (so I'm sure Jamie will have no trouble!). Of course, that won't be happening much. It's also a reference to how you can i-frame through Lexaeus' big dumb attack if you GIT GUD SON!


Playstyle: A Silent Hero


"My power has no limits, you have no chance!"

Lexaeus is all about sheer, simple and overwhelming power. He starts off with powerful attacks and turns them into crushingly powerful attacks if he can get going, but must play carefully and be aware of his weakness to not simply get rolled over. Although Lexaeus appreciates setup, he is not dependant on it, and a good Lexaeus knows how to fight even without any power buffs at all, although Lexaeus should always be looking for chances to start powering up.

Lexaeus' favorite type of opponent are other slower and more set-up oriented characters, characters with low range and in addition light characters. Lexaeus is rather lacking in combos due to the strength of his attacks, so he doesn't gain much from heavier and more combo-able characters: If anything, the fact they take longer to kill can be a bit troublesome for Lexaeus, as he has much more threat against light characters with his power. Lexaeus prefers to play a slow game anyway, so he actually enjoys less offensive and thus slower characters, especially since powering up will usually force SOME kind of reply from the opponent. However, Lexaeus' passive armor upon powering up is actually usually more helpful against faster offensive characters (who have lower damage, combo-oriented moves) and thus it could be thought that Lexaeus gets more benefits when he does power up against them. While projectiles can be bothersome to Lexaeus, his pillar makes it less of an issue compared to normal.

One of the keys to playing Lexaeus is applying pressure without ever committing to one action. The power of some of his attacks, his Up Smash may be ultra-risky but it also has insane rewards, and the ability for Lexaeus to pressure with possibilities is invaluable to him. For example, utilizing Up Special properly allows Lexaeus to threaten super armoring through attacks, new combos and an escape. Starting a power charge forces some reply from the opponent which both Lexaeus and the foe must respond to accordingly. Since Lexaeus' tomahawk affords him a long range, Lexaeus can move close to the opponent and threaten with mere existance, which is advanced with his power charge's passive armor and moves like Forward Tilt. This is all important because Lexaeus has the common heavyweight weakness of lag: Most of his moves are punishable on the back end, the ones that aren't are usually slow (although there are exceptions!) and so carefulness is key.

Lexaeus' power charging turns into a battle of wills when the opponent is able to respond, which they usually should be. The ideal situation for the opponent is to scare Lexaeus to use a move without committing, so that they can punish his option...however if Lexaeus doesn't blink, then he gets a large buff. As for Lexaeus, he wants to punish the opponent most appropriately for whatever action they take, either a move such as Forward Tilt or Up Smash against moves, a power option if they approach him for something like a grab or if he predicts, for example, an air dodge from an aerial approach, or to complete the charge if the opponent does not have the bravery to approach. The best Lexaeus will get the most out of these situations, while a mediocre Lexaeus is frequently outplayed.

Lexaeus should pay attention and consider the placement of his Hypocenter throughout the match. In addition to opening the opponent up, the focal point is notable for providing Lexaeus possible safety: Being able to send a shockwave or other bonus effect out with your laggier attacks is a pretty big bonus, and in particular the shockwaves can keep opponents from punishing as fast or at all and thus add a good deal to Lexaeus attacks. Lexaeus' pillar provides a bonus as well, but more to allowing Lexaeus more of an actual combo game thanks to the effect of people running into it and also being the most true projectile that Lexaeus has albeit one which takes some time to achieve. Lexaeus should keep the HP of his pillar in mind along with his current strength, as well. It can also add to his combo ability or safety with the rocks as well.

Throwing the opponent away and performing one of your setup options is certainly something Lexaeus can do, not only utilizing moves like Back Throw but also more pure spacers like Back Aerial and Jab. Lexaeus should not just think of this as a simple task he can pull off at will, however: It isn't like opponents at 0% are going to go flying, so he can't just start power charging off of everything. Lexaeus may instead wish to opt for the less laggy Hypocenter or pillar, especially at lower damage percentages. Lexaeus isn't a camper, but instead enjoys space to construct his more melee centric gameplan to the highest degree. This is another reason Lexaeus can enjoy lighter opponents. They're easier to toss around and gain space for!

One weakness Lexaeus has is another one common to heavyweights, which is landing. In fact, Lexaeus generally prefers to be on the ground. While Lexaeus' aerials are not bad, they tend to have more specific uses (like catching out air dodges or spiking) rather than being great at air combat or combos. The addition of Neutral Aerial is a big boon for Lexaeus due to being a strong all arounder that he can use in a pinch, but it will be predictable if that is all he uses. When it comes to landings, Lexaeus needs to try and mix it up between a stall than fall Down Special, his quick Down Aerial, his coverage Neutral Aerial and air dodge landing. All of these have their own issues, but it does give Lexaeus some more options than heavies like Donkey Kong or Bowser...but Lexaeus still has a big frame and high falling speed without as much mobility as others to get down and it's still a bother. Amusingly, Lexaeus himself loves getting the opponent in landing scenarios, as he has multiple good ways to catch out a falling opponent between his pillar, Up Tilt, Up Special, Up Aerial or even potentially a Forward Tilt in addition to the passive 8% armor he has. This is also usually Lexaeus best chance to throw out an Up Smash with a hard read, which he might want to do simply to scare the opponent into playing more safe in these scenarios to punish with his other moves.
 
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n88

Smash Lord
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,527
In honor of Piranha Plant making it into Smash Ultimate, enjoy this set for another classic Mario enemy! Just click the nice GIF!
0.5/10

Very solid first page, gets things off to a strong start. Unfortunately, the moveset really derails in page two with the cowardice of bringing in the super crown. Make a moveset for a generic villain that can't even move next time.
 

Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,439
Xaldin, the Whirlwind Lancer
The first moveset we’re presented with in FrozenRoy’s Organization XIII project is Xaldin, who is the Organization’s #3. Interesting. I’m only going to assume that Xaldin and Lexaeus were completed first due to you having a stronger wealth of ideas for them, Froy. We’ll see. Oh, and seeing as the Organization has been done before, I’m not going to look up the movesets and compare your own with those. It would be unfair.
First, I like how you made Xaldin better on the air than on the ground. It fits so well with his element and his theme. Having a practical spike available to an aerial character is wonderful too, and it makes so much sense considering Xaldin’s weapons. I do fear that it may be too strong. You claim that it can’t KO especially early but recovering from even moderately powerful spikes is usually impossible above extremely low percents. The rest of the down special is brilliant; from placing lances as super disjointed hitboxes (I will not call them traps) to utilizing them through shield special, I can see why you wrote Xaldin first.
I notice that your writing style is quite detailed and thorough, but you often have a few oddly-worded sentences that get across to the reader what you’re trying to say but can cause the reader to stumble and look over them again. This is usually associated with the number of commas present in a sentence, so try to not liberally use them when you can.
Dragoon Reign is a wonderful move that ties into his themes very nicely. It scales up with Lindworm spread out and gives him serious aerial mobility and strength which further ties into his playstyle. Well done. Your attacks traditionally feel like multiple moves in one disguised as a single attack, which is one of the things I love about your sets, Froy. You never fail to squeeze the most out of an attack and you always integrate these interactions that make each move more like a tree from which branches extend.
Where’s the windbox on the side special? Oh, you’re going to tell me it’s just a normal projectile hitbox? Tsk, tsk. Well, at least you have a windbox on the neutral special. That neutral is sweet too, even if you lay it on thick in the second part of the attack. It’s something I had to type out to fully grok as the technique of layered branching attacks I praised you for often overwhelms the reader at first but is easily understandable when explained in a simple way. Turning the wind shield into an offensive and mobility option is very cool, especially the smashes in the air option. I don’t see how he’s supposed to be a defensive character, though, with all these powerful neutral control options. He seems like he could apply a lot of pressure.
Moves that change in power depending on how many lances Xaldin has on his person is a brilliant idea, really. There are two perspectives to look at them from: they give the player all the options they want and let them choose how they want to play Xaldin; or they pull the moveset’s strengths in different directions and Xaldin can’t decide if which direction he wants to go in, limiting the potential strength he could have if he only focused on either spacing the lances out or keeping them together. Obviously the first perspective is what most of MYM strives for and is generally a good thing, but I do fear that the second perspective could harm the moveset’s impression on a reader.
Thank you for working in combos with other moves directly into the attack description, especially going as far as to note which percentages they combo into. That and all the other details you include on your moves inform the reader that you have thought out the playstyle, how the moves interact, and the properties of moves. This is great attention to detail as always and it helps the reader understand how each move fits in to the cohesive whole and I can tell you have confidence and took time with these moves.
I can tell you’ll do well with all the Organization members because you have plenty of attacks that use the member’s weapon and just as many that use the Nobody’s element. It’s a smooth implementation of the character’s abilities that makes sense. You also use attacks taken directly from the boss fight, but they’re written just like the original attacks, meaning I could not know anything about the boss fight and believe you had created them entirely on your own. The moves don’t just utilize the weapon and element, they feel like the weapon and element. What I mean by that is Xaldin fights like a gale of wind: surrounding the foe, beating them down, blowing them (and himself) across the stage, battering at their defenses, and pushing back against any attacks they throw at him. The only thing missing are more windboxes... since he controls wind and all. He also fights like a lance: piercing the foe, raining down on them from above, striking them with myriad hits, poking at them, and dealing more damage when the foe is not near but not too far away.
Your presentation is simple but effective. I adore the lances in the headers as those are a nice touch, and your color scheme is very muted but pleasing. All the images are a very nice touch, especially with the attacks that are inspired by his in-game appearance. The extras benefit from this too, and speaking of those thank you for including them! Your attention to them are quite refreshing to read and an excellent way to end the moveset after reading such a heavy playstyle section. Bonus points here for the win animation against The Beast or Belle. Flavor text like that really shows how much you cared about the set while writing it and it may seem insignificant but to fans of the series, it makes so much more of a difference. Other movesets could do this too, even when it’s not relevant (such as the interactions in question don’t have a moveset to pin them to).
In conclusion, Xaldin was a wonderful read and my favorite I’ve read yet this contest. I hope nobody shrugs this set off due to character bias or indifference because it’s quite a treat. You have an eye for detail and playstyle, and it does really show your skills not only as a writer, but as a designer also. You don’t leave anything out: thorough information on indivdual attacks, a vision of how they work with the whole, a hefty playstyle section that guides the reader and ties the moveset together, and an understanding of character that sandwiches the set through the introduction and the extras. Awesome job here, Froy.


Lexaeus, the Taciturn Stalwart
Silent Specials
Lexaeus' entire body shakes as he crouches down slightly, seismic energy forming behind him as he lets out a loud grunt and yell...
What?
Teasing aside, Lexaeus is a pretty neat character. One could say that he doesn't have much of one (and you do state that, more or less) but I see him as more of both the muscle and respected member of the Organization, such as a capo of a mafia. Taciturn Stalwart indeed. Too bad most of that is bogged down by the absolute mess that is Kingdom Hearts lore.
Much of what makes Lexaeus great I've already covered in my Xaldin commentary. You know the character's abilities well and how to translate them so naturally into Smash. These sets feel like the ultimate representation of what their character is. He's powerful, durable, and his moves have weight behind them. Truly a mountain of a man, Lexaeus fights as a representative of earth itself. His other dual nature, the tomahawk, cleaves his foes with the weight and force behind his attacks that truly requires resolve and strength to put to use. The moves Lexaeus (and Xaldin as well) use feel like they wouldn't fit with any other weapon or element.
In a similar thread, I'd like to praise you for how textured the moves feel. What I mean by this (and my liberal use of "feel") is that consequences of moves seem natural. Okay, that's even more confusing. Let me put it this way: the way your moves interact and behave with not only each other, but the foe and the stage are not only excellent and natural, but form connections that only a few people make. You do it, and MW does as well, but stuff like Lexaeus cracking the earth with his massive weapon and this point acting as a focal point for his attacks, including creating shockwaves are among interactions that not everyone would think to make. They have a style that's distinctly you, and after a while of reading these I can expect them to show up in the logical places and they actually do. It's how I know I'm reading a Froy moveset. Sure, many people could also think to write moves like these, but you're the only author I know of who can elegantly come up with these branching interactions that don't feel contrived. When I read them, I think, "Oh, of course it should work like that, why wouldn't it?"
The moveset is pretty much identical in quality with Xaldin, which isn't a bad thing at all. They have similar strengths and Lexaeus has a few more weaknesses, and I don't mean gameplay-wise. Your writing style can be hard to grok sometimes due to the thorough detail provided and it's usually when you get too punctuation-happy. Perhaps proofread it and try to make it flow a little better? These long paragraphs with more and more added interaction can also clog up the reader's understanding of the move and make it feel too heavy at times, so I'd recommend breaking up those signature Froy move text blocks with the enter key. The presentation here isn't as good as Xaldin's, and I'm not fond of that bright red text which is an ironic contrast to Xaldin's more calmer tones (considering Lexaeus's taciturn nature when he's not in beast mode). Try this text color, for instance, and it'll look more appealing. Great job on the playstyle section again, but where are my extras, Froy??? You got my hopes up.
Alright, so that's Lexaeus. I personally enjoyed him just as much as Xaldin, and it's hard to say which is my favorite, so I'm not going to. Froy, I sincerely hope you match the rest of the sets with the quality of these two, and I look forward to them keenly. To everyone else, read these two when you can. I highly consider them the best I've read so far.


BLADOS
It’s a shame that Smash Daddy has been the most consistent commenter in the thread and posts a moveset that only has one comment on it! Blados handles the interesting concepts of portals in a neat way but innovative way. I appreciate that they can function with only one out at a time, because I assume that the average writer dealing with a portal-focused set would require two portals for the move to do anything. Keeping a limit on the range was smart too, but it does dampen the possible creativity of being able to have them anywhere. A counterpoint to that, conversely, would be that restrictions breed creativity. I’m interested to see what he can do. The only question I have about how they function is what happens when Blados makes two portals face each other and he enters one of them. Does he gain infinite momentum due to the speed boost?

You’ve got plenty of creative moves in the set used in innovative ways and ways to make mechanics relevant in matchups where they normally wouldn’t, such as contriving projectiles from a melee-only character. Unfortunately, these moves can get bogged down by a sometimes-confusing description. I get what you’re trying to say with them for the most part, but when you start going into detail you can sometimes repeat words to the point my train of thought gets muddled and lost and I must reread it. There are a lot of really cool interactions here, especially with the shadow shield and portals, but it’s definitely not a casual read, and a reader must devote their full attention to the moves to grok how they work as a cursory read will yield a headache.

I love how this set manages to have these self-contained toolbox playstyles where each move builds on the others that all ultimately tie back to the shield special. It feels like Blados is constantly adding more and more onto it and building it up for a payoff. At times it even feels like what I thought would be the most interesting aspect of the set (the portals) is put on the backburner for interaction with the shadow shield. On the other hand you utilize his katana and shuriken quite effortlessly, and all of there’s plenty of slicing and dicing for the couple of weeaboos who pick up Blados because they want to go all ninja-samurai.

One of the things I don’t think you touched on was if the gathered projectiles in the shield vanish if they damage the foe, or how they interact with a grabbed foe. If they don’t disappear, then a grab would be absurd as the foe gets barraged over and over again passively by the projectiles then gets thrown after also getting pummeled. If they do disappear, this is a good way to transfer their damage to the foe without blasting them out of your shield, but it limits a player who wants to chuck them at portals or whatever but also wants to be grab-happy.

Those are my brief thoughts on Blados. I enjoyed the set and the myriad interactions you have, Smady. You always manage to make interesting playstyles for obscure characters and get me interested in someone I would have normally written off. I’m reading Chalis next, and I hope her quality is just as well. Also, the reason my commentary is so brief now is not just that I'm trying a more casual approach to commentary rather than detailed critique, but that you and as well Froy are quite competent writers. There are no egregious balance concerns and no details left out. Your playstyle, innovation, and creativity are top notch, and it seems like the only thing you suffer from are writing hiccups. Then again everyone has different reading comprehension so what I may not be able to parse, others can. Great work here Smady, you’ve shown through your moveset and commentary why you’ve been a leader for so long.
 
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FrozenRoy

Smash Lord
Joined
Apr 26, 2007
Messages
1,260
Location
Las Vegas, Nevada
Switch FC
SW-1325-2408-7513
A note about my star rankings: The descriptions are just to give you an idea about what it might contain and shouldn't be considered gospel truth that all sets within have all elements of it. Mostly, consider what the numbers mean. 10 is best, 0 is worst, 5 is average, 6 above average etc

Star Rating Explanation​

- 10 Stars(3 Ranked): Yes, I actually give out ten stars. 10 star represents the best movesets and usually have a strong playstyle, excellent execution, cool concept or the like, and on top of that, usually have something I personally find exceptional, be it from exceptional character (which can easily put a high 9 into 10), exceptional execution of a tough concept, an exceptionally creative concept or so on. These are rare, but I usually put out about 1 a contest.

- 9 Stars (4 Ranked): Nine Star may sit a tier below, but these sets are still quite amazing, and represent the "top" tier below "best". These sets share similar qualities to a 10 star set, tight knit playstyles and/or cool concepts and/or amazing execution or the like, but they usually have a collection of little nagging problems or a single large problem that keep them from the coveted 10 stars, or they lack "exceptionality" that pushes them over the top.

- 8 Stars(6 Ranked): Eight star sets usually contain some greatness, for it is the "Great" tier below "Top", but they have flaws which I cannot overlook, characterization issues, weaker concepts or execution and so on, which keeps them more on the level of great sets that may not be as fondly remembered later on.

- 7 Stars(8 Ranked): Seven star is "good", the sets that you see and think "that's good", but just don't hit the marks of greatness. Maybe it's a lack of expansion of the concept, a shaky execution, no heart in the characterization, or some lackluster sections, but these sets simply stay in the spot of good, not great. Usually, sets with a lot of good and a lot of bad tend to end up here or in 6/5 as well.

- 6 Stars(16 Ranked): Six star is "above average". They're better than your average set, sure, but they don't exactly speak to me, or are heavily flawed, or are simply average sets with just enough enjoyment to them to put them a smidge higher, or what have you.

- 5 Stars(7 Ranked): Five stars is "average". It's hard to describe average, but that's what it is, something in the middle that I don't find especially good or bad, such as a moveset with a little good and a little bad, a general moveset that doesn't do anything offensive, or something with such large drops between good and bad that I can't get behind it either way. Average.

- 4 Stars(10 Ranked): For 4 stars, it is "below average". It isn't horribly bad or anything, but it's getting there, issues are starting to outweigh positives, maybe the characterization is far off your average-ish set, you've got some unavoidable number issues or your execution just wasn't up to snuff, but I can't get behind the set, though these sets fairly often have hidden gem concepts to be shined by later movesets.

- 3 Stars(13 Ranked): Three stars is when we get into "bad". These movesets actively detract from me a good deal and begin to lose redeeming elements, and often contain multiple large issues, such as terrible execution, lacking playstyle and bland or bad characterization, yet they lack the means to be truly, memorably bad.

- 2 Stars(5 Ranked): Two stars is "Bottom", and you've about hit rock bottom and have numerous issues that probably require large scale changing of your moveset, yet you lack the exceptional awfulness characteristic of the truly terrible 1 star movesets, and you usually fail to break the game.

- 1 Star(7 Ranked): At one star, the moveset is LOOOOOOOOATHED ENTIIIIIIIIIIIRELY.

---

Ranked Movesets

Number of MYM21 Sets Ranked: 77


Sylvia
**********
10/10


Himiko Toga
**********
10/10



Aurelia Midam
**********
10/10


Rime Marz
*********
9/10


Kilton
*********
9/10


Shinobu
*********
9/10


Kamoshida
*********
9/10


Ribbon Witch Velvet
********
8/10


Rex, Pyra and Mythra (Muno)
********
8/10


Yui Hirasawa
********
8/10


Aromage Rosemary
********
8/10


SCRATCH
********
8/10


Okumura
********
8/10


PlanetMan.EXE
********
8/10


Misko/Lambda
*******
7/10


Honey Witch Eleanor
*******
7/10


Chalis
*******
7/10


Frost Witch Idella
*******
7/10


Nightmare
*******
7/10


Blados
*******
7/10


Paper Witch Mint
******
6/10


Bill Blastette
******
6/10


Alolan Golem
******
6/10


Omega
******
6/10


The Mountain
******
6/10


Morag
******
6/10


Colobot Astronaut
******
6/10


Kris, Susie and Ralsei
******
6/10


P A P E R M A R I O (Muno)
******
6/10


The Elephant
******
6/10


Cat Battleship
******
6/10


Darmuk Syreus
******
6/10


The Bounty Hunter
******
6/10


Percy
******
6/10


Rintaro Okabe
******
6/10


Wrecking Ball
******
6/10


Fark the Electric Jester
******
6/10


Washizu
*****
5/10


Guzma
*****
5/10


Nabbit
*****
5/10


Jupiter
*****
5/10


The Black Knight
*****
5/10


Dead Hand
*****
5/10


Kammy Koopa
*****
5/10


King Dedede Remix
*****
5/10


Asagao
****
4/10


Hidan
****
4/10


Dark Matter
****
4/10


Kazuya
****
4/10


Simirror
****
4/10


Baron von Guu
****
4/10


Jebediah Kerman
****
4/10


Rex (Altais)
****
4/10


Zoroark
****
4/10


Impa
***
3/10


Merasmus
***
3/10


Katia Managan
***
3/10


Revali (Old)
***
3/10


Pyrogen
***
3/10


Arle Nadja
***
3/10


Galvantula
***
3/10


Chill Penguin
***
3/10


Jergingha
***
3/10


Blupi
***
3/10


Kirby
***
3/10


Spongebob Squarepants
***
3/10


Dehaka
***
3/10


Boruto Uzumaki
**
2/10


Samson
**
2/10


Corn Barnacles
**
2/10


Wario Deluxe
**
2/10


BotW Link
**
2/10


Hollow Knight
*
1/10


Arcade Bunny
*
1/10


Alucard
*
1/10


Sora
*
1/10


Weavile
*
1/10


Paper Mario (Squirtle/Mario guy)
*
1/10


Vaati
*
1/10
 
Last edited:

MasterWarlord

Smash Champion
Joined
Aug 24, 2008
Messages
2,902
Location
Not wasting countless hours on a 10 man community
WASHIZU IWAO


Washizu is a very unique case as a villain in that his arc has gone on a ridiculously long period of real life time, totaling 20 real life years, and that's with constant monthly updates on the part of the manga writer, having only recently finished in 2017. The arc is all set in the same room for the majority of it, so the story isn't something especially complicated. The anime was made in 2005, so it doesn't have the vast majority of his long arc and just ends randomly. Washizu is in the series for about 230 out of the 300 chapters. He has by far the most dialogue of anyone in the series, and things are very commonly presented from his perspective, much more commonly than anyone else. Washizu is the main character of the series for all intents and purposes. He even got his own spinoff manga named after him, much like Tonegawa, though he is far more important to his original series than Tonegawa.

Washizu is an elderly rich man who has grown old and bored with normal things, somewhat like Hyoudou, who he shares a voice actor with, but is generally less senile. He plays mahjong games (like everyone else in this manga) where he forces enemies to wager their blood against his sizable fortune, making things very obviously rigged in his favor with enemies having to win over 10 times as much as he does in order to catch up to him. All he has to gain out of this is pleasure, and he normally very casually beats all of his opponents before coming against Akagi. Akagi has to slowly whittle down his fortune against pretty much impossible odds. As the game goes on, Washizu quickly gains a level of fear for Akagi. All he even had to gain was psychotic pleasure, but now his fortune is being legitimately threatened. Washizu gets more and more desperate as the game goes and regularly views Akagi as a demon, given how edgy he is and how rarely he even talks. He despises him and is always running through tons of possibilities for how to beat him. He usually loses most small scale battles, but what few victories he gets throughout the game are very decisive. Despite how long this series is, the game always feels like it could end at any moment one way or the other after the first quarter of it or so, making it into a real pageturner of a manga. This applies for both Washizu and Akagi, and Washizu is almost constantly in desperation mode doing whatever he can to survive and trying to finish off Akagi and end the game. Washizu is still most definitely very evil, but when he is fighting primarily for his own survival it is hard to not root for him with how much more likeable he is. No villain is constantly in desperation mode and coming back like he is while still being a legitimate threat to the protagonist. While he is obviously much less skilled than Akagi and is only in it due to the big handicap in his favor, he gets better as the match goes on as he tries to recover from his mistakes.

(Spoilers from here on) Washizu mahjong is a 2v2 affair, with Washizu playing alongside an incompetent minion who gets zero character development in 230 chapters and remains very generic, having to heavily carry him. Akagi, meanwhile, plays with a prominent character who much more regularly is able to help him, so to be fair here, Washizu isn't entirely at an advantage. Washizu's fortune eventually gets so far down that he desperately offers to give Akagi's partner a third of his fortune if he helps him to 3v1 Akagi, which would've also been enough to beat him, but that doesn't come to pass. It goes on to become drained completely, and he is forced to finally come down to Akagi's level and bet his own blood to try to save his money, much to the protest of his minions who are concerned for his well being. He comes so close to death from having his blood drawn multiple times that he hallucinates that he is in hell, and there are 30 chapters or so where he hallucinates he is in hell. He leads an uprising in hell against the demons and defeats King Enma and makes him his *****, finally ascending back to real life at the end of it, definitely the biggest highlight. Even assuming that it is not real, it reveals a lot about what Washizu thinks of himself and how obscenely egotistical he is. King Enma's "mirror of evil" breaks because Washizu is just so evil that it cannot show his past sins.

Washizu does have questionable sanity as he does rely heavily on getting good luck at some points, but the reason he does so is because he knows that Akagi is blatantly a better player than him, he only looks to beat him through very specific means in ways that he cannot resist him. With how many chances Washizu has to win, it only makes sense, right? Washizu comes close to winning several times, but loses these opportunities because he takes the advice of his minions who are constantly watching and cowering, telling him to take the safe route. I regularly sided with his minions and thought he was being stupid at some points, but he would always inevitably prove me wrong. As complicated as mahjong is, you don't really have to understand that much to appreciate the manga, as all of the key gameplay is very meticulously narrated as everyone's thought process is fully explained.

Washizu has no shortage of displaying just how much he hates Akagi for reducing him to this state, at moments it's fear, but he's always talking about how happy he will be when he finally kills him. Towards the end of the game, it stops being fear and evolves into outright respect for him. He even hesitates if he wants to kill him when he has the advantage after all he's been through at the very end, but isn't held back and still intends to do it regardless. He finally draws his winning mahjong tiles that will win him the game, but his heavy blood loss causes him to pass out, making everyone assume he died. Akagi's partners take their share of the money. Akagi acknowledges that Washizu was blatantly going to win and lets him keep his share. After it's over, Washizu gets blood pumped back into his system and revitalizes. In a rage, he says that he doesn't want Akagi's pity and says to burn all of the money that Akagi left behind for him. After recovering for a few minutes, he next decides that he wants to hunt down and kill Akagi even after the game is already over. To do this, he will need money, so he beats his minions over the head with his cane for being so stupid as to burn his money and forces them to get it out of the fire for him. The manga ends with him desperately chasing after Akagi as if it's a happy ending, which it blatantly is. Washizu is very obviously the manga writer's favorite character, it's not hard to see it. Despite being introduced later, just by chapter appearances alone he's very competitive with Akagi, having about 50 chapters where Akagi doesn't appear at all.

STATISTICS
Weight: 8/10 (107 units, 8th place with Ike/Wario)
Size: 7/10 (Captain Falcon)
Ground Speed: 2/10 (1.4 units, 50th place above Link's 1.394 units)
Aerial Speed: 4/10 (1 unit, tied for 31st with Bowser and Rosalina)
Falling Speed: 5/10 (1.5 units, tied for 31st with Mewtwo and Mario)
First Jump Height: 3/10 (30 units, 49th above Ike's 29.9 units)
Second Jump Height: 5/10 (34 units, 30th place above Toon Link's 33.79 units)
Aerial Control: 7/10
Traction: 9/10

Washizu has fairly ordinary stats. He's not miserably slow, but he has no movement option he excels in, being below average in both the air and on the ground. His first jump height is rather poor, though he does have good air control and the minimum jumpsquat duration, so he's still able to use his aerials on the stage decently. With use of his Up Special, his air presence improves.

SPECIALS

SIDE SPECIAL - DEAL



Washizu's stale moves are important enough to his moveset that they are constantly displayed on his hud in the form of mahjong tiles with their button inputs shown on them. For aerials, the jump button will be shown + a direction, and the grab button + a direction for throws. The 9 stale moves essentially represent Washizu's mahjong "hand" at any given time. If Washizu has at least one stale move in his hand and presses this button, he will "deal" the Mahjong tile forwards, throwing it at his enemies to dispose of it. The mahjong tile does 5% and knockback that kills at 300%, but is thrown forwards about two thirds the distance of Final Destination at a fairly high speed.

If the Mahjong tile hits the foe, whatever move was on the mahjong tile will show up on their stale moves list to enter their hand, enabling you to make the foe's moves stale. Meanwhile, the move on the tile will exit Washizu's stale moves list. By default, Washizu deals the most recent move on his stale moves list, but if he inputs any attack while he is still in the lag of the move, the mahjong tile in question will be of the input Washizu makes. If Washizu hits with this move, he will effectively refresh his "ammo" for the attack by causing the Side Special itself to enter the stale moves list. The move still exits the stale moves list regardless of whether or not Washizu hits with the move, however. Washizu certainly has no problem keeping his kill moves fresh, and if anything has trouble hitting enough attacks to keep up ammo for this move, given he starts with no moves stale at the start of a match.

If this move is held down instead of pressed, a smaller version of Washizu's Mahjong table will appear in front of him for to draw a tile out of, enabling him to add a random move to his stale moves list. Washizu can still choose which stale move he throws away to make room for the new Mahjong tile, even throwing away the random move he drew if he wants. This is fairly slow and has no hitbox. Relying on luck is far from the best strategy either, it's mostly useful early on in the match before you've hit 9 moves and are just trying to get any kind of Mahjong hand regardless of its quality.

DOWN SPECIAL - WHITE SUITS



Washizu snaps his fingers, which has a tiny, pathetic hitbox that deals 4% and a flinch which isn't even safe on hit, though starts up fast. This does not cause a random judge in the middle of the stage to bang his gavel, but instead summons one of Washizu's ridiculously loyal minions to aid him. These simple minded thugs are severely weakened clones of Captain Falcon, who are most comparable to the Male Wire Frame from Melee (adjusted for the current Smash game). Their only differences are they aren't floaty and don't have increased jumps, and they also don't even have the sweetspot on Falcon's dair the wire frames do, so they're even worse than those guys. Their AI is insultingly stupid with that of a level 3 computer by default, though they will go out of their way to protect Washizu if a foe hits him, briefly increasing their AI to that of a level 7 computer for 3 seconds as they gain a panicked expression, specifically going after the foe who attacked him. The AI will still increase if the foe attacks Washizu's shield, being a good way to convince your idiotic minions that this match is serious.



Washizu can only have one White Suit out at a time, serving as his Mahjong partner. While they don't have any specials normally, if Washizu inputs Down Special with the White Suit out, they will use Washizu's Side Special, Deal, in his general direction. Washizu can make another input during that time to choose what move the White Suit deals, just like when he personally uses Side Special, though the White Suit will by default deal the most recent move they hit with. If the Mahjong tile touches Washizu, he will pocket it and add it to his hand. During this animation, Washizu can make an input to choose what he discards, discarding the oldest stale move by default. If Washizu doesn't care what he discards, he can cancel out of the animation instantly like an Incineroar taunt, in which case he will automatically discard the oldest move. White Suits can also pocket Mahjong tiles dealt by Washizu into their own hands, enabling them to be kept around for later.

White Suits will ocasionally use the held version of Side Special to draw a new tile at random, though will only do so when they aren't in their defensive panicked states.

UP SPECIAL - BLESSED BY THE HEAVENS



Washizu is an insane man who believes he is favored by the gods. If this move is used in the air, a horde of various religious figures such as Buddha, King Enma, Allah, Zeus, and Satan will appear transparent and grab onto Washizu before carrying him up into the air, giving him free flight. These gods only exist in Washizu's mind, however, so his recovery's quality depends on how favored by the gods Washizu thinks he is, which is determined by the quality of Washizu's hand.

For the purposes of Smash, the kinds of hands Washizu wants to get involve getting all of the moves from one input section, and/or all of the moves in one direction. Having all 4 specials, all 5 standards, all 3 smashes, all 5 aerials, all 4 throws, all side moves, all up moves, all down moves, or all neutral moves are the hands you want. You can also get "5 of a kind" by having one move in the stale moves list 5 times, but that leaves you very predictable and with a horribly stale useless move. Given your hand can be up to 9 moves, it's possible to get 2 of these matches at the same time, which further increases the quality of your hand. For the maximum quality, you want there to be no "filler" move in the hand but for it to still be 9 moves, so 5 aerials and 4 specials, for example. To get all "neutral" moves, side moves will count for throws and smashes. Washizu's pummel cannot enter the stale moves list.

With no matches and less than 9 moves in the list, you get a single god who carries Washizu with free flight for 1 second at the speed of Pit's Brawl recovery, which isn't bad, but has no hitbox and leaves him in helpless at the end.

With 9 moves and no matches, you get 2 gods, a hitbox that deals 5% and radial knockback away from Washizu during the attack, and the recovery lasts for 1.3 seconds. Washizu is no longer left in helpless at the end of the move, though can't use the move again before touching the ground.

With at least one set of "matching" moves, Washizu gets 3 gods, it's buffed to 2 seconds, and he can now attack during the recovery.
With two sets of matching moves, he acquires the fourth god, buffs the recovery to 3.5 seconds, the speed of the recovery goes at 1.7X that of Pit's recovery, and he is superarmored for the entire duration of the move against attacks that deal 7% or less.

With a perfect hand that exclusively consists of two sets of matching moves, he has 5 gods, the recovery lasts 6 seconds, goes 2X the speed of the Pit Up Special, and he has superarmor against moves that deal 11% or less. If Washizu manages to get a match of all of his specials involved, that will give Washizu 2 gods instead of 1 god, though the cap remains at 5 gods. None of Washizu's specials are particularly easy to land outside of Side Special, and White Suits can't even use Specials besides Side Special.

Getting more than one set of matching moves isn't super realistic most of the time, but it's not exactly a ton to ask for to only get one match in your hand. You can quite possibly get a single match on accident, or at least close to it before you actively try to get the last move needed to complete the match.

White Suits will actively try to hit with moves that will most directly help him to complete his hand in a very methodical manner, so they can then give those tiles to Washizu. They will automatically default to dealing moves to Washizu that will help him to complete his hand if applicable when ordered to deal a move to him, though you can still override their decision if you don't trust the computer. When they go to draw tiles, they will discard useless moves which won't help Washizu's current hand get to a complete state. Washizu and his minions unfortunately cannot attack each other, so they can't just casually get whatever tiles they want that way.

NEUTRAL SPECIAL - POWER OF MONEY



Washizu places down a very large, very heavy pile of gold bullion bars with lag comparable to Villager's fsmash, though with a considerably bigger hitbox. If Washizu drops the gold on top of the foe, the move is every bit as powerful as the aforementioned attack, and he has superarmor against attacks that deal 14% or less during the move. If used in the air the gold will drop until it hits the ground rather than vanishing early, traveling at the speed of Bowser's Down Special. Villager doesn't have the luxury of using his fsmash in the air, which can make this move a lot scarier. However, Washizu will just slam down the gold in place if the gold would fall off the ledge, as his gold is too precious to just mindlessly drop off the stage to kill a mere peasant like the foe, meaning it can't be used for casual gimps.

After having been placed on the floor, the gold bullion functions as a very durable wall with 60 HP, easily blocking projectiles from most foes. The gold bullion bars are arranged in such a way that they create a small slope that characters can walk over rather than a solid wall that can be directly used for combos, though will still absorb non piercing projectiles due to the fact the construct has HP. Because the gold isn't a true solid wall, Washizu's Mahjong tiles can still pass through it with no issue. The gold is slightly less wide than Bowser, and is as tall as Mario at the tallest point.



Washizu doesn't have infinite money to throw around. Inputting Neutral Special with gold already out on the stage will cause him to order a White Suit to come out from the background and carry it on a cart to his current location when he input the move at the slow speed of Brawl Ganondorf's walk. The White Suit will not carry the gold to a location beyond the platform it started on. Attacking the White Suit will "kill" him instantly, causing him to run away into the background. Washizu can ride on top of the gold given it goes to the location he was at when he first used the move and the White Suit carries it quite slowly.

If Washizu inputs Neutral Special in front of a gold bullion bar, he will just pick it up and slam it in front of himself again to recreate the hitbox from the start of the move. This is slightly faster than when he first uses the attack given it's already out, but is far more predictable given he now is stuck using the move in a specific location, and he doesn't get superarmor when using the move this way.

Washizu becomes enraged if the foe destroys his gold, which is largely his life blood to him. This will increase his dashing speed and air speed by .3 units for the rest of the stock, as well as increase his rage as if he had taken an extra 35% damage. This bonus rage enables Washizu to go over the regular cap of 150%. Washizu passively gains some slight superarmor when enraged, starting at 100% with superarmor against attacks that deal 1% or less, with that then increasing by 1% for each 10% he takes above 100%. This normally caps at 150% for a mere 5% superarmor, but can stack for Washizu to reach a theoretical max of superarmor against attacks that deal 19% or less. The passive superarmor will stack with any other superarmor in Washizu's set, such as when Washizu slams the gold bullion for the first time during this attack.

GRAB-GAME

GRAB - RESTRAIN

Washizu points forwards, causing two White Suits to come out from the background in front of him to grab the foe for a disjointed grab. This is an amazing grab with range on par with a tether, and is easily faster than any traditional tether grab, though is of course still slower than physical grabs. If Washizu misses, he will angrily shake his cane at his minions and yell at them, giving the move long ending lag on par with the worst tether grabs like Pac Man's abominable grab.

If Washizu has a minion White Suit out from Down Special and there is currently only one enemy in the match, they will just stop what they're doing and start cheering Washizu on uselessly, or give him horrible "advice" on what to do. They can't even be bothered to use this time to draw Mahjong tiles or anything.

PUMMEL - DRAW



Washizu plunges his hand into the foe's chest to draw a Mahjong tile out from their person for a slow pummel that deals 3.5% before taking the tile for himself and adding it to his hand. By default, Washizu takes whatever tile would most benefit his hand and replaces the most useless tile, though can make two inputs to choose what move he takes and replaces. While this pummel is slow, this is mainly so that Washizu has enough time to make the inputs if needed, and his grab is 1.2X harder to escape than a regular grab to compensate for this.

Being able to take tiles from the foe is very important to complete your hands with move that are otherwise difficult to land. While you can rely on the gimped Captain Falcon moveset of the White Suits sometimes, they are still dumb computers at the end of the day, and they can't give you Specials. Washizu's Neutral Special is very slow and predictable most of the time outside of the first time it's used, and Washizu only has a very brief moment to hit with his Down Special finger snap when he first summons a White Suit and will even be punished for it. Up Special requires Washizu to have at least 9 Mahjong tiles to even have a hitbox!

A foe who is trying to play against this has to be very careful to avoid hitting with moves that would be helpful for Washizu's hand when attacking not only him, but his White Suits and his precious gold. If the foe has a particularly good move they like to spam to destroy the gold, your burden in hitting with that input on Washizu's moveset is made much smaller as you can just take it from the foe later. To destroy a construct, foes will almost always have one move that is the best for it, but if they spam that you can just take that move from them over and over to get 5 of a kind. It's important to realize which moves you can easily just pick up from the foe later, especially considering the quality of Washizu's grab.

Now that it's relevant what moves are in the foe's stale moves list, it's worth noting that any hits against your superarmor will still become stale. Directly tanking an attack just to get a tile in the foe's list isn't something you want to be doing regularly, but if you can kill two birds with one stone by getting a hit of your own off it, it's very possible to multitask and make those top tier Mahjong plays.

For the purposes of Mahjong, the pummels of foes will be read as "fthrow" given Washizu cannot use pummels.

DOWN THROW - BLOOD TRANSFUSION



Washizu says "Ron!" (Essentially meaning "I win!") as his Mahjong tiles appear in front of himself and he knocks them down, emptying his hand of stale moves and "ending" the game of Mahjong which gives Washizu a payout based off the quality of his hand. If Washizu didn't have any matches, the White Suits will just shrug and attempt to cheat despite the fact Washizu did not actually win, not daring to disobey Washizu's orders. One White Suit will hook the foe's arm up to a blood transfusion machine, while the other White Suit hooks Washizu's arm to it, directly transferring the blood into Washizu's body to heal him of the many wounds that annoying foe has inevitably dealt him. The White Suit shoves the foe away afterwards as they have a small frame disadvantage from the shock of having their blood sucked out of their body like that.

With less than 9 tiles and no matches, Washizu deals 3% and heals 3%. With 9 tiles and no matches, 10%. With a match, 15%. With two matches, 23%. With a perfect hand, 30%. In addition to this considerable damage lead Washizu will have got off the foe, the foe's movement statistics will be lowered for the rest of the stock based off how much blood Washizu has drained from them. Their ground speed will be lowered by .01 units per 1% dealt from this move, while their air speed lowers by .005 units. For every 7% dealt in this way, the foe's dodges also gain an additional frame of ending lag, one extra frame to the ending lag of all their moves, one extra frame of jumpsquat, and grabs become 1.1X harder for them to escape. If you somehow deal 50% to the foe with this attack in one stock, they'll just instantly keel over dead like in a stamina match, but you should kill them normally long before that happens. Washizu will retain any rage he gained before he healed, enabling him to pass over 150% rage without having to make use of gold.

FORWARD THROW - MIRROR OF EVIL



Washizu takes out a mirror and lets the foe see themselves in said mirror. Washizu believes this mirror lets him see how evil someone is, and is supposedly the real mirror used by King Enma in hell, which he took from him himself! Washizu looks at the foe's Mahjong hand in the mirror (which causes it to show on the foe's hud for the throw's duration), then has a varying level of anger based off the quality of the foe's hand. The better the foe's hand is, the more enraged Washizu is, and thus the more "evil" the foe is in his opinion for daring to oppose his hand with a better one! Washizu then slams the mirror over the foe's head, shattering it and breaking it into a million pieces if he was angry enough. The mirror judges the foe based off how evil they are, having greater power if they are more evil, it is most definitely not because Washizu swung the mirror harder at the foe because he's angry they are luckier than him.

At minimum, the throw deals 9% and knockback that kills at 200%. If the foe has 9 stale moves, 11% and knockback that kills at 180%. With a match, 13% and knockback that kills at 115%. With 2 matches, 16% and knockback that kills 80%. With a perfect hand, 20% and knockback that kills at 65%. This does not empty the foe's stale moves list, so Washizu can potentially just grab them and hit them with the powerful throw again, but foes can go try to get a "bad" hand before then. Foes will probably have to go out of their way to attack White Suits and gold bullions with their worst attacks just to get them out of the way rather than hitting Washizu with them, freeing themselves to use other moves if they choose to respect this throw. Foes having the luxury of being able to put anything in their hands by attacking gold is great, but they have to be careful to not destroy it while they're doing that, less they just make Washizu angry about something else. Of course, Washizu can deal directly into their hands if he so chooses with Side Special to give them a hand that he can more easily get offended about.

BACK THROW - PUNISHMENT



The White Suits forcefully carry the foe over to Washizu's other side before he beats them over the head with his cane, sending them flying behind him for his most powerful throw without any set-up, dealing 10% and knockback that kills at 160% as he laughs at the foe. Washizu's cane is not among the most durable things in the world, however, as it will break after hitting the foe 3 times. It is most powerful when it breaks, being boosted to a very powerful 16% and knockback that kills at 95%. While not as strong as Washizu's other throws, this is not a KO throw to be taken lightly either! After the cane breaks in half, one of the White Suits who had grabbed the foe will give Washizu a new one before leaving.

The only thing that is unfortunate about this bonus is given the fact you must have used it twice already before you get the boost, the move will be stale already and not be as powerful as it could be. You will need to deal out those two back throws if you want this move to be at full power. Alternatively, just spam this move away to get 5 of a kind. By the time you get 5 of a kind, you will have another full power bthrow in your pocket to use at a later time after you use up your current tiles on a dthrow blood transfusion.

UP THROW - DOGPILE

Several additional White Suits come in from the background and clumsily body slam the foe all at once, including the two that were originally restraining the foe. This deals 9% and weak vertical knockback that doesn't kill until 260%. The knockback takes place in front of Washizu's current position given he is not physically performing the attack, but is otherwise entirely vertical. If the attack is performed on a slope, the knockback dealt will be at an angle, potentially enabling the move to combo into Washizu's Side Special.

The mountain of minions sticks around for about 3 seconds as sloped terrain similar to Washizu's gold bullion, but is a bit bigger than that, being a Ganondorf tall at the highest point and a Bowser wide. The minions will slowly recompose themselves over those 3 seconds as they get out one by one and go back into the background, not being a permanent terrain change as the mountain gets shorter and shorter. They will not get up if Washizu steps on them, however, as that would be highly rude considering the fact that Washizu is currently making great use of their bodies as ground. They will only start getting up once Washizu is no longer standing on them. This throw's knockback would be pretty useless for comboing without the pile of minions, but with it, Washizu can run up the side to get greater heights to combo the foe, as he personally gets out of lag with this move quite fast. This also enables him to use the move to combo into grounded attacks where he otherwise couldn't at very low percentages, as well as to change the angle of the knockback when he combos the attack by standing on the side of the minion slope.

SMASHES

FORWARD SMASH - EXECUTE



Washizu takes out a massive cleaver sword which he struggles to have the strength to wield properly, making this move incredibly laggy. He swings it forwards in an arc comparable to Ike's fsmash, dealing 21-29.4% and knockback that kills at 75-40%. This attack is incredibly laggy on both ends and is one of the hardest moves to hit in the game under normal circumstances. If you want to get a fsmash tile, you're much better off taking it from someone else.

If Washizu has a match, White Suit minions will try to grab and hold the foe in place when he performs this attack so that he can "execute" them as penalty for the foe's "loss". The generic Captain Falcon grab is much faster than this move, essentially turning that into the real hitbox for this powerful attack. Under normal circumstances, White Suits will always use their throws immediately, too stupid to give Washizu the chance to take advantage of the foe's stunned state. Fsmash is the only time where they will hold the foe down for Washizu to strike.

While the White Suits will constantly be roaming around, you have the ability to have them perform the Mahjong Tile dealing at any time, and if Washizu has a match, their grab. The White Suits can become significantly more threatening despite their stupid AI when Washizu has this level of control over them. This isn't a combination Washizu can put out on demand given he can't control the movement of the White Suit unless he constantly hides behind his minion, but that makes him more predictable. It is significantly more threatening if he simply waits for the White Suit to get into position naturally before springing this deadly combination on the foe. This move also happens to deal a bit of bonus shield damage and shield push, making the move very punishing to shields in general. A foe who has lost blood from Washizu's down throw will have a lot of their defensive options hamepered, including their dodges, but their shield is one of the few things that isn't neutered.

If you don't have a match, you probably want to mainly use this move for the range at points where you won't be punished for it. This mainly translates to when the foe is at the ledge or is traversing the sloped gold bullion terrain. With the slope in the way, it can serve to somewhat "block" for Washizu if he uses the move on the opposite side of the gold as the foe.

The White Suit will use his grab immediately if he's not currently in lag when Washizu inputs fsmash with a match. If he's dashing, he will input his dashing grab, potentially sliding and carrying the foe forwards into Washizu's fsmash. While White Suits don't dash nearly as fast as Captain Falcon, they're still based off him and have his bad traction, so they will slide a decent ways after landing a dashing grab. They can potentially carry the foe over a gold bullion over to Washizu, where he would've been entirely safe if he missed the attack. Of course, like any normal character, their standing grab is faster than their dashing grab, so if they're already in the obvious position for it it's better they're not doing anything.

UP SMASH - RIICHI



Washizu throws several wooden sticks with markers on them that represent accumulated points in Mahjong, saying the name of the move as he does so. The points sticks go upwards at a 45 degree angle, reaching about a Kirby width in front of and above Washizu before falling back down to the ground in front of him. The points sticks deal multiple hits that total to 12-16.8%, along with knockback that kills at 150-100% in the same angle on the final hit of the attack. This angle is typically always very bad for killing foes.

At lower percentages, this attack reveals that the knockback is dealt at the Sakurai angle, causing foes to slide horizontally and will also always leave Washizu's enemies tripped before the foe starts taking knockback at higher percentages. This move is quite fast but is especially low on ending lag, enabling Washizu to combo the attack more easily when he can capitalize on the trip. While fast, the hitbox starts above Washizu before gradually falling in front of him, so it's a bit harder to hit foes right in front of him. Making use of slopes is very helpful to aim this hitbox directly forwards, and makes this move into an intimidating wall to approach through if casually thrown out. Washizu can potentially combo this move out of uthrow before comboing this move into something else, such as another up based move to get a good match going. If he already has 9 tiles, he can hit Up Special and uair at the same time even. At higher percentages where the moves loses the ability to combo, the move becomes exceedingly mediocre outside of serving its expected purpose as simple anti air.

In Mahjong, declaring Riichi requires you to keep drawing tiles every turn until you get what you need to complete your hand, but gives you the ability to improve your hand, but can only be declared when the player is one tile away from winning the game. In Smash, if Washizu hits with his usmash, nothing out of the ordinary happens unless he is within one tile of completing a match. This will cause the tiles in his hand that make up the incomplete match to start flashing, down next to his stock icon on the hud.

The tiles will continue to glow until Washizu causes another move to enter the stale moves list. If the move is a tile that will complete the match, it is added to the hand as normal but those tiles will continue glowing, indicating that Washizu has a riichi bonus on those tiles. This makes that match count for 2 matches, increasing the quality of his hand significantly more than by what it normally does. However, if Washizu hits with anything else at all, that tile won't enter his hand and the tiles that made the incomplete match will all instantly be discarded. This segways Washizu into being forced to hit with that specific move, making him incredibly predictable. Granted, if Washizu has multiple sets of matches that can use to complete a hand, so long as he completes any of those matches with the next move he inputs, it will get the bonus and he won't lose any tiles. Ideally, Washizu wants to set up a scenario where he only has a move that's easy to hit with as his final one before declaring Riichi, or give himself multiple options to hit with. This can also be used as a simple mindgame as you surprise the foe by using some other move you don't need for your hand to defend yourself, but that's a heck of a lot of effort to go through for such a mundane reward.

The simplest solution is to use this move's great comboability at low percentages to simply confirm directly into the move you need to complete your hand for maximum payout and minimum risk. That's easier said than done because of the fact this move stops comboing at higher percentages, and you have to hit with moves to fill up your hand in the first place, thus damaging the foe. There are some incredibly flowchart like ways you can play with Washizu to get to full hands as quickly as possible, but when put into practice will get him easily defeated due to him not giving his foe the proper respect, something Washizu knows all too well. Keep in mind you're allowed to use other moves without losing your hand, you're just not allowed to hit with them, so feel free to throw out some other moves just to control space.

You can of course try to cheat by simply only doing this when the foe has the move required to complete the hand. Because grab and pummel don't enter the stale moves list, if you just steal the move you need after declaring Riichi, that'll be the next move in the list and get you the more powerful hand. Alternatively, you can also have your White Suit deal you the tile you need to complete the hand and play around some last move the White Suit has as the finishing vital tile. The foe can more easily interfere with this by intentionally blocking the tile the White Suit deals to you with their shield, or even their body if they really need to, as either of these options will destroy the tile. The foe's counterplay is always the most important thing to watch out for.

DOWN SMASH - CANE SPIN

This is a pretty simplistic looking smash where Washizu spins around rapidly with his cane extended outwardly from himself, with the crook of the cane facing away from him. The cane deals 10-14% with knockback over several flinching hits that drags foes in towards Washizu, while Washizu himself does 13-18.2% and vertical knockback that kills at 160-140%. Foes can get hit by Washizu's hitbox immediately without being hit by the cane for an underwhelming smash attack, but if they get hit at the edge of the cane's range at the very start of the move, it is possible for them to take as high as 22-31% just from this move alone!

The cane does more hitstun than usual as it sucks enemies in, enough to at least cover Washizu's ending lag should he fail to hit the foe with his personal hitbox. Having the foe in his face at point blank range in a frame neutral position is still a bad situation for Washizu most of the time, especially given his grab is basically a tether. However, Washizu should never really find himself in a disadvantaged state here, as Washizu has the ability to move left and right very slightly during the dsmash by angling the dsmash in that direction at the start of the move, which will cause him to walk in that direction about a Bowser width over the course of the move. If he just walks towards the foe, he will guarantee he gets the knockback dealing hit off most of the time. If he walks away from the foe, he can drag them with him slightly while keeping this perfect spacing Washizu likes so much at the end of the move, enabling him to try to hit with something else after the move is over, being one of the better set-ups for the grab/jab or to even repeat the move again if he's feeling ballsy.

If Washizu uses this attack next to a White Suit minion, he will pick them up and spin them around like the Mario bthrow animation instead of using his cane for the attack. This will unfortunately add some starting lag to the attack, but greatly increases the range of the move, more than doubling it. The White Suit's body is no more powerful than the cane, but at the end of the move, Washizu will release them, causing them to be thrown behind him a platform's distance, a hitbox as powerful as Washizu's personal hitbox during the move that deals knockback horizontally instead of vertically. This version of the move also has drastically reduced ending lag for Washizu, enabling him to outright combo the foe if he didn't deal any knockback to them. If he wants to combo the foe, he wants them to be in front of him rather than behind him so they're not hit by the White Suit flying at them, as he drags them into ideal range to have just barely enough time to true combo into grab. This move would be very strong if Washizu could casually do it on demand, but the White Suit ends the move in prone, unable to be picked up by Washizu's dsmash again, and will just stay there on the floor like a useless rag doll for a while.

The White Suit will have less lag if you throw them off the stage at the end, and it makes for a very obnoxious edgeguarding attack, as the White Suit will then typically use some aerial attack to defend themselves from the foe afterwards, or possibly even ledge trump the foe or something if you get lucky. If you want an aerial tile off the White Suit, this is certainly a good way to do it. Even if you don't give a crap about playing Mahjong at the current moment, if the White Suit already has some aerial tiles, that will influence his AI to try to hit with the move he hasn't hit with yet, enabling you to try to bias him towards using a particular aerial on the foe, with the most prominent one you want here being the Captain Falcon dair of course. Even if the White Suit has no aerial tiles, you still have full control over yourself to try to play off of the foe's dodge. The White Suit may very possibly die from a scenario like this, but it's not hard to get a new one. The main thing you will lose is the tiles he is carrying. If he does start falling off the bottom, you can have him still throw a tile towards you to try to hit the foe one final time, or to pass on the only tile that his useless life was good for.

Washizu is free to grab his White Suit even if they are currently in lag, so if the White Suit has managed to provoke the foe into dodging, that can very easily cover the starting lag of this attack even with the lag increase from using the White Suit version. This can make the White Suit's otherwise unintimidating attacks a lot more threatening when you can pull this off, with the huge range of the White Suit version making it able to easily catch rolls.

AERIALS

NEUTRAL AERIAL - "REAL" VILLAIN

Washizu looks at himself in the same mirror before smashing it with his fist, thinking that god did it because he is such a vile and despicable villain! It's either that, or Washizu just hating the fact that he's old, while all those vile, despicable Corrins of the world get to enjoy their youth despite not being nearly as deserving of it as the great Washizu. After the mirror is smashed, the pieces of it shatter all around him, making a nice multihit hitbox that deals a few flinching hits that total to 9%, with the last hit knocking foes away vertically with knockback killing at 185%.

The move is a perfectly respectable nair that hits around Washizu that serves its function. The starting lag is rather long as Washizu scowls in the mirror before he breaks it, but the range on the move and the generously low ending lag makes it incredibly safe. The real selling point of the move, though, is that the hitbox lingers on for a while even after the "ending lag", as the shards of the mirror fall downwards as projectiles, falling for a maximum of one Ganondorf height before disappearing. The mirror shards deal 1% and a microflinch, and are spread out far enough apart that foes will rarely be hit by more than one, and even if they are they'll absolutely never be hit by more than 2. The stun for being hit by this move is very, very brief. If Washizu isn't prepared to take advantage of this effect, he won't get anything out of it, as it'll be over before it even begins. Washizu needs to be already starting up his fair or bair, or some other very fast move, in order to punish the foe and capitalize on this.

This can sometimes be Washizu's main way to hit foes below himself, as his dair is a slow stall then fall move. It's also worth noting that the glass shards won't vanish early if they come in contact with the ground, instead embedding themselves into the ground. This will increase their power to do 6% and tiny set vertical knockback, perfect for comboing, though the shards will still vanish after the same very brief time they normally would. If Washizu goes out of his way to use this effect, it'll be pretty obvious given he has to be a very specific distance above the ground when he uses this move for that to work well. It can be made significantly less predictable, though, if Washizu has the ability to attack during his Up Special and uses this move just barely off the ground, similar to a Peach float.

FORWARD AERIAL - MEAT SHIELD

Washizu takes out a White Suit minion to use them as a meat shield from the foe's attack! The unwilling White Suit frails their arms and legs frantically, not wanting to outright take a hit for Washizu despite how loyal they've otherwise been. Their flailing limbs deal multiple flinching hits that total to 10%, with the last hit dealing knockback that kills at 170%. This attack's range is quite good considering it's another man in front of Washizu's position performing the attack, though it also means the move has a large blind spot at point blank. This is a very obnoxious move to spam for spacing purposes, though Washizu has to be careful of the move's bad landing lag if using it much on the stage.

The very front of Washizu's body has superarmor against attacks that deal less than 7% during the move. That's not much, but hitting the White Suit doesn't hurt Washizu. However, if the White Suit is hit by any attack whatsoever from the foe, they will instantly keel over and die, showing that they were right to be afraid! Washizu will still be stuck in enough ending lag he won't be able to get a punish off on the foe, but the move will be nullified against him as if it had already hit him, so the minion will have done his job as a meat shield. It is still possible for the foe to hit Washizu and the White Suit at the same time to hit him directly. This gets a move into the foe's stale moves list without any harm to Washizu's person.

If Washizu has flight and is able to attack during his Up Special, he can pursue the foe with the fair quite easily to combo them off-stage. His meager superarmor, when stacked with the Up Special's superarmor, will also make it much harder for the foe to resist the move than it already is.

If Washizu uses this attack next to a Down Special White Suit minion, he will use them for the attack instead of pulling out a new one. While still incompetent, the White Suits from Down Special are less wimpy than the White Suits seen in this move, so they won't instantly die if they are hit during the attack. They will simply take the effects of the foe's attack, and the move will end instantly. Assuming Washizu wasn't also hit, this means he is totally free to punish the foe's attack now, as he is now immune to whatever hitbox the foe currently has out, nevermind actually attacking during the foe's ending lag.

BACK AERIAL - CANE DRAG

Washizu extends out his cane behind himself, crook pointed outwards, before dragging it back in towards himself. Only the part where he's dragging the cane in is a hitbox, but the move is still very fast on both the starting, ending, and even the landing regardless of that fact. The move deals 7.5% and horizontal knockback that pushes foes towards Washizu rather than away from him, killing at 220%. The knockback does not stop at Washizu, with foes instead getting knocked a good ways past him. The move can sometimes combo into itself at 0% if Washizu moves away from the foe as he uses the move, but this is quite rare, being more likely to just combo into the fair instead, which can last all the way up to 35% or so.

Washizu's bair becomes a powerful way to drag foes if he is able to attack during his Up Special, with him constantly moving away from the foe in the direction he wants to drag them to chain more and more bairs, and even when the bair stops chaining, the fair can potentially chain just as well after you stop chaining with the bair.

Washizu's fair is a very respectable spacer in its own right with its speed and ability to block, but the blind spot and long landing lag makes it less reliable to use strictly for spacing than the bair. The bair's main issue is that unless you already have a good Mahjong hand, you can only really use it once per air trip given it knocks foes inwards rather than outwards. Washizu definitely has his blind spots that he has to do his best to protect, but if he can manage it his air game is very respectable.

UP AERIAL - THE NOSE KNOWS

Akagi's artist is infamous for drawing characters with ridiculously large noses, and Washizu is no exception. For this move, Washizu rears his head back as if in an overly confident pose before doing a headbutt upwards, nose first. This is yet another aerial that is very quick, but unlike the others, the sheer volume of his nose makes it pack a real punch, dealing 13.5% and vertical knockback that kills at just 105%. Washizu even gets a bit of token superarmor on his head for good measure during the starting lag and duration, not being interrupted by attacks that do less than 8%.

Washizu's nose may be big, but it's not big enough to give this move a big hitbox. Even with all the speed, hitting with this move isn't easy unless you set up to combo into it with up throw. Up Throw will stop comboing long before it becomes a kill confirm into uair, unfortunately, but it's still a nice way to get the foe high up into the air above you to harass them with this attack even once it does stop comboing. While it's a fast close range move, the fact it hits above him and requires him to be in the air means it's not especially useful for defense from a very rushdown oriented foe. It does little to enhance Washizu's neutral, only being helpful for offense.

Some of Washizu's easiest hands to get are aerials and upwards moves, so it is a bit unfortunate that the uair will often be stale before Washizu attempts to actually kill people with it. If it is stale enough, though, Washizu can outright use this move to ladder people during his Up Special if he can attack during it, killing them off the top outright!

DOWN AERIAL - IMPALE



Washizu takes out a spear and thrusts downwards with it, falling downwards at an accelerated rate. The spearhead is pointed at a slight 15 degree angle forwards as he does a stall then fall at a similar angle to Sonic's dair. Washizu could try to use this spear more liberally, but having it here means gravity can do most of the work for the old man. The spear deals 17% with forceful downward knockback at the same angle Washizu is traveling. He will fall for about 3 Ganondorf heights before he comes out of the move if he hasn't already landed or died yet, having basically no ending lag if he somehow manages to fall for that long uninterrupted.

This move has all of the horrible lag that you would expect from this archetype of move. Even with gravity doing the work for him, Washizu takes quite some time to go through with this move, and god help him if he has to pull the spear up out of the ground by experiencing landing lag. It's not a terribly appealing move, being as slow as something like the aerial Bowser Bomb without quite as much power and no shield breaking potential. There is, thankfully, a big hitbox when Washizu hits the ground as a small shockwave is emitted from the ground, though this is no more powerful than the rest of the move. This is still considered the same hitbox as the main move, so you can't hit with it twice.

The main appeal of this move is if Washizu can use it during his Up Special. The dair will only "stack" with the Up Special's movement rather than overwrite it entirely if it's currently going, enabling Washizu to fly up to greatly slow the speed he goes down at, as well as reposition himself horizontally. Washizu can even hold downwards to go down faster than he normally does! The move is a lot scarier off-stage when Washizu can fly during it, as the one thing this naturally has over Bowser Bomb is the angle is very good for gimping. Just having a good recovery might not seem like a good payoff to getting a good Mahjong hand, but that recovery makes his air game far, far more powerful.

This is the only move that makes getting a hand that consists of all 5 of Washizu's aerials hard, being far harder to hit with than the others. If you're still trying to get a hand in the first place, you won't be able to have the luxury of using the dair during Up Special. The move can autocancel into grabbing the ledge like Bowser Bomb does, thankfully, so harassing the foe off the ledge with your side aerials and humping the ledge with dair is your best bet without getting a big read.

STANDARDS

JAB - FORMER GLORY



Washizu takes out a steel ball and chain before he goes to start spinning it around in front of himself, just like when he was young and ridiculously muscular! It looks quite impressive and intimidating, until Washizu actually hits somebody with it, at which point the on hit sound effect is quite pathetic, revealing that the "steel" ball and chain is actually made out of plastic.

This move is essentially Sheik's crappy old chain Side Special that got removed in SSB4. Washizu will automatically move the ball and chain around in a circular motion if nothing is input as holding A, but can direct it about with the control stick to more customize the hitbox. The chain deals rather poor damage for a repeating jab, while the Kirby sized plastic ball itself does average damage. The chain can reach out a respectable distance for how pathetic and weak it is, reaching slightly further than Bowser's width.

The jab finisher has Washizu slam the plastic ball in the direction the momentum was currently going. It's most powerful if slammed downwards onto the floor, dealing 8% and decently strong knockback that can possibly gimp off-stage. On-stage, they'll just get spiked against the floor and not take very strong knockback due to the SSB4 reduction, making the move usable for comboing. Washizu can also knock the foe towards himself at the end of the move if the ball was coming inbound, potentially leaving them in point blank for a combo at very low percents. If the ball is not slammed downwards, it deals a paltry 5.5% and knockback that kills at 250%.

Aside from using the move as a basic comboing tool, like Sheik's chain, the wonky gravity on the ball and chain enable it to see some use at ledges and on Washizu's gold slope, giving the move rather deceptively good range. In particular, the gravity when Washizu performs the jab finisher will have him slam the plastic ball down all the way onto the ground, potentially letting Washizu even reach over to the other side of a pile of gold or to smack the ledge with the plastic ball. What a pathetic way for the foe to go.

DASHING ATTACK - STOMP

Washizu does an overly exaggerated stomping motion out of his dash, dealing 15% and knockback that kills at 90% for an obviously laggy dashing attack. Ending lag is added to the dashing attack as Washizu skids to a stop from the dash after the stomp is complete, kicking up aesthetic dirt as he does so.

The existence of this move makes it obnoxiously difficult to get a match of all of your standards put together on one move, when all the rest of them aren't big asks to get Mahjong tiles for. If you get the other 4 standard Mahjong tiles, White Suit minions will be more biased to use their dashing attack if they haven't hit with it already. While they're not as fast as Captain Falcon, they're still fast enough that the move is fairly easy for them to hit with, and you can get the tile from them easily afterwards. It's an incredibly respectable stance to just never want to use this input due to the lag, especially considering Washizu's sluggish dashing speed.

Washizu's Side Special can be used as an obnoxious camping tool to get the foe to dash at Washizu a lot, and thus use their dashing attack so he can just take that tile from them with his pummel. So long as Washizu hits with every Side Special, the ammo for it is self renewiing and infinite, though he has to be careful of throwing away other tiles he actually needs for a good hand if trying to use his Side Special to camp and aggravate the foe into making mistakes. If a foe respects Washizu enough to not use their dashing attack somehow, this camping will have been made significantly more powerful.

If Washizu, god forbid, actually wants to use his dashing attack, it performs better if used on a slope. Washizu's stomping leg is a hitbox until it touches the ground, so if he jumps up at the top of a slope, the hitbox will be out for a significantly longer period. The ending lag is still terrible, and if anything you're making the move take even more time than it normally would so you're technically making the move slower. Still, having the hitbox out for more than just a couple frames can make the move more threatening.

If Washizu is in his sliding ending lag from the dashing attack when going down a slope, he will travel farther than he usually does, potentially saving him or at least making his punishment lesser than what it could be. If you slide far enough away from the foe when whiffing your dashing attack, the only option for some foes to punish you in time will be their dashing attack, giving you an opportunity to get the sought after tile. This is especially true if the foe wants to avoid damaging Washizu's gold so as to not offend him. If Washizu is in the ending lag of the move and is sliding up a slope, he'll come to a stop sooner, which will lessen the ending lag somewhat, though the move is still slow.

FORWARD TILT - DECEIVING TRAP

Washizu takes out the pathetic plastic ball and chain again, but this time swings it down in front of him at the full length of the chain. The plastic ball comes down 1.25 Bowser widths in front of Washizu, dealing 6.5% and knockback that kills at 190%. However, after it comes down, Washizu hits a button on the chain, which causes real iron spikes to come out of the ball! These spikes deal a powerful 14% and knockback that kills at 110%!

This move is fast and has good range, though has a rather large blind spot in front of Washizu, with the chain not being a hitbox in this attack. What's more important is anybody hit by the pathetic ball itself will be knocked out of the way before they can be impaled by the spikes, making the powerful hitbox rather difficult to hit with unfortunately. The move's range at least makes it decent for catching rolls, with foes ideally dodging the plastic ball hitbox before being hit by the spikes. The most common way to hit with the move, however, is that it's very good against shields. The plastic ball is a hitbox as it's slamming down and will be blocked by the foe's shield, damaging it, ideally just barely enough that the spikes that come out of the ball on the ground will shield poke through it and hit the foe directly!

This move is primarily good for punishing shields and dodges, which makes it good in tandem with the White Suit and if the foe's defensive options are weakened by having their blood drawn. That said, even if you're just threatening with the plastic ball hitbox, the move's speed and range can make it a threatening spacer if the foe isn't in point blank range yet, so long as you're careful. This move does not have any of the wonky Sheik chain gravity on it like the jab does, though, so it's not as good for being defensive. The range will be shortened if Washizu uses this attack against the ledge/the top of a gold pile's slope, enabling Washizu to hit foes who are closer to him with that move in such scenarios if he's aware of it.

It's also worth noting that Mahjong doesn't care if you hit with the sourspot or the sweetspot, you still get an ftilt tile. If Washizu has set himself up where getting the ftilt is a threatening tile, foes have to be scared of the ordinary plastic ball ftilt. If they're scared enough of it and excessively dodging/shielding to avoid it, then that just makes it easier to hit with the sweetspot anyway.

UP TILT - NECK CHAIN



The plastic ball and chain appears strapped to Washizu's neck as he spins around. Washizu's body is not a hitbox during this attack, just the ball and chain. The chain deals multiple flinching hits that are miniscule and deal less than 1% damage, pushing foes to the outer bounds of the hitbox. This theoretically does the most damage if Washizu hits the foe at point blank range at the start of the move, but the damage gain is so small that it's not terribly worth it, netting you 2.5% extra if done perfectly. The ball hitbox deals 8% and horizontal knockback away from Washizu that kills at 165%, located 1.25 Bowser widths on either side of Washizu due to the speed at which he is spinning. It could be considerably more powerful if Washizu turned the spikes on on the ball, but he doesn't want to risk hitting himself with the thing when it's bound around his -neck-.

This up tilt can be angled horizontally the same way some ftilts can be angled vertically. This will cause Washizu to tilt his head and swing the ball and chain around at a 45 degree angle. This is mostly useful to hit grounded enemies, though gives the move some considerable vertical range also, enabling the move to combo after a uthrow where it otherwise couldn't. Angling the move also changes the angle of the knockback, and if performed on a slope can potentially have Washizu swing the ball completely vertically. Standing near the top of a slope with the move angled up can make it into a weirdly viable KO option if a foe tries to just jump over Washizu's gold, potentially killing at as little as 125% under totally ideal conditions. It'll stop comboing out of uthrow before that, unfortunately, but this is still good if you just want to space the foe a long distance away.

Used at the ledge, the downward angled one's knockback is ideal for gimping foes, similar to the jab. This is significantly more powerful than the jab, but leaves the dizzy Washizu with much more ending lag than that move. Having both of these moves at your disposal after having thrown a White Suit off-stage with dsmash will leave the foe in a rather miserable position getting back to the stage without Washizu having to bother getting off, and unlike his aerial gimping game, is still very powerful with no boosts from Mahjong.

DOWN TILT - CANE STAB

Washizu angrily stabs the pointed end of his cane into the ground in front of himself. This move has very poor range in front of Washizu, though at least has the decency to be fast. The attack deals 7.5% and deals knockback at the Sakurai angle that kills at 155%. Foes will always be tripped by this attack if they are a low enough percentage that they take horizontal knockback along the floor from the Sakurai angle, rather than getting launched at higher percentages. This attack is mostly useful for tripping foes, and once it stops doing that you're basically just using it as one of the few close range panic buttons Washizu has. He would have a more realistic shot of comboing with the move if his dashing speed wasn't bad, and as is mostly has to stick to comboing it into Side Special. The move will always combo into Side Special so long as it trips, and at super low percents can combo into grab or the sourspot ftilt. If you're not looking for a Mahjong hand that can make use of the dtilt or your hand is getting full and you risk pushing out tiles you actually want to use, this simple combo into Side Special is a good way to space without filling your hand with garbage you don't want.

Like many of Washizu's moves, this attack is easiest to hit with at a slope/the ledge, this time it's because the move is aimed at the ground. The move doesn't gain advantageous knockback in those situations, though, and he because foes won't be on level ground in those scenarios Washizu won't be able to earn his trip. Washizu needs a runway of ground for the foe to slide along, longer the higher the foe's percentage is, if he wants them to stay tripped and be able to combo the move into something. Those dtilt trips don't come for free.

While this move is still fast, the hitbox only comes out when the cane hits the ground, meaning the move is good at shield poking. Considering the somewhat slow nature of Washizu's grab, shields are a rather powerful measure to deal with him at point blank range, where he is already fairly weak in general. His other anti shield move, the ftilt, doesn't hit at point blank range either unless Washizu uses the move close to a ledge. This is still far from ideal, but it gets the job done in a dire situation. If Washizu does get the dtilt into his stale moves list a couple of times, the Sakurai angle knockback will keep tripping foes for longer, enabling the combo into Side Special to keep going strong.

FINAL SMASH - WASHIZU ARC

Upon inputting Final Smash, a group of White Suits appear in front of Washizu to try to grab the foe(s) like in his grab, though there's a lot more of them this time. If successful, Washizu will take them to his mansion in a cinematic and force them to sit down at his Mahjong table to play Mahjong with him for the next 20 years. The passage of time is conveyed by spinning clocks, and after it's complete, the foe will have aged! This will treat them as if Washizu had performed a single full strength dthrow on them, and can potentially kill them. During the Final Smash, Washizu can make any inputs he wants to get those tiles into his hand, given he's playing literal Mahjong for 20 years. If the match was a time match and Washizu is currently winning the match, the timer will instantly go down by 2 minutes.

Washizu mysteriously seemed to have not aged over the 20 years that have supposedly taken place...Which is because he has secretly used an aging formula from a tacky spin off manga to drug the foe. The tacky nature of this formula explains why character models do not significantly change after this Final Smash is used - Lucas, for example, just gets a mustache and gray hair similar to Porky rather than aging into a proper adult model.
 
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Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
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I'm always surprised by your talent for crafting these long, intricate movesets for relatively obscure characters from relatively obscure manga and anime, Warlord. Especially Washizu, because I wasn't aware of the presence of this manga before today, much less the idea that there was even a manga for mahjong of all things. Mahjong isn't a game I'm terribly familiar with either, other than playing a few rounds in the school computer lab back in the day. The idea of a set based on mahjong is such a completely unique concept that I have no doubt that that will be the reason someone who would normally not bother with the set due to character bias would give it a read, even if they don't know anything about mahjong.

When you mention the "best tile to complete his hand", I'm assuming that you're referring to getting a complete set of tiles, as in the up special. Otherwise, one could want a specific tile, such as the enemy's best move. Certainly having more of that move would be the best hand, right? It would be helpful to have a cheat sheet for the best hands, just to know exactly what you mean. Take for example, this scenario: Washizu has a hand of UTilt, USmash, USpec, DSpec, NSpec, FThrow, FThrow, FSpec. The enemy's best move is an FThrow. What's the ideal mahjong tile here? Is it an UThrow or an UAir, to complete the Up inputs? Is it FSpec, because the FSpec will be discarded because it's last in queue and Washizu needs a full set of specials for a good hand? Or is it a FThrow, because a stronger FThrow hand means more FThrows to use against an opponent who relies on that throw to kill Washizu? I may just be looking too deep into it and best just means the matches you outlined in the up special.

Something that can't be adjusted with numbers is the forward throw due to the nature of it, because Washizu draws blood from a foe. I had this same problem with Hidan (which I will eventually comment), but how does this work against characters who don't have blood... or an arm, for that matter? What do you drain from R.O.B., for instance, or a ghost... or even The Mountain, a set of your own from this contest? Lava? That seems painful.

You know, with all the detail, Smash terms, and the playstyle revolving around staleness, this is one of the most in-Smash sets I've read from you. That's ironic considering how much influence mahjong has on the set. It's such a well documented and thought-out set that I'm impressed by the amount work put into it and I realize why you haven't posted a set since The Mountain. It looks like it could actually work well in Smash. Washizu is quite a far cry from ye olde Roller Coaster Tycoon and Inspector Lunge.

For the FThrow I would have the mirror briefly reveal the foe's mahjong hand, as trying to track it mentally is another thing entirely. I find it funny that Washizu gets angry at the foe for having a better hand than himself as he is the one giving the foe the tiles in the first place.

The moveset oozes character all over the place, especially with his abuse of his White Suit minions. I can tell you genuinely understand this character and the series he's from. Your style is one that I think is the best at pulling this moveset off; in fact I think you're one of the only ones who could do it. Who else would have taken the care to naturally implement this character into Smash, much less made sure it worked and it was faithful to Washizu? Very few, I imagine.

There are some moves that benefit from staling despite you saying they're hard to hit with. Forward Tilt, for instance, if staled would hit with the spikes due to the reduced knockback. The abundance of super armor, too, makes use of staling because moves hitting on super armor still stale. I don't know if it was intentional or not but I will assume it is. Little things like this make the mechanic very relevant and squeeze the most out of it, so good job on that.

Wrapping up, it was rather refreshing reading a set from you, Warlord. You have been consistent in pretty much all aspects of moveset writing and after 140 sets you still can put out these interesting, detailed, and creative sets. There's not much to improve on here. I can't expect to get extras out of you but Washizu absolutely needs a playstyle section to guide the reader on how to play him because of the intricacies of his mahjong and staling based set. I was honestly surprised you didn't include one, especially since you are one of if not the most important heralds of playstyles in MYM history. Remember match-ups? Good times. All of that being said, this was an excellent and surprisingly digestible set, awesome job.
 

MasterWarlord

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I'm always surprised by your talent for crafting these long, intricate movesets for relatively obscure characters from relatively obscure manga and anime, Warlord. Especially Washizu, because I wasn't aware of the presence of this manga before today, much less the idea that there was even a manga for mahjong of all things. Mahjong isn't a game I'm terribly familiar with either, other than playing a few rounds in the school computer lab back in the day. The idea of a set based on mahjong is such a completely unique concept that I have no doubt that that will be the reason someone who would normally not bother with the set due to character bias would give it a read, even if they don't know anything about mahjong.

When you mention the "best tile to complete his hand", I'm assuming that you're referring to getting a complete set of tiles, as in the up special. Otherwise, one could want a specific tile, such as the enemy's best move. Certainly having more of that move would be the best hand, right? It would be helpful to have a cheat sheet for the best hands, just to know exactly what you mean. Take for example, this scenario: Washizu has a hand of UTilt, USmash, USpec, DSpec, NSpec, FThrow, FThrow, FSpec. The enemy's best move is an FThrow. What's the ideal mahjong tile here? Is it an UThrow or an UAir, to complete the Up inputs? Is it FSpec, because the FSpec will be discarded because it's last in queue and Washizu needs a full set of specials for a good hand? Or is it a FThrow, because a stronger FThrow hand means more FThrows to use against an opponent who relies on that throw to kill Washizu? I may just be looking too deep into it and best just means the matches you outlined in the up special.

Something that can't be adjusted with numbers is the forward throw due to the nature of it, because Washizu draws blood from a foe. I had this same problem with Hidan (which I will eventually comment), but how does this work against characters who don't have blood... or an arm, for that matter? What do you drain from R.O.B., for instance, or a ghost... or even The Mountain, a set of your own from this contest? Lava? That seems painful.

You know, with all the detail, Smash terms, and the playstyle revolving around staleness, this is one of the most in-Smash sets I've read from you. That's ironic considering how much influence mahjong has on the set. It's such a well documented and thought-out set that I'm impressed by the amount work put into it and I realize why you haven't posted a set since The Mountain. It looks like it could actually work well in Smash. Washizu is quite a far cry from ye olde Roller Coaster Tycoon and Inspector Lunge.

For the FThrow I would have the mirror briefly reveal the foe's mahjong hand, as trying to track it mentally is another thing entirely. I find it funny that Washizu gets angry at the foe for having a better hand than himself as he is the one giving the foe the tiles in the first place.

The moveset oozes character all over the place, especially with his abuse of his White Suit minions. I can tell you genuinely understand this character and the series he's from. Your style is one that I think is the best at pulling this moveset off; in fact I think you're one of the only ones who could do it. Who else would have taken the care to naturally implement this character into Smash, much less made sure it worked and it was faithful to Washizu? Very few, I imagine.

There are some moves that benefit from staling despite you saying they're hard to hit with. Forward Tilt, for instance, if staled would hit with the spikes due to the reduced knockback. The abundance of super armor, too, makes use of staling because moves hitting on super armor still stale. I don't know if it was intentional or not but I will assume it is. Little things like this make the mechanic very relevant and squeeze the most out of it, so good job on that.

Wrapping up, it was rather refreshing reading a set from you, Warlord. You have been consistent in pretty much all aspects of moveset writing and after 140 sets you still can put out these interesting, detailed, and creative sets. There's not much to improve on here. I can't expect to get extras out of you but Washizu absolutely needs a playstyle section to guide the reader on how to play him because of the intricacies of his mahjong and staling based set. I was honestly surprised you didn't include one, especially since you are one of if not the most important heralds of playstyles in MYM history. Remember match-ups? Good times. All of that being said, this was an excellent and surprisingly digestible set, awesome job.
Thanks for the feedback, it's quite nice hearing your perspective on a set like this after all this time. In-smashness has crept into sets where you wouldn't think it was terribly possible before - nowadays, the term isn't used directly, it's about making sets that are actually viable and not broken in some way, that are concerned with fighting foes properly. That said, yeah, I agree this is one of my simpler sets, given the basic Mahjong premise one wouldn't want it to be super complex anyway. Staling was a fun enough premise for me to carry a set, even if there was other stuff like minions and terrain in there given Washizu doesn't have a whole ton of potential.

Yes, for "best Mahjong hands", there are set hands that are just based off of advancing Washizu's hand to a higher level for Up Special/dthrow/fsmash. The game can't take into account what the foe's best moves are. Even if that was programmed in, the meta might not agree with what the developers considered were their "best moves." Things like that are why choosing "the best move" is only the default.

Good idea to have the foe's hand appear briefly during the fthrow, added that in.

The drawing of blood was a central element of Washizu Mahjong that really had to be included if you were going this far with the concept. It doesn't make perfect sense on every character, but if you want to see wacky aesthetics like this interacting, just look at something like League of Legends or Dota. Darius/Bloodseeker can make anybody bleed, regardless of if they're robots, ghosts, or whatever. Unlike most bleeding moves in sets for characters like Butcher or Atlantis, no blood is directly seen either. Who knows what they're really doing to such characters without blood. The blood they're giving to Washizu could be from someone else, while the foe is simply being electrocuted.
Also Mountain canonically has blood for some reason
 

WeirdChillFever

Smash Hero
Joined
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Messages
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Location
Somewhere Out There
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Alola everybody!

I sent Link on a mission to save the Divine Beasts, but he needs your help! In order to unlock the terminals from the Blights' grasp, he needs your credit card number, the expiration date and the three numbers on the back. Do it quickly though, as the Princess has been fighting the Calamity for a hundred years.

Go! Save Hyrule!
 

Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,439
Just the name Cat Battleship got me interested in this set from your updates in the Discord, Lex, and even moreso when I saw what the character looked like. What an odd character. I'm guessing Parodius is a portmanteau of Gradius and parody?

The penguins are a neat idea that reminds me of followers from The Binding of Isaac, specifically the Incubus follower. The way they function and that you mention they fire the projectiles that Cat Battleship fires before you get to the projectiles themselves makes me anticipate that this will be a faithful homage to shoot 'em up games like the ones Cat Battleship is from. Very nice. I do fear that their fragility may make them too weak, but for now I'll believe that they're not.

Never mind, with the penguins out Cat Battleship becomes an absurd projectile spammer. Characters with no good approach options would get riddled with the myriad projectiles, all the kitty has to do is spam and run away. Great job faithfully recreating bullet hell in Smash, but still... when you give a character who already has a myriad amount of projectiles at their disposal an upgraded version of one of the best NSpecs in the game as their Jab...

You've got an absurdly silly character here and while you do inject a lot of flavor into the set, you don't seem to own the absurdity of it. Rather than playing up the silliness of Cat Battleship and Parodius, you repeat the phrase "Parodius is a weird series" four times and always follow up the comicality of the moves you write with hesitant confusion like someone handed you a box with a dead squirrel in it as a Christmas gift but you don't want to be rude to them. The best part of having a comical and weird character or source material is running with it and being behind it all the way, not caring what the reader thinks. The reader will join in with you and celebrate the weirdness if you back it fully, otherwise they'll just not get it and lose out on the experience.

Your writing has quite a lot of voice, making it an easy and digestible read. Unlike many of the other sets I've read this contest, I had nearly no issues with understanding what you were trying to say through your writing. Your writing is impacted by that you sometimes seem fed up or confused by your own set like I previously mentioned. Try limited the negative remarks when writing and focusing on the positive, even sounding excited for things that may not be that exciting. It will leave a stronger impression on the reader and get them excited as well, and cover up the weaker parts of the set to boot.

There's also the minor problem of your comparisons. Rather than using a set measurement tool for everything or terms that are easy enough for the average reader (very small, huge, medium, quick, slow, etc.) you constantly compare moves to attributes from other characters. While this isn't necessarily bad, the varying amount of characters you use is far too long, rather than keeping it narrowed down to a few characters. The reader is expected to know attributes from Ganondorf, Samus, Villager, Kirby, Duck Hunt, Bowser, Link, K. Rool, Mega Man, Kirby, Bowser Jr., Pichu, Pikachu, Fox, Corrin, Luigi, Peach, and Robin. Try to keep the amount of references like this low, otherwise these comparisons will mean nothing to the readers who don't know these characters, who will just nod along, expecting that you know what you're talking about.

Cat Battleship has quite a lot more character than most sets, and it shows through the minutiae of attacks. The goggles breaking, the little penguins, the cat's emotions during animations, using meowing as an attack. I love it.

There seems to be a few logical inconsistencies in the way the Options work that would confuse players. You state in the NSpec that they fire the exact same projectiles whenever Cat Battleship fires projectiles, but then contradict this in the USpec, USmash, FAir, and DAir. The penguins from the NSpec die from any damaging hit but the penguins from the DTilt have two HP... and the penguins from the UTilt don't have a specification whether they're the former or the latter, but they are also different sizes from the DTilt and NSpec penguins. And they also preform the DSmash for no good reason, as it's not a projectile and the explosions are harmless which means they do absolutely nothing!

So, I know I've been quite a bit more negative with this set than others I've commented on. Here's what I think is good: You have a great playstyle idea here. Bullet hell from a bullet hell boss. It's as close to the character's home as it gets, and a pretty faithful translation of it. You've got a lot of characterization that befits the Cat, and each attack feels like its distinctly for this character. Everything the set needs to work is there, and there are no balance complaints, as the Battleship has very clear weaknesses that can be exploited. Your writing is great and clear, and you don't stumble at all in communicating your ideas effectively. Cool stuff, Lex, I know you have the potential to wow us, so I'd like to see that in the future!

Right on the heels of Cat Battleship we have WeirdChillFever's Impa who seems to have waited 100 years for Link but not for a comment on the previous set to appear before they posted it. Tsk, tsk. As shown with Kilton, you have a sort of affinity for these Breath of the Wild NPCs who clearly have no business fighting anyone, but here they are. Most people, when writing an Impa set, would have opted for her Skyward Sword appearance, or her Ocarina of Time. Old age isn't going to stop her here, though. She looks quite battle ready as a T-posing Yoda.

First, I have to say that Stasis is such a cool move idea. Taking the Sheikah Slate abilities from Breath of the Wild and applying them to Smash is so cool, especially with the silliness that you can do with them in Breath. Impa is the kind of character I'd play just for this move alone. You capitalize on this idea by giving Impa the orb, which I assume is the orb from her home in Kakariko Village. It would be helpful to have a picture. I don't like the disconnect between the grab and neutral special having different properties despite both being Stasis. In fact, throws should be something the character can't do unless they have the opponent grabbed, and as it is there is a good logical argument for Impa being able to use throws during the NSpec Stasis.

I would have liked less props as well. I know Impa is quite a frail old lady, but there is some spryness in her and a glint of mischief. Call me a Sakurai-lover if you want but I do have an admiration of how he turns these characters who have no business fighting into smack-happy combo characters. Props in moderation are okay, but I don't see why Impa needs four on her throws, and each one different. The moves utilizing magic are much more agreeable, so I'd have preferred you use that more. Perhaps even replacing the prop hitboxes with magic versions that are functionally identical.

The way you use the other Sheikah Slate abilities is really clever. I'm not sure if they're magic or technology, or if those two are indeed indistinguishable from each other (thanks Arthur C. Clarke) but I'm wondering if Impa has some Sheikah tech hidden somewhere. Maybe in that stupid hat of hers? Heh. Consider using the other abilities in conjunction with each other for a deeper playstyle. For instance, what if you could use Stasis on the Cryo pillars, hit the pillars, and then send them flying off in blocks from the force, rather than being destroyed in place?

The playstyle itself is really fun, it looks like. I'm more of a nimble fighter, so I think I'd enjoy her. Great job. I'd prefer if you had a Final Smash, but you have a playstyle section to make up for it, as many people forget one or the other. I'd like some extras here too; Impa has a lot of potential for characterization, which you seem to nail most of the time. Your writing is very accessible and easy to read, and the moveset has a lot of voice which is good. I wish you'd double space your moves instead of hitting the enter key once, but that's just me. Overall Impa is a fair piece of work from you and a nice translation of her Breath appearance, even though you had to squeeze a lot more juice from the rest of the game to fit her.
 

WeirdChillFever

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Right on the heels of Cat Battleship we have WeirdChillFever's Impa who seems to have waited 100 years for Link but not for a comment on the previous set to appear before they posted it. Tsk, tsk. As shown with Kilton, you have a sort of affinity for these Breath of the Wild NPCs who clearly have no business fighting anyone, but here they are. Most people, when writing an Impa set, would have opted for her Skyward Sword appearance, or her Ocarina of Time. Old age isn't going to stop her here, though. She looks quite battle ready as a T-posing Yoda.
First, I have to say that Stasis is such a cool move idea. Taking the Sheikah Slate abilities from Breath of the Wild and applying them to Smash is so cool, especially with the silliness that you can do with them in Breath. Impa is the kind of character I'd play just for this move alone. You capitalize on this idea by giving Impa the orb, which I assume is the orb from her home in Kakariko Village. It would be helpful to have a picture. I don't like the disconnect between the grab and neutral special having different properties despite both being Stasis. In fact, throws should be something the character can't do unless they have the opponent grabbed, and as it is there is a good logical argument for Impa being able to use throws during the NSpec Stasis.
I would have liked less props as well. I know Impa is quite a frail old lady, but there is some spryness in her and a glint of mischief. Call me a Sakurai-lover if you want but I do have an admiration of how he turns these characters who have no business fighting into smack-happy combo characters. Props in moderation are okay, but I don't see why Impa needs four on her throws, and each one different. The moves utilizing magic are much more agreeable, so I'd have preferred you use that more. Perhaps even replacing the prop hitboxes with magic versions that are functionally identical.
The way you use the other Sheikah Slate abilities is really clever. I'm not sure if they're magic or technology, or if those two are indeed indistinguishable from each other (thanks Arthur C. Clarke) but I'm wondering if Impa has some Sheikah tech hidden somewhere. Maybe in that stupid hat of hers? Heh. Consider using the other abilities in conjunction with each other for a deeper playstyle. For instance, what if you could use Stasis on the Cryo pillars, hit the pillars, and then send them flying off in blocks from the force, rather than being destroyed in place?
The playstyle itself is really fun, it looks like. I'm more of a nimble fighter, so I think I'd enjoy her. Great job. I'd prefer if you had a Final Smash, but you have a playstyle section to make up for it, as many people forget one or the other. I'd like some extras here too; Impa has a lot of potential for characterization, which you seem to nail most of the time. Your writing is very accessible and easy to read, and the moveset has a lot of voice which is good. I wish you'd double space your moves instead of hitting the enter key once, but that's just me. Overall Impa is a fair piece of work from you and a nice translation of her Breath appearance, even though you had to squeeze a lot more juice from the rest of the game to fit her.
Thanks for reading my set and taking the time to comment on it! Really appreciate it!

Let me prelude the rest of this comment on the comment by saying this Impa is an epilogue on Kilton of sorts. When I finished Kilton and discussed it on the Discord, I was especially proud how Kilton's zany kit mended together a lot of Breath of the Wild's mechanics and that the only mechanics left were the Slate abilities (which was untrue, I left out the Champions as well) and I said that Impa and Kilton together could cover a lion's share of BoTW's mechanics.
I've dabbled before with Impa as Breath of the Wild representant for general speculation, so I took the plunge and started a list of mechanics Impa could cover and wrote a set from there. Part of your feedback stems from that history, so I thought I'd mention it.

When writing the set, I did think of the two Stasis-moves being redundant, but I figured they were still the best choices for both an interesting Neutral B and Grab Game, so the pros outweighed the cons.
While writing this comment, I did add a bit of flavor text, describing how the two Stasis-effects are different in-universe and added a proper grab animation so Impa doesn't stand idle.

The grab game itself and its prop-heavy capacity is a valid complaint though. Especially Down Throw seems very tacky in the grand scheme of things, with the Monk only appearing for one move.
The Forward Throw and Back Throw share the same prop, but one of them is a kill move and the other a spacing throw so I figured it'd make sense to differentiate the two visually.
The prop-heavy set is an indirect result of the set starting out as addendum on the big BoTW set that was Kilton and quite literally starting out as a list of things to cover. However, the bow and arrow directly contribute to the playstyle, the hat plays a bigger role in the Side B, so I couldn't give Impa all hat-moves (before I made this set, I pictured Impa's moveset to be like Marth's, but with the Magnesis Hat as sword.) and both sword and magic all have their purpose in the set as well. As you said, Impa is a surprising fighter, so she has a surprisingly big toolkit.

The Sheikah Slate's technology is implied to be based on actual Sheikah magic and Master Kohga uses Magnesis without the help of the Slate, confirming the theory.
Your comment on the Stasis + Cryonis is a weakness of mine of movesetting in general, which is me sticking too close to source material. Since it's not possible to Stasis the ice blocks in BoTW, it never crossed my mind to do it here.

I did have a Final Smash, forgot to add it to the document, consider it done. (Because it is, I just added it)
I struggled a bit with Impa's personality. Her character is in general stern, but even she has her funny moments in-game and her appearance is of course not akin to any other fighter. Even though the introduction post is a straight up meme and I did slip in a T-Pose reference everywhere, I decided to play Impa straight as a serious warrior, with the humour coming from the fact she's very old and still doing these moves instead of giving her comical animations.

I really appreciate your comment and even if it may seem I'm explaining your valid criticism away, that's because unlike Kilton, I have no intention in making this a big editing project. I did make some edits following your comment, and I'll rewrite Down Throw to exclude the Odd Monk Out and streamline her throws' props where possible, but the other edits will most likely go towards making Kilton again or to start a new set before the contest ends.
 

Kholdstare

Nightmare Weaver
Joined
Oct 10, 2008
Messages
1,439
I was surprised to see a moveset from you so soon after Cat Battleship. Corn Barnacle reminds me of the Battleship as well, although I'm sure many of the similarities rise to mind due to your prior set being so fresh in my mind. You have an unconventional character choice from an obscure source material, because how many people do you think are familiar with Parodius or NEO AQUARIUM? Writing with a source material you have a much more intimate knowledge of than the average reader could be either a boon or a curse. Having a more recognizable source (say, for example, Pokémon) means that your moveset will spark more interest in a reader, but the flip side of this is that the reader will have preconceived notions of the character that you may not fulfill; they will inevitably say, "Well why didn't you include this move?" or "Why wasn't this in the set?". When you have a relatively unknown source, the world is your oyster, so to speak. You can make the set however you want due to the reader's unfamiliarity with the source. No one's going to call you out on mischaracterization or Pokémon Syndrome (putting in attacks from a character's source that don't fit the character; for example, a Ryu set borrowing moves from Dhalism just because they're Street Fighter moves) except the one other nerd who wanders in and lectures you on NEO AQUARIUM.

Another aspect of Cat Battleship this set is reminiscent of is a kind of incremental, increasing power the two sets share. Corn Barnacle gets stronger as it multiplies as Cat Battleship gains strength through Options. The extra barnacles multiply their attacks, just as Options multiply Battleship's projectiles. The structure of the sets' attacks are also similar: you describe the attack in the beginning of the move, then expound on its strengths and weaknesses including modality, and lastly mention how the additions to the set affect the attacks. This is something I wouldn't have caught if I hadn't just recently read Battleship.

I'd like to compliment you on improving your writing. There is a lot more confidence in this set than the issues I pointed out in your prior set. There's much more zaniness in the source material and character concept behind this set in my opinion but you aren't constantly questioning the zane this time. You stand behind it, fully endorsing it, as in, "Yeah, it's a damn arthropod. Just a barnacle fighting in Smash. What are you going to do about it?" I don't even mind that the moves are pretty brief. It's a very pleasant and light read that's not hard at all to grasp. You've still got plenty of voice, and the moveset reads like you're inserting your internal monologue into the moves at times.

Obviously everyone's going to wonder how balanced the set is. Due to the nature of it, I feel like it's going to be either overpowered or underpowered. A character with unique mechanics like this doesn't typically have middling matchups. I'm inclined to believe it's underpowered, especially after playing Smash Ultimate which seems like a fast game. Large hitboxes, powerful attacks, and great grabs seem like the name of the game, and it feels like Barnacle would have a hard time sticking around against these. On the flip side, in the MYM World of Durdling I think it'd do quite well. There are polarizing matchups, for sure, some of which I'll leave you and Jamie to endlessly roast in the Discord like you usually do. Just pick a Wizzerd or Junahu set and have fun.

I adore the idea behind the set, and the moves themselves look really fun and unique. You've nailed the playstyle of a barnacle down for the most part, if that's even possible. Well, as much as you could do with what you had. That being said, I feel like Barnacle is being torn between two worlds. On one hand, you need to make a set for Smash. On the other, I'd have loved if you ran with the barnacle concept even more, going beyond Smash and the source material. Having as many barnacles as you want on screen, pure stage control, a creeping fighter that's hard to remove that would eventually cover everything. If I would have done it, I'd have borrowed from Dark Blue Moon from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. Imagine, for instance, covering the foe in barnacles and weighing them down, perhaps even controlling them? Encrusting their shields, perhaps, or maybe some underwater shenanigans. I didn't make the set, however, so I can't be that picky.

Overall, I like this set a lot more than Cat Battleship! It was a cute read and some freshness that I haven't seen in a character concept in ages. It's still got your style and personal passion, and shows that you can improve and learn from feedback. Thanks for the read, Lex, I look forward to more.
 
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