Make Your Move 26: Top 50 Is In! MYM27 starts on January 31st

[Katapultar]

Spoiler: Ilyana

Oooh, here we have the ambitious WCF set of this contest. A shame it wasn’t actually Zeus, but I was expecting a Fire Emblem character from you more than anything else. Also this character is giving me serious Asagao vibes.

Biorhythm feels like it’s practically inventing a new type of stale que for Illyana where her power fluctuates, which is handled quite coolly here. Ilyana gets a phase where her first few attacks start out strong, giving her better KO power and more projectile range, but it can harm her combo potential. Meanwhile, Worst phase gives Ilyana better combos, but worse projectile range means that she has a harder time getting out of the phase with projectiles.

The Convoy have interesting touches of puppet fighter and construct-dependent-attacks while having their own Biorhythm, so Ilyana isn’t stuck dealing with her own (as cool as it would have been if it was applied to her entire set), while Down Special applies the classic WCF trope of having multiple buffs to keep track of in together with the base mechanics. It’s all a fair amount to take in for a lot of inputs that haven’t been introduced yet, but nothing that actually detracts from the set’s quality.

• Might be a decent idea to colour-code what colour the tomes turn for each state of Ilyana’s Biorhythm - would make it easier for readers to take in. I also wonder whether pictures exist for some of the listed upgrades like the tempest blade, spear and tomahawk.
• Mend is nice for the Biorhythm reset.
• It’s neat how the “Best” purchase from Down Special plays directly into a bonus you gain from the “Bad” purchase later down the line. You can then use Forge Cards to apply some neat bonuses to a Best attack Ilyana cycles to later down the line.
• Neutral Special is certainly a unique move hitbox-wise. The ability to drag an opponent for positioning purposes while your hitbox rotates makes the move a cool Special.
• Bolting plays finely into Ilyana starving for reach when she’s at her Worst.
• Up Special plays off of wind’s potential hitgrab nature, while also being nice for the lingering tornado and how it allows Ilyana to easily follow into her vertical game. Just one nitpick here: you mention that the bonus for wind magic from Forge Cards specifically gives them hitgrabs, which don’t go through shields like regular grabs, but Up Special and Jab specifically say they do go through shields. You probably meant to say command grab and not hitgrab.

I quite like how the Forward Tilt input is used here, being one of 3 attacks that are assigned to each of your Convoy members for utility. It’s good that Aimee gives Ilyana some actual frontal coverage if Muston isn’t positioned in front of Ilyana, which is pretty likely given the mobile nature of Smash. Daniel & Jorge’s attack sounds rather potent reach-wise when it’s stated to come out fast, even though it has high end lag and is based on the Convoy’s positioning. Is Ilyana vulnerable during all these attacks? The first paragraph gives us this sentence: “Ilyana….conserves her energy in this input and warps away in a spotdodge animation.”, but the last paragraph more or less says that Ilyana is vulnerable. It sounds like it’s the latter case, and I would prefer it to be balance-wise: the move doesn’t say that it can be used as a pseudo-dodge anyway.

• D-tilt and U-tilt are simple but welcome tools towards Ilayna’s general combo game.
• Dash Attack is a little odd, being tied entirely to a secondary entity and serving as the means to move them around, but its uses in preserving Ilyana’s Biorhythm - and allowing her to attack during the end lag - are appreciated.
• Forward Smash is the magic counterpart to Forward Tilt and great for getting in that extra magic utility. At first I thought this was going to be a “pick your attack based on control stick angle” type of move. As with the other tornado moves, I like the potential hitgrab here, specifically where Ilayna could grab an opponent above her and pop them below her for something like a tech situation. If the moveset went into detail on how Ilyana could mix up these moves (which she could, because they cycle with charge), it could make the move even better. Wind provides potential anti-air coverage if foes were expecting the fire, whereas I could see Thoron being the go-to if foes keep their distance.

• Neutral Aerial plays off of the Biorhythm mechanic very well, thanks to how its uses fluctuate from best-to-worst in tandem with Ilyana’s good aerial game and needing to be precise to land it. I also quite like Up Air’s place as a Ilyana move, a drag-down Aerial that can be used to KO or set up into Ilyana’s vertical melee attacks like her U-tilt, U-Smash or F-Smash tornado as well as NSpec. D-air is likewise a combo tool, but it changes up the Convoys’ Biorhythm.
• Aether wannabe F-air’s synergy with the lingering tornado is nice. Brings to mind images of using Ike’s Aether in an updraft on Stage Builder to stall his descent for fun.
• B-air is kind of cool as a “turret projectile” Ilyana can have fire from the Convoy while she’s airborne. Being able to split the twins so they fire their arrows from different positions is fun too, even if it’s pretty specific to pull off.
• Pummel is appreciated to get through your Biorhythm, and U-throw works as a KO’ing throw.
• It would be cool if the B-throw arrows moved at a non-instant speed, so that the farther the boys were when you performed the throw, the longer it took for the arrows to reach their target - and thus give Ilyana a bigger frame advantage. F-throw seems to fit this niche as a delayed hitbox, though.

Overall, Ilyana is a strong pseudo-stale + Hugo moveset, one that slots into your upper-echelons nicely. I think Quackfaster had a notably stronger concept, but Ilyana has a consistently solid set where none of the moves feel too gimmicky, even if parts like Dash Attack and half of the moves being scattered across Hugo attacks can make it strange. I can’t say for sure whether the moveset reached its full potential, but the two main concepts Ilyana leans on manage to work in a neat way. With both this set and Sherlock Holmes under your belt, MYM26 feels like it’s one of your stronger contests!

 

[FrozenRoy]

"A refund? Weeeeeeeeeeell, I do pride myself on having the best customer service in the realm. But before you act hastily, can I interest you in a discount on the latest model instead?



Trust me, the improvements are to die for!"

(A Daehypeels / FrozenRoy Joint)​

 

[BrazilianGuy]

I read most of these sets a while back, but due to power outages and college being kind of important, I'm only getting to write them now, hope I can get through all the jamcon ones.

Spoiler: Shadow Naoto

I'm not very familiar with Persona 4, my only experiences with the series (and with Shadow versions) are from 5 but this set does a good job at filling in what a shadow version is as well as giving context to Naoto specifically which is nice. I think how she was made to be this incredibly powerful character with some weaknesses is a good way to translate a boss character. I also like how you translate moves that in the Persona series act as debuffs, as well as the way she has the elemental spells in her Smash Attacks. Other moves I enjoyed are the Forward Air, simply for how it plays on Falcon's iconic Knee of Justice, the Dash Attack being a drill that allows for breaking shields is very smart, and I gotta say I think giving the foe a lobotomy with Down Throw is a bit much, but it does fit the character from what I've seen in this set. Overall is a great concept with great organization and details, I've never given actual rates, but Imma try and start doing that, Shadow Naoto gets 4 out of 5 stars from me.

Spoiler: Alternate Gabriel

I actually went on and watched some of Mandela Catalogue before reading this, quite a neat little spooky web series, I'm not sure if it started the Found Footage horror genre but it definitely helped popularize it, anywho I think Gabriel is cool. Now yeah, his moveset is quite wacky, which does help him stand out and fit with his origins, but idk, maybe one or two more "normal" moves could have been cool cause I think he would not be an easy pick-up and play character. But his uniqueness is great, turning into an alternate of your foe, calling out all of the weirdos for his attacks and being able to have them out and about, as well as the really well-implemented U.I. mechanic makes him feel like something entirely different from any other character which I love seeing. Also from my limited time with his home series, it made me like seeing the acronyms you use in the set as well as the quotes in the move's info section, those parts in particular look really great, I love your style of writing sets. But I found nothing as spooky or messed up in this moveset for Satan, than Shadow Naoto giving you a lobotomy, funny how that works. But yeah this is getting a 4 out of 5 from me, really loved it.

Spoiler: Team Fortress 2

This gave me Sega All-Star racing flashbacks. But gotta say, this is one of the most ambitious sets I've ever seen, doing all of TF2 into a single character slot is quite impressive, it's one of my favorite games of all time, so seeing it get all this love makes me really happy. The style and organization on this set are great, love how the Voice Commands are done, how you describe their playstyle as a CPU, and how each merc is introduced with "Meet the __" it really shows your love for the base material. I also feel like making it so it's a Team moveset it gives Medic and Engie a lot more room to do what they are truly known for, something other sets sometimes struggle to really capture. I think the idea of being able to decide the strength of the CPUs is awesome, not sure how it would work online, but awesome. And that brings us to the plot twist, this is a Spy moveset, really fits with Jamcon's false theme and I honestly don't know how I didn't see it coming- but yeah if some of the other mercs (pyro) felt kinda lacking Spy definitely carries them by taking full advantage of his strengths to go invis, disguise and mix in with the rest of the team. I like how Sapper works in Down Tilt, Down Air and Back Air are really fun, and the Throws being Bond references is a nice touch, tho I wish Up Throw was more explained. And that brings it to the fact that this set isn't fully finished, which is why I won't rate it rn, but I am excited to see how it gets updated, and hopefully, it gets more significant upgrades than TF2 in the last few years has.

Spoiler: Toedscruel

Toedscruel was quite a fast but enjoyable read. I appreciate that you used your limited Jamcon Time to produce the wonderful "Tentacruel's Gift to Toedscruel" painting, which brought a tear to my eye with its beauty. The Ode to Toed bit was also amusing, I beg to see the other 753580 verses. Learning about hyphae and convergent evolutions was also cool, love learning stuff like that with movesets. But as far as the moves go, the specials feel really fun and actually balanced even with you being able to put them to sleep and the Wrap which does serious damage, but they are neat and interact well with each other. The rest of the moves feel a little bit meh, a lot of them are just hyphae swings, I feel like Toed could maybe use moves like Grass Knot or Earth Power (I'm not familiar with his movepool), but this was done in very limited time which is understandable. I had fun reading Toedscruel but he gets 2 out of 5 stars from me.

 

[WeirdChillFever]

Way Down Hadestown (Hades by BKupa666 )

Woweeee what a set! Actually, I’m writing this comment before reading the set in full, because I have so many thoughts already. This comment will thus be sort of divvied up per input section

Hades is big, after all, not only in wordcount (both the set and the man), but also in scope. Hades does a lot of things, lots of meters, extra mechanics or simple tweaks that add more to the set.
Neutral Special/Soul Mechanic and Down Special take the BKupa approach of writing multiple mechanics into one move with subheaders that seem to veer away from the main mechanic at first glance before bringing it home once again. You really see B writes for a living, with the paragraphs being structured in a logical but narratively interesting way. Soul mechanic is incredibly out of the box (though I personally can’t distinguish between a fully new idea and a dug up Old MYM relic, so it might be less impressive to others who have seen this mechanic on say, a Drowzee MYM11 set).

It all works though, which is a feat in and of itself with a scope this size. I don’t have much to say about the soul mechanic and the different flames, it all ties neatly into eachother, no loose fate threads there. When Down Special seemed to introduce a mechanic worthy of its own set for example (with the aging and the soul time bomb) that’s less connected to its main mechanic, it does some soulful recentering by making the vortex the option to reunite body and soul and it pulls me right back in.

Side Special tying back to the different fires was really good, and the various extra projectiles means the set has no intention of slowing down. As someone who just finished a set where I desperately tried to cut down mechanics to make it flow better, seeing a veteran flaunt their skills by weaving all these extras into the set was a masterclass.

Up Special I’m less of a fan of? Maybe either the set or my reading brain approached the maximal amount of bells and whistles it can handle, but Up Special seems to add mechanics just to add them here. The set would have worked fine and perhaps better if there were no Piranha Plant smoke clouds and crevices and a seperate move buffering mechanic and as of the time of writing this part of the comment seems mostly to exist to have more moving parts to throw in, rather than it flowing back to a centerpiece mechanic.

Grab is fun! It adds more to Hades’ gameplan than the sum of its parts, but then two pummels seems gratuitous.

The throws themselves are really unique and, even when they seem like they give more options for more options’ sake (timeable Forward Throw, extendable Back Throw), win back their dividend purely based on rule of cool points. Ursula reference in Down Throw made me smile and its function slots really nicely into the rest of the set so far.

I have no qualms with most of the Aerials and Tilts. Positive standout here are the Neutral Air and the Down Air, though Forward Air and Back Air are also very appreciated for their relative simplicity. Can’t go all the way all the time.

The Smashes then tie it up nicely, with references to the rage mechanic and the orange-blue flame distinction, as well as some simply fun heavy-hitting endeavours. An excellent, excellent set overall!

I live again! (Just a little voice actor joke ladies and gentlemen, little parlor trick, don’t worry) (Dr. Facilier by dilliam )

First thing that struck me reading the set (aside from the gorgeous presentation) is just how clean and clever the mechanics are: Combining puppeteering with the shadow and the general mumbo jumbo that is the curse status effect all works well to form a pressuring set, with a terrible fate looming over both Facilier and his opponents via the Debt System. Add in the telegraph card play and there’s a lot of mechanics for a little JamCon set that all fit the character and do work together nicely.

Aside from the obvious JamCon time pressure resulting in shorter normals, one thing that could’ve worked better is the Debt system. Now, don’t get me wrong; I love the mechanic itself, but maybe making it a weaker penalty might give it nore strategic appeal to go over the line instead of making it a hard line to always avoid. Otherwise I think the numbers are fine and it makes for a creative JamCon set. Nice job!


I mean it’s one Ballista Muston, what could it cost, ten gold? (Anna by FrozenRoy and Daehypeels )

If Anna got a nickel everytime FrozenRoy made a joint set for a beloved Fire Emblem character that features upgrading various weaponry that feature the Hammerme staff to repair said weapons, she’d have at least two nickels to invest into weapon upgrades. Similarly, if she got a nickel for everytime there was a Fire Emblem Merchant set featuring upgradable weaponry, she’d get another two nickels! Finally, she can get another two nickels for every time Dae made an Anna set! Well, that was a freebie.

Anna’s core mechanics remain the same from last contest’s Anna, which are a neat and refined version of the Anna mechanics that have been floating through general moveset speculation: Anna has a gold mechanic that affects her weight and the rest of her set in cornerstones like Spendthrift and her bag-sized moves. They’re all mechanics I heavily praised last time, so I applaud the decision to remake them here. Praiseworthy is the decision to not make the weapons straight upgrades, with Bronze Swords having a place in the set outside of being overshadowed by Armorslayer. The balance is geared at comical, with many 0G and upper echolon golds being geared towards very situational areas of the game.

In fact, not to wish more words on this set, but the effect bag-filling has on mobility goes conspicuously unmentioned across the melee, when the interplay between the different swords and the different bag sizes is the peak of the set. A similar move that doesn’t make it past its own input is Jab’s Hexstaff: A relic of the old set that I would’ve liked to see come back as part of a status effect throw or something or an Up Air, instead of the one that randomly adds extra stun. Especially a move like Up Air could’ve benefited from mentioning that Anna’s vertical speed remains the same regardless of bag size.

Move-wise too, the set retains the set-up of the original set, dividing Bows, Swords, Staves and Sacks across the melee. Even though FSmash’s word count was stupid, it serves as a economical way to give Anna a second set of tilts. Back Air returns with the sack and it bemoans how trying to filll the bag according to the foe’s percentage would mess up the balance, but aside from FSmash (which generally follows the same purposes even if it can be angled) there aren’t a lot of bag moves to keep this in mind with, when it’s a really fun mechanic.

Dae’s casual FFC style and Froy’s hardened MYM-isms are fun to swap between and luckily swapping doesn’t occur too much within moves; Very appreciated, considering they are definitely two different writing styles. The different colors help set them apart, though it becomes a bit weirder when the color is switched for small clarificating sentences.

Dae’s style also seems to be where most of the wordcount is coming from, I do think it can be a bit more refined without stripping the style of its charms: Nest Egg for example spends Nine paragraphs talking about the animation before getting to the actual function. Too much fluff harms the readability, as it makes the structure of the paragraphs less clear. Most moves have a very clear style though and FSmash, despite its word count, was an example of a move that was really well-written, to the point where you could’ve swapped the colors and I would’ve been none-the-wiser.
Unrelated note, art scattered throughout is nice, but please cite your sources if it’s not official art or something either of you made yourself. Overall, a very nice job with some room to add me to the team in 27 and go for the hattrick.

 

[GolisoPower]

That Wrench Of His Glows With An Awesome Power
Tinker Knight by majora_787

Playing heavily into my recent Gundam kick, we've got Tinker Knight and his mechs. Tinker Knight is a combination of Iroha and Valkyrie, where not only does he have different forms that are a lot more specialized in specific inputs, but he also has the ability to directly pilot a mech similar to how Iroha can pilot her tank when in battle. All those together make for an interesting combination that makes me imagine the possibilities of what you can do. Not only that but they have entirely different attacks tied to specific inputs as well: Down Special has a Bomb Drop with the bigger blue mech that's used to both disrupt and kill, a Mech Hook on a smaller red mech that's a heavily disjointed attack for poking and long-range attacking and a carpet-bombing Special with the airborne yellow mech that serves as good area denial and is good for building up damage. That's not even getting into the Blue Mech's and Yellow Mech's Grab attacks either, with the former being a lock-on burst damage attack that chases down the foe and the latter being a drill projectile plucked straight out of the Drill item and given explosive properties. All these unique quirks across all those mechs give Tinker Knight a unique sense of adaptability that allows him to pick the right mech for the right job.

And that's not even getting into his own Specials, showing a major upgrade from his Shovel Knight boss fight by giving him more to defend himself. We have his signature wrench through his Neutral Special, a tricky little dash dance that has him throw up to 6 wrenches while running around in a panic. If this was Melee, I have no doubts it this would be the strongest move in the game. Then there's SSpec, which has him use an "honorary fourth mech" as the set puts it to activate a Splat Roller-style stance where Tinker Knight can charge head-first into a foe, can be used as an item if jumped off, and gives him a unique Dash attack. Lastly, we have his USpec, a rocket platform that he can use to float to the ledge should he ever get knocked off the platform. All those together make him a veritable speedster where it's hard to actually attack him and even if you do manage to get close enough he'll just get you off him with his wrenches.

All his attacks across both himself and his tools show off his penchant for gadgetry pretty well, making up for a lack of muscle with sheer ingenuity. I particularly love the Blue Mech, it just makes my gorilla brain wanna go "built that and use that only". Not to say the other mechs are bad in and of themselves, but I think I'd prioritize the Blue Mech personally. Overall, if Black Knight hadn't been released before him, Tinker Knight would've been a unique and fun first step in a franchise redemption arc for Shovel Knight after a few SK sets from past contests of...questionable quality, shall we say. I'm sure Black Knight's a good set as I've yet to read it, but it's good to see you putting in the effort for sets in this franchise. You did a great job, Majora!

 

[Arctic Tern]

ILYANA (WCF)

Ilyana, as with a few other characters, has a gimmick revolving around her stale move queue. In this case, it’s based on the Biorhythm mechanic from her home game combined with her voracious appetite, where her moves become stronger or weaker depending on their space in the queue. Thankfully for Ilyana, she has help in the form of the Merchant Convoy, who have several moves that attack in her stead that generally have the same effectiveness regardless of her Biorhythm. On the other side, every member of the Convoy runs on a Biorhythm of their own, which alters the item they can supply to Ilyana through the use of DSpec. These items run the gamut from buffing the Convoy’s attacks to buffing Ilyana’s attacks depending on the element she uses to removing the worst state of her Biorhythm, and all seem useful in their own right.

While I was a bit unsure on the pseudo-Hugo elements when skimming the set, ultimately it works out for me. Ilyana doesn’t have a traditional Dash Attack, but Muston provides Luma-esque coverage with his that grants him great stage control and good counterzoning. Likewise, while she doesn’t have a FAir she has a follow up out of NAir that essentially serves as one, so she at least has a means of approaching via the air. The set gets a lot of mileage out of Ilyana’s Biorhythm mechanic as well, such as the NSpec that automatically boosts it up and acknowledgement in NAir that being at “bad” levels can actually be good for her combo game due to the lower knockback. Her allies have very fun attacks of their own as well, from the FTilt where the angle changes the specific move to a DAir that serves as combo glue independent of the Biorhythm mechanic. In this regard, I have few complaints other than the standard “more elaboration” I tend to have with more complex sets like these.

I do have gripes with a few individual attacks, however. The first is FSmash: while the idea of a cycleable FSmash and one that changes properties based on charge are cool, putting them together just makes it frustrating to use for the player since it cycles based on use and charge, meaning that I can see players who want to use one attack having to charge in order to even use it. I’d just have them change through angle - it’s not as unique as the cycle, but there’s a strong difference between “unique” and “hampering to gameplay”. The second is the BAir, which seems far too gimmicky to be usable - it’s a move that depends on the Convoy’s positioning that hits at an angle the set admits is awkward, and for only single digit damage with low knockback. I’d make it so either they always aim towards Ilyana’s back so it’s more likely to hit or simply buff the existing move’s damage and knockback so that the reward equals the difficulty in landing it. And while this is more of a nitpick than anything else, I thought that the Convoy were actual playable characters (there is well-known precedent in Fire Emblem for playable shopkeeps) and that Ilyana had no real relation to them beyond being friends. While after doing further research I see why you did this (the Convoy are NPCs and they saved her life in her backstory), it is not established in the set itself, which could lead the decently large portion of readers with no Fire Emblem knowledge (remember that everyone in Smashboards can read the set, not just MYMers) to just assume you’re giving the Hugo mechanic to her for forced creativity.

Despite that somewhat sizable list of complaints, I overall came out Ilyana with positive feelings on it. She definitely satisfied my hunger for good sets!

ANNA (Froy/Dae)

Anna is essentially a remake of the MYM 25 set for her, also by Dae, but with the aid of Froy elaborates a lot more on her toolset. She maintains the gold mechanic where she can choose to keep some of her gold in a bag to increase its power at the expense of making the attacks involving it slower, also adjusting her stats to be slower but heavier. Gold is also expended in Anna’s DSpec, where she can trade her weaker Bronze weapons for more powerful Iron or Silver weapons, or specific Special weapons - Armorslayer deals chip damage, while the Longbow increases the range of her bow attacks. While in terms of damage they’re more powerful, they also have less durability and cost more, thus meaning Anna has incentive to hold onto/use weaker weapons. Aiding this is the SSpec, a chargeable move that uses her Gold that gets absurdly powerful if she has the resources to spare, but if she’s broke gives her a quick and easy way of getting back on her feet if she hits the foe. It’s a very interesting mechanic all around and one fitting for a shopkeeper.

The other moves play off of the weapon mechanics in the set well, with each sword type filling their own niche - I especially like the acknowledgement that in some cases the “weaker” weapon actually is better for the given input, like with DTilt since the second hit loses the tripping chance it normally has with Armorslayer. Anna’s bag moves are where it gets particularly interesting, most notably in the insane FSmash, which I’m pretty sure is the longest of its input in MYM if all of the angled versions are counted as one move. They have different uses depending on angle and the amount of Gold stocked, from being alternative poking tools with low money to absolutely absurd KO moves if the bag is full. Anna’s individual moves are nice too, such as the oddball UAir from the original set (one of the standout moves for me when I read Anna 1.0), the NAir and its ability to create mixups with both charging and whether or not she’ll be punishable, and FTilt and its ability to kill with the Silver Sword at markedly low percents if it lands a tipper. It all comes around to form a very fulfilling “jack-of-all-trades” playstyle, held down by a lack of good defensive options and the heavy resource management required of her. The only real issue of note is that the most interesting mechanics, Jab’s weight debuff and the general stat changes Anna gets, aren’t really mentioned that often aside from a few moves. But with that aside, she’s certainly a fine product, and one I’d happily recommend!

Comment block link here!

 

[ForwardArrow]

King Radical
You seemed very hyped for this set writing it, and if early reviews were any indication it was for good reason. Upon reading it, I'd say it pretty much lived up to the hype for me, although the actual process of reading it was a bit odd. The set introduces a LOT of ways to augment King Radical's aggressive game that don't feel particularly closely tied together, up until Down Special goes 'yeah you can give them all to minions and landing enough big hits with them upgrades your minions into something cooler'. And that was cool, but I felt like the connective tissue was still missing, and in some ways, I came out of the set feeling it still was. King Radical feels like a ton of disparate chaotic ways to get aggressive slapped on one character with different parts of the set playing well with different ones, and even if the upgraded minions are a cool end goal, it all feels a bit too much like a 'throw things at the wall and see what sticks' kind of deal.

Now, mind you, this drags the set down a lot less than you'd think, because while I'm not sure every idea the set has gels that well with every other idea the set has, it doesn't necessarily have to. King Radical's whole gameplan seems to be to stunt wildly on his opponent with ridiculous aggressive gambits that either get him a super strong setup fast or he'll just kinda die trying. Like yeah he's got 4 different vehicles between Side Special, Up Special, Dash Attack, and the scooter item, but the man's only getting his best setups when he hits the opponent with his laggy chainsaw attacks while riding one of them, so he actually kind of needs that much variety. Tennis at times feels a bit underutilized in terms of how much the non-racket moves acknowledge it, but there's a very fun dynamic between having a racket on King Radical's person, a racket carried by one of his minions, and a racket carried by an opponent who is going to suddenly find King Radical's FTilt an absolute menace to deal with. And while he seems like a bit of an across the board all-star at a glance, a closer look will reveal that his KO potential is a lot less than you'd expect, only really getting early KOs via the Birdasaurus in particular or the wildly tricky to land aerial spikes, and he gets the bad heavyweight disadvantage state that usually comes with that kind of kill power.

It makes for a set where the chaos ends up being the point, and even if its maybe not as fun as focusing in one element and utilizing it to its fullest potential, I feel like each of these elements the set throws out are a lot of fun. The set's strength, in moveset design, characterization, and in actually winning with him, is not really being predictable and going off in whatever wild direction you feel like to keep the opponent on their toes. It feels exactly like the kind of playstyle this ludicrous character would want to have and keep games with him high on excitement and rarely playing out in a similar way. There are a couple parts of the set I didn't like very much even considering this angle: specifically FThrow comes to mind as a bit of a janky-feeling throw that I think could use a bit of fine tuning, it feels like the tennis game is never going to really escalate to a particularly explosive finish due to low racket durability and IMO that's a shame, and I think the machine gun on a minion can just feel like 'the best' setup at times. But its a very good set with an unconventional but in-character way to approach its MYM tropes and setups, and I'd be shocked if it was unseated for me as my JamCon nomination given its one of the best JamCons I've read in general.

Sherlock Holmes
I've been back and forth on this one a bit as I realize its time to comment it. This set honestly has some pretty solid ideas where I see why they hooked people. The kind of 'custom loadout' style of putting the card types in his mirrors, weakening your kit to create a passively damaging hitbox in front of you, fakeout deaths, and traps that trigger when the foe uses specific inputs and get stronger over time are all cool ideas. The set ends on a pretty strong grab game that ties back into these mechanics well enough to end on a high note too. But I'll be honest, I'm just not here for what this set's doing, and I think it really comes back to the cards mechanic on the mirrors.

The only real opportunity cost to using said cards is that, well, you can't use them on other magnifying glasses, and this set has a weirdly high number of attacks that just use all your mirrors at once. This leaves you just getting all your buffs at once, something that feels like it should have a high bar to entry, but instead the only requirement is 'you at some point put cards on the magnifying glasses'. Side Special feels just insane in this context where its nearly dealing the damage of Bowser's extremely high damage fire breath while Holmes can also move around and attack at the same time, even if his moveset's a lot more limited, and its dealing an alarmingly large amount of hitstun too. This isn't some setup he needs to put actual thought into preparing, you just kind of can have it if you get a little time to yourself, and (unless I missed them) the set's missing some critical details like how far the side special's light actually goes forward and how much lag NSpecial is to set up. Its not that he isn't paying a significant amount for this setup, its just that it feels too strong for the opportunity cost involved. The Down Smash feels like it has the opposite problem: it feels like its meant to be this big important move to encourage Holmes to have all his magnifying glasses available, but then you actually look at it and its just 'this is a very mediocre kill move that's not going to matter much without the help of one specific throw'. Its such a weirdly lackluster thing to require all of Sherlock's magnifying glasses be free to get use out of.

I think a lot of my issue with the set beyond that is getting past some mechanical issues, its just not very fun. The buffs provided by the mirrors feel very mundane, and I don't think the moves really managed to highlight much of an interesting dichotomy in 'what loadout to pick for what situation', so the whole mechanic isn't nearly as exciting as you'd hope for out of this kind of 'custom loadout' mechanic. Its one of my favorite types of mechanic and I just wish the set was a little more interested in both making the actual buffs you get out of it exciting and also emphasizing the advantages of particular mirror setups in a way that feels like it matters between inputs? Rather than just going 'oh you can make this one input faster or stronger or linger a tiny bit more'. There's also just a huge chunk of the set between the grab game and specials where the melee honestly doesn't have much going on, its not bad melee but it never really elevates the set's concepts for me.

I'm probably being a touch harsher in this comment than I have to be, because this set has had a very positive reception and I'm just sitting here unable to really see it. I'm not sure I'd call it a bad set as the problems I spent so much of this comment on are more 'things that frustrated me over time as I read and made me wish the set was better' than 'things that broke the entire experience'. Its also a lot better than WCF's last JamCon, and from what I can tell, a lot of why is on WCF throwing out stronger concepts and, while the melee's not particularly gripping, at least writing it with some actual solid goals in mind. But I find myself confused and annoyed by enough of the decisions that I can't say I liked the set, unfortunately.

Alternate Gabriel
I do not know what's gotten people trying to make Hugo sets again, but Alternate Gabriel goes a step further by also basing the set mechanically around building up to this bizarre 'time bomb' effect based on the strength of the opponent's inputs, foregoing the conventional approach to damage for a Smash character. Smartly, the set DOES let Gabriel bring all these inputs back to use on his person in case of emergency, and the abysmal damage and knockback the alternates deal due to mostly focusing on building up to the MAD effect is actually kind of clever as a balancing measure. Alternate Gabriel is dealing a lot less damage than a regular character with each of his and his subordinates attacks, even when he does get to land a big hit, its dependent on the strongest thing the opponent is willing to give him. I think the Ganondorf example at the start of the set is a bit misleading, because no Ganondorf in their right mind is going to throw out a random Warlock Punch against Alternate Gabriel, let alone with characters who have lower firepower. But I'm weirdly fine with that? Alternate Gabriel can compensate a little if the foe won't give him good kill potential by pushing the foe to a higher MAD count than 100 for extra damage and knockback, and FSmash/USmash/UThrow's repositioning effects and juggling foes between your gaggle of weirdos and freaks can make them take that damage and knockback in a spot that makes it potent enough to kill earlier than expected. Its also kind of a necessary countermeasure to the fact that this set has 5 guys beating you up at once without a lot of the drawbacks of a classic Hugo set, so keeping their damage/knockback this weird and situational makes them feel a lot more fair to play against.

Now, I enjoy the mechanics on display here, and I think the set does sometimes make solid use of them. FTilt and FSmash struck me as particularly strong move concepts. FSmash teleporting foes is certainly gimmicky for the input, but it works well enough in practice, and FTilt's ability to make it weirdly annoying to deal with your minion by flipping them around the foe repeatedly feels both character appropriate and like a clever use of the Hugo mechanic. I do think the set's not particularly consistent with that though, a lot of the moves are just 'here's a new way to whisper something eldritch in the foe's ear in X direction' that the set struggles to give much greater context to. When they're not, they feel maybe a bit too gimmicky, like the Up Smash's weird grab hitbox and Down Smash being a non-MAD mechanic that's also based on the foe's move strength with no baseline power of its own, both of which rubbed me the wrong way. I do like that these stronger moves along with the FSmash that I actually like are tied to the guy who can't move at all, that feels like a clever use of the mechanics. It mostly just feels like the set's a bit undercooked due to its short development cycle, from the mechanics feeling a bit hard to parse at times to the fact that there's only a couple standout exciting moves past the Specials. But there's clearly cool ideas on display here and I came away finding this approach to a Hugo set more legitimate and interesting than I expected.

As a random edit suggestion: while I think the set's balance makes sense the way it is right now, I think going over 100 points of MAD should actually be stronger than it currently is in terms of scaling. You have to line things up in a pretty specific way to get anything more than 110 points of MAD, and Alternate Gabriel is often going to struggle in melee even with all his buddies around with how hilariously weak his actual attacks are. May as well make his big damage/knockback opportunity potentially even stronger to make up for all that.

Dr. Facilier
Man its just a recurring trend today of "specials here are good and I don't feel its fully taken advantage of" huh. Dr. Facilier has some inputs later on that try to have a bit of fun, I do like Up Smash/Down Smash and their respective prediction buffs and I think FTilt would be a pretty cool concept if the set leaned into its bait and punish mechanics a bit more. I also think reversing the benefits of what the foe got out of their deal is fun, with the highlight being using the foe's own strength against them. I kinda wish the other 'turn your boons against you' ideas leaned into that a little more, but ah well. But really, the set's entirely relying on the Specials to carry it because the latter inputs just don't flesh out his melee game in the way I'd hope.

Fortunately, those Specials are really good! I like this take on prediction mechanics, getting a move at random and having to figure out how to land it is honestly a pretty fun mechanic and one I think is supplemented very well by the excellent shadow. That's a really cool Nana-type minion if I've ever seen one, though I'd maybe make it dissipate via stamina instead of a weirdly specific knockback threshold. But I like the way it can store inputs to use later, follow foes to any location on the stage, serves as a huge payoff to cursing the foe with your deal, and hold in place so Facilier can set it up exactly where he wants for combos. The set doesn't need to specialize itself a ton to take advantage of the shadow when its this fun and versatile, even just "Bair is really strong" can be a good incentive to use the shadow man to set it up in crafty ways, so I'm a bit more willing to forgive the set for not going all the exciting places it could with the melee. The deals and Up Special are good fun too, and I feel the set's clearly your best entirely because the core is strong enough to carry what comes after.

I will say, I respect what you're going for on the debt mechanic, but I'm really wondering if the set punishes Facilier a bit too harshly and too easily. He definitely feels like he'd be a bit too strong without it, don't get me wrong, but I'm left wondering if its a bit too strong a punisher for failure for how often it'll probably come up. I do think its a neat way to balance Dr. Facilier at least, but part of me wonders if maybe its distribution should be different. Maybe the Smashes or Curse Deals shouldn't be quite so expensive given they already have their fair share of flaws, but the shadow should actually gradually accrue some debt? Mostly just things to think about now that you're not on a tight deadline, I'd be interested if you decided to spruce this set up some as it can clearly be more than it is right now.

 

[SaltySuicune]

Alright Kerbeus! It's time for the Chain Launch!

 

[FrozenRoy]

Wild and Horny Hermit (Kasen Ibaraki OldManHan )

I did extensive previewing on various sets this contest, but I don't really like officially ranking and commenting on a set unless I give it a full reread excepting some scenarios (mostly ones like Tinker Knight, where I only previewed it when it was already finished). I thought that today I would go through some that I did preview and comment / rank them since it'd be faster, although please note that since I did preview them I might not have as much to say since. You know. I already gave pointers!

A lot of this set's reception, like I said in previewing, will likely hinge on what thinks about the projectile cancelling abilities on the True Form. They're essentially an extremely amped up version of Link's shield, and I am not surprised it is a bit unpopular. I do think that this kind of effect is not Inherently Bad, but I do agree with Majora's thought that 15% would cover a lot of projectiles. The fact she can't move too fast without bringing it down helps a lot, I wonder if giving her a slow walk speed (maybe confident and taunting, given it is her "evil" form?) so that she cannot approach as effectively especially given she already has damage halving on it. Or maybe lowering the threshold to 10%/12%? Or maybe 5% when running / in the air, 10% when walking / during moves, 15% standing / crouching? Those are some suggestions that might make this more palatable to people and maybe tighten up the balance. (Like I said I, personally, would have considered something like making it only during her command run / standing or something, but I know that's not where you want to take the set. Of course, this does mean living with the consequences.)

I'll also say, before actually getting into the meat and potatoes of the set, that your writing feels improved from Ilias/Adramelech in a way that bodes well. It feels like the set better captures the nuance of what it is trying to do, what to keep and what to cut, stuff of that nature. I can certainly attest that this is not easy to get down, so seeing that felt through the set on what is essentially your first one made for Make Your Move / "Modern" is a great sign.

That's still only one part of the set, of course. The main thrust of it is Kasen having a main form where she's a bit of an all-around keepaway girl who struggles to kill, and a "True Form" she can switch to but NOT switch back from (which instantly reminded me of my Necalli set. This kind of form switch is appealing to me) where she is a speedy, powerful and aggressive superheavy with overwhelming power but bad on the backfoot and with sometimes awkwardly placed attacks in exchange for extreme power. This is the kind of thing that means nothing without good moves, but is a potentially potent core with them.

And I think Kasen succeeds at having some pretty good moves! The Street Fighter / M. Bison-style parry + projectile after anti-projectile is a cool opener, and I do like how it essentially foreshadows Kasen's anti-projectile nature later, Side Special / Forward Tilt / Forward Aerial trio of spacing moves (although it does feel rather powerful for Forward Aerial to be such combo food in that context, albeit added by the damage %), True Form Down Tilt is honestly pretty cool with all the DI shenanigans at play that make it interesting in more competitive contexts, True Form Kasen's grab game is also cool and I gotta say I love Domination Dash. This kind of command dash feels rarely done in Make Your Move and is the kind of thing I'd love to explore. Seriously, though, this is cool! A unique ledgegrab attack for when she reaches the edge of the stage? The Mountain Breaker / Kishin Slayer mixups that also present huge risk to Kasen? Command grab mixups? That's some fun stuff right there.

It'd be nice if Forward Throw had ending lag stated, so we knew what the window was with the crumple for Kasen to use an attack. It must be less than 14 frames if she can't Down Smash out of it. I generally wonder if Kasen might kill too early for the playstyle you intend: Down Smash's 90% kill isn't amazing, but it feels like it might be good enough to help out, and she has two strong kill throws in the Vengeful F-Throw (tho that is gated behind a mechanic) and Back Throw. I might make Back Throw kill more around 160%, to emphasize her lack of easy kill power. She has strong spacing and good enough combo game material, after all. Absolution might not be easy to get, but it is reliable enough that I think base Kasen being a bit more lacking in kill power is reasonable. As good as True Form Kasen's kill power is meant to be, I would consider lowering Dash Attack's kill percent. The sheer speed of the move might crowd out some of her other kill options, and also I think it being a lower strength and slightly (but not extremely) more setup oriented move would add a little bit of dimension to it. Back Aerial, I think, should have some more ending lag when I think about it. Maybe more in the 24-26 frame range. Some stuff like that is generally around as a concern. I think I agree with the general sentiment from ForwardArrow that Up Smash and Down Smash feel a bit disappointing or odd.

In an overall sense, Kasen feels like a strong improvement on Ilias/Adramelech in most respects, but is bogged down by some of the balance. It isn't even a matter of being overpowered, but fun gameplay patterns. Like, even if Mega Man or the Belmonts win, is it actually fun for them to fight someone who passively shuts down their gameplan so much? That's definitely the thing that, to me, feels like it caps how high I'd put Kasen in practical terms. I do like base form Kasen too, although True Form's anti-projectile nature means in some MUs you just want to turbo her out, and the fact True Form has more quick options compared to someone like Ilias makes them inherently quite a bit more menacing. The well designed, fun and thoughtful melee is enough to overcome it for me but I think you get the idea. Good work, and I'm excited to read your other sets later!

 

[GolisoPower]

His Radicalness Has Arrived!
King Radical by U UserShadow7989

...US, one of these days we need to have a talk about the amount of ungodly effort you put into these JamCon sets, I dunno how much sleep you've sacrificed for these JamCons.

That's not a criticism, by the way, King Radical is a pretty nutso set, dare I say it's "rad". Big Daddy Raddy's kit has a lot going for it: he has a mechanic where landing Specials and Smashes builds up a Rad Meter...and even gives vibes of Citizen V by having it fill using taunts uninterrupted as well. Those lead up to a Down Special that while normally summons lame minions who barely do anything spectacular, with Rad Meter gets even more powerful minions and even his own right-hand man to fight alongside him. Those minions can work with his Neutral Special, an item-generating Monado Wheel stance that King Radical can use one of four unique items that are different in roles: a tennis racket that shoots its own projectile and reflects other projectiles at the cost of breaking the racket, a bottle of True Dew that he can use to heal himself or his minions, a machine gun to spray and pray for good burst damage, and a skateboard for amazing burst mobility both on the ground and in the air. Dividing your special items across your minions almost sounds scary to divert attention, as you can avoid one minion who's charging at you with the skateboard only to get barraged by machine gun fire before getting smashed away by King Radical using a tennis racket. Then we got his sweet ride, a dirt bike with minute differences from Wario's Bike, the biggest difference being that King Radical can attack while riding it, which is actually a hell of a boon for him for when he wants to build up Rad Meter. The same concept generally applies to the more airborne Birdosaurus (Not to be confused with the purple Mario character), albeit you're limited to only Smash attacks. All those together make King Radical an extremely aggressive character who fights with absolute gusto worthy of the Radical Lands.

I do love how the set also makes deeper shoutouts to his appearances in the TF2-tier absurd storyline known as Dr. McNinja, with Rule Of Cool being absolutely an application to this entire set, from using Chainsaws as Smash attacks to epic right hooks to rocket-powered rollerskates that help further bolster his mobility. He certainly lives by a code of "live by the rad, die by the rad", and that seems to make me really want to read the story once the website gets back up (which I've heard went down while the JamCon was active). Honestly, this has surpassed Citizen V as most likely to vote, but who knows, I might actually find another set I decide to vote for. Nice work!

 

[Deleted member]

Hades was an incredibly significant set for me early on in MYM, he’s one of my all-time favourite Disney villains, and this set was noted to take inspiration from my Baku the Dream Eater set, so it was enough to compel me to read. The set was overall very enjoyable, with some great concepts that bring together everything I could really want or expect out of a Hades set, although I did find some issues with the execution. Overall, it’s a very strong contribution that absolutely does justice to the legacy of the character in MYM and as an iconic Disney villain.

First, it’s probably the right time to discuss my connection to this character. I already said he’s one of my favourite Disney villains, but he also has a fun connection in that he was designed by Gerald Scarfe, who worked on The Wall. I definitely recommend looking up his art for Hades and Hercules, it’s very cool. I can’t say I expected to see links to things like The Hollywood Reporter and some off-hand references to things like your other sets this MYM or even some older sets like Amadeus where it was relevant. Somehow, and it speaks to the strength of your presentation and writing, you are able to tie it all together though. Sitting down to read a modern MYM set is a bit like watching an extended Lord of the Rings movie (the reference is somewhat topical with Sauron being recently posted). However, your impeccable writing style and presentation made it a fairly smooth ride. I really don’t think many people in MYM can match your professionalism when it comes to the actual writing, and Hades as a character is a perfect conduit for your comedic (and hilarious) off-hand moments and also your flair for creative animations. I noted the words ‘flit’ and ‘clime’ to look up because I’ve never really seen them used before in MYM. The alliteration in forward smash is a Kupa trademark that was very funny, and there were many funny moments reading this set befitting of Hades. Calling the up smash a “hairy hitbox,” “fluttering out the window,” the Pennywise reference in the up special. I figured you were getting all the funnier quotes out of the way immediately with his idle animation, but it was paced well enough that you still had some great zingers even by the end of the set. I also have to shout out the amazing use of visuals and images. You have come leaps and bounds from the first sets in this regard, making Hades feel all the more definitive. All of the character stuff and faithfulness to Hades was top-notch and absolutely did not disappoint.

Another positive element I want to highlight is the creativity and animations. I can’t say I disagree with your choice not to include Pain and Panic this time. As a ‘soul swap’ set, or whatever we’re calling it now, it does take on a lot of the ideas that my Baku set utilized. I heard that in chat but didn’t realise it would be done with such a fun idea as the down special whirlpool of souls, which was an excellent choice. It’s a very cool visual to go with the soul-steal mechanic, and I commend you for working it into the set from the movie. The grab, needless to say, is perfect here. I would’ve been happy to see even more quotes and emphasis on the grab because of how iconic it is and feels pretty bold, which is a theme in this set I will get back to later. The fthrow animation is an awesome reference and really well done, especially like the “WTF” look he gives upon failing. The same goes for the forward aerial “back flip,” the down smash is sick, and I like the use of Corrin’s fsmash to quickly explain how it works. All of the taunt-like animations with his thumbs up in fsmash and little asides like in down special about the souls always got a kick out of me, and is very fun to imagine in the game. I also liked the side special Sun and giving a simpler conduit for chaos. I guess Rool was right about you making your sets like a constellation of planets, after all.

Now to get into the nitty-gritty. The way the set approaches Hades’ playstyle is pretty neat and different from what I had imagined. The way I see Hades, I think, is definitely as a schemer, but not necessarily a strategist or tactician. This set kinda straddles the line between a technical specialist and a very underhanded fighter. Firstly, I actually was a bit confused about at what point exactly the soul is hit out of a body. I checked over the text a few times and good chance I’m just overlooking a sentence or misreading the set, I get how it works, but I missed the exact threshold there. The neutral special, besides that, was very impressive and well explained, especially the sections on Temper Flare, Infernal Wrath, and Eternal Fury, which were perfectly summarized. I was definitely a little worried they would be confusing because this set is very mechanically thick. I will say, too, the use of an instant KO in the down special was a bold idea. It’s not really central to his playstyle either; it could’ve simply been an unblockable super powerful attack. I don’t really disapprove of this choice, but it felt worth noting. I think it’s worth just for the scissors of life sound reference alone, and there’s not much difference between a super powerful hit and an instant KO, practically speaking. The Sun side special is actually a very cool idea, and I think the specials are all great choices for their input. The side special gives a pretty simple stage control option, but Hades also has a couple of inputs where he can make traps and interact with the foe’s prone body when they’re a soul. Hades probably has to keep track of at least a little of the foe’s two percentages because of his various mechanics. I will say the up special feels like it goes on a bit too long about its playstyle purposes here. We can’t forget the rage mechanic from the neutral special, which actually seems like the real focus of the playstyle that comes up the most later as a buff or way to skip charge. And that’s definitely the right choice. There’s also a bit of a thing with him being a boss-type character vulnerable from behind or below. Okay, I think that’s everything. There’s a lot going on in this set, and while it is well done, I feel like it makes Hades into a very technical character. It feels like Hades would always be conscious of about four or five different things going on at once, purely from his own set.

I think the set actually is onto something and makes a bit of a mention at the end of forward smash that there is so much going on with percents and damage alone that it’s practically another form of trickery for Hades. The foe will find it hard to keep track of their damage ticking up, but Hades, as Lord of the Underworld, will be keeping a watchful eye on that number rise, like the ticking death counter seen in the neutral special. I think that would’ve been a good point to emphasise more and to focus more on how much chaos Hades can create and take advantage of, or at least make things slightly more intuitive. For example, I think the instant KO should be a bit more central than it is in the playstyle and probably needs a clearer HUD/sound acknowledgement for Hades and the foe. That and/or making the other thresholds for building up to the other “time bomb” aspects clearer, as they seem very critical to his playstyle more than his rage mechanic, but it seems a bit hidden away. Just more of a nod to that alone would help to clear things up a bit playstyle-wise.

Overall, this set was definitely good enough to be worth coming out of reading retirement. I had a lot of fun reading it and laughed out loud many times at the jokes, the references, and the character moments where you continue to be the master. It’s amazingly well-written and also well-balanced. It gets all the concepts in there I could hope to see and pretty much every major animation from the movie that could be worked into a moveset. I did have some issues with the execution or playstyle, but I’m not sure if that’s more to do with some minor things I would like to be more intuitive. Great work, Kupa, and I hope you continue to do such quality work, even if every character can’t appeal to me as hard as Hades.

 

[GolisoPower]

"Words Cannot Express How Much I Hate France Right Now!"
"Team Fortress 2" by Kholdstare

Welcome to Khold Moveset 2. After almost 2 years of absence, fortunately, it was worth the wait. Team Fortress 2 is a bold attempt to put the entirety of the team into a single slot, and if I'm being honest it's a pretty ballsy attempt with all the AI-controlled teammates and unique playstyles. I will say that I'm a little bummed that all of them only have 3 attacks across the same input. It almost feels like...oh. OH. So...in the middle of the set, it reveals a shocking truth: it's a set just for the Spy, and all those same incomplete novelist sections are just part of his transformations. Regardless, it keeps AI teammates and makes really fun use of the coordination mechanics while making a pretty mind-blowing adaptation of what made the Spy unique in the game. I don't really have much to say at the moment because it's Dodongo'd at the time of this writing, but I just wanna say there's a hefty bit to unpack here, from having a lot of his kit use his various weapons to all the James Bond references to what the Spy can do with all the weapons he has to help him with, it all comes together in unique twist on a class in TF2 surpassed in infamy only by the Pyro. I really hope you can get around to those edits soon because you have an amazing base with a surprising bit of meat for the state it's in. I applaud what you have so far and wish you the best, Khold!

 

[ForwardArrow]

Sauron
I'm just going to say up front, its been a long time since I've read a set and had this little idea of where I want to rank it. I think the reason why comes down to the One Ring mechanic in a lot of ways, which is a really interesting concept that I have no idea how to evaluate. The foe really gets 3 choices with it once they dislodge the ring from Sauron. They can just leave the ring alone and let Sauron get it back after a bit, they can pick it up and pocket it to keep it out of Sauron's reach but make themselves a bit more vulnerable to some of his tactics, or put the ring on for a huge power boost that's inevitably going to backfire when Sauron reclaims the ring for an insane power boost. I find it a bit hard to weigh how good these options are against each other because the ring buff is so insanely strong, but the backfire effect is just as absurd. It does feel like things are weighted in such a way there's a very correct answer to the question of 'do I put the ring on' but I have no idea if its yes or no. Its very hard to evaluate these sorts of mechanics where so much of the decision-making in how Sauron's kit will play out comes down to 'what's the sensible way to use the ring'. If nothing else, I think the set does one thing right here: the hypest option is to put on the ring, and in the casual side of Smash that inherently makes it an appealing mechanic if nothing else.

Given the set's very opponent driven premise, it does end up running into a problem when it comes time to write the actual moves. Sauron's actual kit feels kind of all over the place, throwing out stage control elements and big flashy attacks that don't really seem to be concerned with the roles of other ones in the big picture. To give some examples: Sauron's Side B has three variant monster forms he turns into to attack, and by the end of the set I came away thinking 'well that doesn't really feel like the rest of his set cares that much about it at all'. Which is a bit strange considering one of them is a Frame 7 wolf transformation that kills at 61%. There's a throw which deals damage to opponent's based on how much damage their Jab deals, bringing back one of the more baffling moves from Alternate Gabriel in a much higher production value set that has less reason to be this gimmicky. There's a throw which summons a mountain in a set that never struck me as 'man, this guy really wants the high ground' but I guess the opponent sure doesn't want to take it either given the Up Smash explodes it for a full on instant kill. One of the Specials has a random chance every 5 frames to flinch opponents which like, Kat made a good argument in favor of and the chance is probably low enough it won't be an issue most of the time, but I still feel like not knowing when the flinch is going to happen will make for some real feel bad moments engaging with Sauron in an unfun sort of way. Especially considering the aforementioned Frame 7 61% kill is not an outlier, there's a bunch more moves that are just like that.

Like the numbers here are really wild. I'm sort of conflicted because I'm usually out here endorsing laggy FSmashes that kill at 19% or close range DSmash sweetspots that kill at 41%, but the only pre-requisite for those is having the One Ring, something Sauron starts the match with. Like he's a superheavy with a downside, but he's not really dealing with superheavy lag numbers especially on a lot of these gratuitously powerful moves. But also, like, its not THAT hard to get the One Ring off him, and I wouldn't call his overall frame data good, so this is a hard point for me to feel confident sticking to. Is being a superheavy with a downside enough reason for numbers this ridiculous that he doesn't have to go out of his way to earn? I honestly don't know. I'm torn between whether I think this is cool or I think its stupid, which is kind of where I'm at with a lot of parts of this set.

Like... BThrow's animation was a bit weird to parse in my head, and then the actual throw felt to me like a weird minigame, but at the same time I can see why Kat likes it? I really did read Kat's comment here to try to understand why other people are so high on this set and honestly, I do think he makes some decent arguments in its favor. Sauron's Dark Lord smashes are very big moves that I feel would be undeniably fun to use, but its a question of if their numbers are a bit TOO big in some cases(though I think USmash is fine, FWIW) and the feeling that their strongest connection to the rest of the set is a mountain Sauron summons specifically on a throw. In general, I think what holds the set back for me is the set feels like its more like the whole thing is about Sauron's ten million isolated ways to kill you that don't care much about the big picture, and unfortunately, I'm very much a big picture guy. I can't deny a lot of the individual moves here feel cool and like a lot of fun was had designing them, but I feel like when moves are building on each other in MYM that's where the real magic happens, and Sauron's more concerned about a weird decision tree it gives to the opponent than the synergies in his own kit.

In the end, this comment's a pretty negative one, and I think that's because I came into Sauron expecting something very different from what I got. It felt disjointed and reliant on empty spectacle a lot of the time, but I do see the argument that a lot of these moves play off the ring gameplay in interesting ways, and that there's a very real appeal to making a mechanic the opponent gets to make so many decisions with. Oftentimes MYM sets are very focused on their own internal synergy without caring much about the opponent and often that'll be detrimental to how they actually play, and Sauron DOES create its own kind of fun in how it asks the foe a very interesting question in how they want to play with it. Between that and the depth to the designs of quite a few of the individual moves(and I've kinda skimmed over this, but I think Shadow Sauron's air game is a weirdly strong and coherent bit of melee in a set that's otherwise lacking that), I don't feel like I want to dismiss Sauron outright. So I'm left with a set I genuinely don't know what to think of. Gonna have to chew on this a lot while deciding on if and where I vote it, especially against what appears to be a gigantic tide of movesets. I just know I'm not nearly as much of a fan as I wanted to be, unfortunately.

 

[n88]

Frowning Friends by BrazilianGuy
These guys are pretty fun! More of a complex set than I was expecting relative to the tidy little size of it. The centerpiece projectile and the way it encourages the foe to jump (and the ways FF can play off that) is a pretty simple central idea that’s used to good effect here. They do feel like they have a lot of annoying attacks, but I think that’s the name of the game. I do worry a little bit about the range on Mr Man, half of FD feels pretty spicy even as a soft hit. One of those things that'd probably be easier to gauge with firmer damage numbers.

Speaking of which, the omission of damage percentages mostly doesn’t bother me (don’t tell the other MYM guys). There are places where ideas feel a little undeveloped and it hurts the set though. Like I’m not sure the set makes particularly good use of the Up Special, and the Smashes are funny but do feel like they could have been doing a bit more.

I really enjoy the sense of humor here; yours that is, not the source material’s. I’m sure the show’s funny too, but the writing here is very earnest and stream-of-consciousness while also having a lot of playfulness to it. I dig it a lot.

Bandit by Slavic
I feel like it’s been a long time since I read a set that invested this heavily in explaining things at the end. It works really well here! It did slightly confuse me at first because I forgot you did this so I was reading these really short move descriptions like “dang, that’s really all there is to say about this?”, not realizing that there was a whole saying-stuff-about-things section at the end.

I wonder how much the “a lot of the substance at the end” structure of it succeeds off the back of the kit being pretty simple? Attacks are largely simple and clean and memorable, in a way that makes it intuitive to remember The Attack That Did That Thing when it’s back-referenced in the playstyle section. Totally speculative though, and the set makes a presentation choice and succeeds with it in any case.

The writing here is a joy, which is very normal from you, but I don’t want to take it for granted so it’s worth calling out. The ways that the set chooses to channel Fire Emblem are weird and wild, but it does all end up feeling like a coherent take on a generic mook. I think wanting to smash the Elixir on a shield (and potentially healing the foe if they drop shield and just take it on the chin) and the way that shakes up his bad-on-shield melee game is maybe my favorite bit of demented setplay offered by the RNG options.

It doesn’t top Nonon for me, since it feels a bit less focused in what it’s doing and occasionally opens up doors it doesn’t walk through. Admittedly, maybe “focus” isn’t the name of the game on Mr RNG Items. But there’re these funky elements sprinkled throughout the set that do feel cool but I’m not 100% on, like the Warp (RNG on RNG, I am pulling this thing every time and it’s never sending anyone where I want them) or the FTilt crit stuff (which is cool but I’m not sure entirely leveraged).

Vania & Fatla by Katapultar
This set rules and I like everything it’s doing. Occasionally it feels a little tricky to follow - I had this problem a bit more early on. The first couple moves aren’t broken out separately despite being pretty different for each sister, and it feels like there’s a lot of context-switching. USpec/USmash/NAir/FThrow/UThrow talk about Vania being able to trigger Fatla’s delayed whirlpool. I thought Fatla is the one who has access to the delayed whirlpool, since they can activate each other’s SSpec effects? Vania should have Fatla’s scalding water thing, I think. Not sure if something got switched around here or I’m just not following. Maybe the “whirlpool” references just mean the scalding water thing, but I found it a little confusing.

I do wonder if the Vania food buffs are a little pushed. The full four-course meal is definitely time-consuming since she has to do it one shift, but even just squeezing the salad in and getting a start on the meat so that you can finish it quickly next time is pretty good and doesn’t take that much investment. The salad is a chunky heal (though the way it plays off the Link 0% Smash mechanic is undeniably sick). I dunno, maybe it’s fine and the shift limit is enough to keep it in check.

How high does the landing hitbox on Fatia’s aerial DSpec hit? The hitbox sounds small in the description but it talks about breaking shields so I assume it must be hitting a decent ways up to avoid poking under shields. Kind of a funky move. Does sound a little bit spooky but the late FAF and low damage probably make it impractical (absent a tag-out) until very late in a stock when it can kill. Definitely a thinker that had me looking at training mode to figure out stage width vs height.

In general I think a lot of the set ends up sounding scarier than it is just thanks to the “big pay-off if you pull this off at exactly the right time” factor of it all. There’s a thread of a lot of small attacks being able to turn scary fast if you land them right at the point of the shift change. Most of the nastiest stuff is around the Vania -> Fatla shift though, so it’s really limited to every 30 seconds and not even every 15. It’s a fun way to work a lot of different crazy tricks into the set in a way that doesn’t necessarily make them the set’s bread and butter. I’ve always liked the Zelda/Sheik archetype (though for both Zelda/Sheik and Pyra/Mythra I insist on only using the slow powerful one and never switching to the juiced fast character) and this set being built so strongly around the transition points is really conceptually cool. Everyone knows when they’re coming and it’s just a matter of time.

Fatla Jab being a frame 1 safe-on-block kill move (even a late one) is an eyebrow raiser. Not a big issue (not like any of my issues with this set are big issues). I’m not gonna sweat the numbers too much, but it stuck out.

The set mostly manages its complexity well. It’s a lot, but it for the most part is an accumulation of a swap character having a lot of attacks. I do think the dash attack carts (particularly the way they behave differently between Fatla and Vania) feel like they’re reaching for relevance in a way that doesn’t particularly make the set more interesting, just throws another thing into the mix. The Fatla BAir rocket also I didn’t 100% buy into. The “specifically when used at the peak of a jump” thing there and on Fatla UAir is a neat way of limiting the usage and preventing stalling though.

I think I’m not quite as high on this one as Tern is, but it’s a fun package with a strong central conceit and a lot of neat ideas about how to play off them. It feels more like a Kanade than a Tsukuyo to me (but I’m more into this one than I was Kanade).

The solo modes are a really fun inclusion at the end of the set! Neat way of giving the characters their due, and kinda reminds me of the various duo characters in Melty Blood.

 

[Arctic Tern]

Important notice: due to the influx of sets this Jamcon and afterwards, the voting period has been extended to the end of the contest, July 31st.

 

[GolisoPower]

Ironically Makes Frowns Upside-Down
Frowning Friends by BrazilianGuy

Well, I'll be, we got ourselves our first Smiling Friends set! And it's...not who I was expecting at all. Anyway, Frowning Friends is a good quick read that references the escapades of the only episode Grim & Gnarly are featured in, but it's enough to make a very cohesive set overall. Their NSpec is a projectile that grows in power and size the farther it travels, changing from a dinky little disruption tool for the neutral to a command-grab projectile that carries foes into very perilous situations. It's an interesting take on a projectile and rewards Grim & Gnarly for reading properly. Up Special is a no-damage rising hitbox that doesn't put Grim & Gnarly into freefall, making for some dangerous ladder combos that allows them to mix up after reaching their maximum vertical distance. Where it lacks in horizontal distance while traveling upwards it makes up for in mix-up potential and being a piece in a stronger airgame. Down Special's a radial hitbox/counter that inflicts what is effectively the bane of all mains of Dedede and Steve: halved jumping power. While it seems to last a really long time, afflicted players can relieve their rage and reduce the time for the debuff by taking it out on Grim & Gnarly, making it so Frowning Friends mains have to make careful movements to ensure they get their money's worth with their Smashes. But then there's the counter effect, sacrificing a damage reflector for half a second of hitstun, giving them more than an ample opportunity to push the counteroffensive. This is arguably the strongest move of the entire kit, as half a second of hitstun seems scary but relies on triggering the counter to pull off. Lastly but not least is Side Special, a summoning move that brings in two gun-toting minions: the SoundCloud rapper DJ Spit and the self-conscious Mr. Man. Both have their own strengths and weaknesses, but having either one out does wonders for the two, even if their whole job is to be as negative and nihilistic as possible. All those Specials come together in a weird mid-range playstyle designed to completely sap the opponent's ability to fight and fulfill their jobs of spreading frowns by silently telling them they're not winning the match.

The rest of the set plays up the deviously deliberate Debby Downer demeanor by showing various attacks that further reference their brief mission to counteract the Smiling Friends' more optimistic goals. I personally found Up Smash to be hilarious in flavor, I would probably take a lot of damage if Grim & Gnarly forced my character to watch something like "all five episodes of The Idol in 1 second" or "[Insert Clickbait Downfall Rant Video Here]". I also love some of the stranger attacks like using a laugh speech bubble as a Jab or tossing the dreaded pocket sand for F-tilt. The only thing I feel it failed to do is put a frown on my face, but I guess nobody's constantly successful. Regardless, good work, Guy!

The Doctor Is Well In
Dr. Facilier by dilliam

And here we have another hallmark of improvement on Dilliam's end...and for this set I think he might've made a contract with those friends on the other side. Dr. Facilier is a unique set that loves to play risks: he has a counter that results in...oddly enough a buff to his opponent. But it comes at the price of being Cursed, which aids in cleansing himself of Debt. No not national debt, a supernatural debt, as if he accrues too much Debt through the use of some of his moves he'll take devastating burst damage and be left open to combos. Now this does seem risky but as mentioned before Dr. Facilier can cleanse himself of debt by dealing damage. He's also a bit of a trickster, both in lore and his set, where he has a Neutral Special that's basically Zero's Sougenmu from Marvel vs. Capcom, a more ethereal copy that is used in tandem with Facilier himself for extra damage and ease of cleansing Debt. That's not even getting into his tarot card readings, which reward Facilier for using certain attacks in a certain order based on predictions in order to get buffs based on how many attacks are predicted. Even his Up Special allows him to take some good risks, with a teleport that risks breaking the Debt threshold in favor of locking onto a cursed target. Truly a kit that plays with fire at the risk of getting burned one way or another.

Much like Grimace before him, Facilier is easily digestible and a bit of a breeze to read, while still displaying considerable improvement in his writing. In line with his toying with powers likely beyond his reckoning, he has a few attacks with held variations that risk building up Debt, and upgradable Smash attacks which are upgraded from successfully landing all three of his attacks predicted with Down Special. I personally love his Up Smash, showing a nonchalant but playful side of the otherwise evil Facilier, and his Down throw, which has inverted versions of his Neutral Special's buffs based on the last one he's used. There's just something about these kinds of sets where some moves play into the mechanic that really tickles my fancy, you know? I'd say this is a close second behind Grimace...and I not only thank you for making it...but also your friends on the other side.

 

[Katapultar]

Spoiler: Tulin

Fascinating that we got a Tears of the Kingdom moveset so early. This is also an interestingly long moveset coming from you, as Akira’s big wordcount partly came from having a good chunk of extra attack inputs and variations.

• This might be the first moveset that flips the usual fast-falling formula to a “slow-fall”, but gives the fighter enhanced air speed to compensate. Cool stuff!
• Don’t need to tell you that the stance-switching mechanic reminds me of Nomad. The return of a bird pick from the Zelda series makes this set feel like a combination between Nomad and Medli + Makar. I like how each of the two stances, in addition to providing different levels of speed and power, affect Tulin’s jumps differently. It all makes for a solid melee base, and that’s before even getting into the Specials.
• I”m not sure if you know this, but there is actually a move in Smash that has head-shot properties - Marth’s Shield Breaker! I wonder if it would be worth bringing that move up in Tulin’s Neutral Special?
• Tulin’s Neutral Special having different properties when landing a “legshot” is fun too. It gives Tulin a very strong emphasis on having good accuracy, more so than your average projectile-orientated character.
• Happy to see this set (fittingly) play on the item-based properties of Link’s Arrows, and play around with them further on a bow-based fighter.
• I could see Neutral Special being notably affected by stale move-negation.

• Side Special is a very cool move for various reasons - wind hitboxes, keeping your opponent closer to you for combo extensions and the suction effect with items, including your own arrows. I do think the full-on item projectile immunity -and- the passive hitbox they give you when one is swirling around Tulin makes for an overly-strong combination, though the cooldown on Side Special and being denied your windstream while you have the cyclone up does alleviate this issue. Surprised at how far this set goes with its item-manipulation of simple arrows so far.
• Down Special’s duplicate naturally adds to the line-up of cool things Tulin’s Specials have going for him, but the set’s writing here (particularly “Throughout the moveset, I encourage you to come up with your own potential shenanigans for your avatar buddy to help you in.”) gave me the sense that the set -might- not fully sell the uses of the duplicate. Probably doesn’t need to, though. Down Special doesn’t mention how much time the duplicate loses if it gets attacked, but that’s easy to write in.

• F-tilt has some nice projectile variety to differentiate it from the Neutral Special.
• Up Tilt is a classic bow attack, one that is welcome on this set. Wasn’t expecting to see a smokescreen on this input, especially coming from a setmaker who likes to play it close to the Smash formula. The pro + con interactions the dust cloud has with Side Special is pretty neat, though.
• F-Smash is a very MYM’ian input, like a lot of Cramorant’s inputs. U-Smash’s little star burst when the fully-charged projectile lands, as well as an extra item to have, is nice.
• Oh man, Tulin’s D-air of some older MYM’ian Aerials that were just dodges or movement options and had no hitboxes. Not that I dislike that this move doesn’t produce a conventional hitbox - it’s well-justified with Tulin’s mechanics, and makes it ironically difficult for him to deal with opponents below him, instead needing to use his air mechanics to weave around opponents so he can land.

• N-air is well-justified in Tulin’s gameplan. Bonus points for making callbacks to his duplicate and cyclone’s combo-extending suction effect.
• You could mention that pummel can be used to refresh stale moves.
• B-throw is a nice move that plays off of Neutral Special’s leg-shooting qualities and Tulin’s upwards-hitting arrow attacks.

A few criticisms. Item-wise, I think the set could have gotten more out of z-drop shenanigans, especially when Tulin is pretty prominent in the air. I would have particularly liked to see the Down Smash item get expanded upon use-wise, especially when it deals knockback and that could lead into some cool combos with Tulin’s duplicate and Side Special tricks. Very minor, but your avatar duplicate isn’t brought up in the grab game and how they respond to it.

I like it when sets invent prone-based minigames like the one on D-throw, which has the fun of setting down a bunch of arrows for Tulin. It does feel a bit overly-gimmicky, and Tulin being left a notable distance above his opponent is not a position he benefits much from when he doesn’t have a proper D-air or any aerial projectiles that hit directly below him. Part of me would almost prefer if Tulin just left his opponent prone normally or had the option to kick them forward and leave them in prone - he has enough projectile options that going into detail about the various ways he could catch enemy get-ups would make for quite a fun move. Grab game felt more focused on status effects than melee applications, as much as I enjoyed the throws.

Finally, Forward Air was the one input that felt notably weak and could have been much better - I could absolutely see Tulin get great mileage out of a slow aerial like this one, but just getting high hitstun out of the wing flap doesn’t feel all that synergistic with Tulin’s ranged game. For how prominent Tulin’s bow and stance-based moves are, it might be better to just give him a slow bow attack that’s aimed diagonally downwards - the ability to harass grounded opponents from the air would greatly benefit Tulin when you consider his slow falling speed.

All things said, I enjoyed Tulin quite a bit and put him above Akira to be your best so far. These two sets are definitely a notable improvement over last contest!

Spoiler: Ken Midori

• It’s wild that someone actually posted a moveset for a Beyblade character.
• I like the idea behind a Luma-type that is super short and doesn’t follow the primary fighter into the air, allowing them to attack from both the air and the ground. Also like that it can be thrown around as an item.
• Jab has some neat characterization. Dash Attack’s tripping animation characterizes Ken as a klutz, but this kind of “accidental” attack feels on-par for a character who is clearly not accustomed to fist-fighting.
• Much as I’m cool with all the Standard attacks being quick combo moves, they admittedly feel redundant and don’t have much to work off of. Can the Beyblade play off of these moves in any way?
• B-air’s power feels like it would be far more justified on a Beyblade attack, as funny as it is to have an accidental elbow attack be on par with the Knee of Justice.
• The Neutral Special Beyblade attack being compared to R.O.B’s Gyro is very, very fitting.
• Up Special doesn’t mention how it helps Ken to recover, if at all.

This set admittedly runs into issues I had with Annihilape - leaving the Specials for last (which feel more important here, given the Beyblade mechanic and the fact that the Neutral Special is used to bring it out), as well as Dash Attack having a confusing and contradictory description. It says that the move trips opponents, deals average knockback and spikes airborne opponents (I assume the latter two are on the same hitbox). The move could absolutely do all of those things, but you would need to be a bit more specific - maybe Dash Attack deals knockback if it hits early, and trips opponents if it hits late?

Ken has a promising concept with his Beyblade, but its Luma-style applications never got touched upon. This leaves the set with a lot of missed potential in my opinion, and a lot confusion:

• The gimmick says the Beyblade follows Ken and spins around him, but he has to unleash it with a R.O.B-style Down Special that sends it out as a projectile. Does the Beyblade start following him around when he reaches it? Or does the separated Beyblade move along the ground when Ken does?
• The Smashes, Up Throw, Down Throw, Side Special, Up Special and Down Special all utilize Kerberus, who I assume is connected directly to the Beyblade. These moves sound like Kerberus magically appears by Ken’s side regardless of where the Beyblade is, but wouldn’t it make more sense for Kerberus to appear where the Beyblade currently is? The idea of your Smashes only spawning from a grounded construct would have been very cool, and it would have given Ken’s own moves a lot more use as he could knock foes towards his Beyblade. The idea of Down Special being a counter that only protects the Beyblade - a great defense against foes trying to get rid of it - but doesn’t protect Ken would have been great too. Side Special would also have a lot more use as a power move that Ken could perform in the air and have his Beyblade use from the ground, maybe comboing into it from his N-air.

All and all, it feels like a case of this set not addressing the elephant in the room with its concepts. There’s a fair bit of criticism here on my end, but I’m all for anime characters and do think this set has a good deal of potential. It also sounds like you’re a big fan of this character in general - it might be worth patching up this set if you’re up to it.

Spoiler: Black Alice

Perhaps the most wild moveset we’ve gotten this contest, the very concept of playing around with stock regeneration would have been crazy even in old MYM. Saving your opponent’s progress for resets when they’re killed by an insta-kill reminds me of some of the insane time-manipulation sets we got in old MYM too, like N. Tropy, Tefrei and Young Xehanort among others. The Time Crunch, Existential Paradox and Parallel Division mechanics were admittedly hard to wrap my head around, notably more so than even the biggest and longest movesets that modern MYM has to offer. It might just be from having so much weird information thrown to the reader at once, but it’s not a genuine issue down the line. Nonetheless, this set manages to sell the chaotic visuals and Black Alice’s unsettling personality through its pre-attack animation descriptions, and the mechanics are fittingly over-the-top for such an absurd character.

• Down Special does a good job of selling the drawbacks to stock-resetting and the work + memorization that Black Alice has to put in to make the most of it.
• Held Down Special is one of the most over-the-top attacks I’ve ever read on an atmospheric level, and I love it.
• Neutral Special is a cool take on Shadow Flare: very, very potent with Black Alice’s tools if she can sic the objects on an opponent, but otherwise she has to contend with taking those delayed hits herself or losing valuable time by constantly resetting their timer progress, though the former does give her meter.
• Wasn’t expecting to see a brief time stop thrown into held Neutral Special.
• It took me a while to realize that the Goddess of Chaos orbs dealing more shield damage is locked behind Time Crunch mechanics and needing to hold the input to do so. I think. I admittedly gloss over some of the numerical-based details at the start of each given move, and put more stock into the attack descriptions.
• Comet freezing and redirection (w. lag-canceling) is certainly crazy and justified by being locked by meter gain, as well as the latter being laggy.
• Ah, the joys of having your own moveset and then being downgraded to a minion/assist character for your master.
• Up Special has some fun stuff going for it, like the surprise insta-kill at higher percents and turning teddy bear into an item. There should probably be some balance measure that prevents Black Alice from casually throwing her bear down into the blast zone to kill her opponent - maybe the bear travels a bit slowly when it’s thrown (downwards?), or foes get popped up a decent distance if they escape while the bear is airborne.
• Heh, surprised at there being no Goddess of Chaos Up Special when there was one for all the other Specials. Not that that’s a bad thing at all.
• Special Cancel has a wild-looking animation.

• I suspect that the name of Black Alice’s Jab is taken directly from the Shin Megami Tensei Alice’s signature move.
• Forward Air’s insta-kill time bomb is very mean indeed.
• U-air’s insta-kill is pretty well-deserved - I could see it being easy to land if you managed to pop your delayed NSpec items on an opponent to juggle them and easily land the hitbox.
• D-air is a cool move and makes good use of the ability to cancel moves via meteor redirection. It might be a tad strong for edgeguarding, but still.
• The image on Forward Smash reminds me of a character portrait from the Disgaea series. The move itself is more simple than what I’d expect from Black Alice’s over-the-top Specials, but it feeds nicely enough into Jab mix-ups when that move has the scary insta-kill effect.
• D-Smash is a cool committal move for its movement-based properties that get better if foes let you charge it, allowing it to be used for offense or defense. Makes it my favourite attack among the Smashes.
• Perhaps Luka should reconsider entering MYM if he’s going to be bullied by Black Alice’s Pummel harder than other fighters, heh. Imagine if Dio Brando had a blood-draining pummel that healed him more if he used it against a Joestar.
• F-throw works well with Black Alice’s threatening capabilities and comet-canceling.
• D-throw sure is fun with its Elder Princess Shroob style “copy the properties of the last move you landed”, which Black Alice gets good mileage from with her endless number of powerful moves (and the fact that only her U-throw is a notably powerful straightforward throw). It’s the type of weird move that would certainly be justified on a Special, and that one could go into a ton of detail on by stating its uses from every attack. I also like its obscene reward for it being the first move that Black Alice lands in a stock.

While the stock/time-line-resetting and insane GoC Down Special among other things might put off others, they weren’t a big put-off for me as I found myself enjoying Black Alice a good deal. Removing time from the match’s timer felt kind of unnecessary and wasn’t touched upon compared to the focus it had in Adramalech, but it didn’t affect the set negatively for me either. It was also interesting that Black Alice only had 3 insta-kill moves in her set when they were advertised as being so prominent, but I think it’s a good balance and all on the right inputs - one for a grounded option that loses to shields, one on a throw and another for an overhead aerial input that hits opponents where the other two cannot.

Either way, Black Alice is handily your best set and with Kasen + Kage not too far behind - it’s fantastic that you’re fond of your work and used experiences from MYM to develop her, but I could easily see you surpassing her when you managed to put Kagetsumugi together for a Jamcon. Great work on this set, Han - hope that she gets the additional praise that she deserves.

 

[BrazilianGuy]

Spoiler: Citizen V

Going in I knew nothing about this dude which was kind of neat, I like learning about characters I never heard of before, tho he lacks a bit of explanation (at the start). I really loved the concept for his Up Special, gliding was one of my favorite things in Brawl, Steve never really captured the feel of it in my opinion, but you bring a concept that more closely resembles Brawl while still being balanced, nice. The other Special that really caught my eye was Down Special, the way you incorporated Taunt cancels honestly reminded me of Dan in Street Fighter 5 who can do a similar thing but the results are very different. I like how much reward he gets from Down Special, feels right for a super character to get a super buff, and how much he is incentivized to go in by gaining buffs to shield damage, his sword, and that free Final Smash, and losing his time if he shields too much. And the Final Smash actually depending on how many times you land it would normally be something that would be a little detail, but with him having access to it (more than the rest of the cast at least) makes it work out in the end. Speaking of the end, getting to read more about him and how he relates to the False theme was really cool and made stuff kind of click a little more to me. The rest of the attacks all had a really good level of quality throughout. Citizen V gets an IV out of V stars from me.

Spoiler: Tinker Knight

I really liked reading this scrunklo, I have a very basic knowledge on Shovel Knight, but just the concept of a little guy who tosses his tools around in a panic before entering a gigantic mech really appeals to me. I also love how you implemented 3 mechs but none of them really feels too op, yeah the giant mech is the one with the most differences but it doesn't feel like you're forced to only use it. I personally really enjoyed the red mech I feel like it would be the one I gravitate more toward. The attacks and their descriptions are also quite nice, tho I do feel like there could have been more descriptions on how the mechs without him help in combat, the way you explain it is good, but maybe talk about what kinds of combos Tinker Knight can get to if he manages to get 2 mechs out or that kind of stuff. Also would alts give him different color mechs to not cause confusion in matches with more than one Tinker? But the extra stuff that is there feels quite nice, especially the interactions with Shovel Knight, I think that's the sort of stuff Smash Bros lacks but could really use. All in all I found Tinker to be a very charming character and a nice read, a 3.5 out of 5

Spoiler: Sherlock Holmes

I actually really love Sherlock, back in elementary school I would read his books all the time, watch the Robert Downey Jr. movie, and just be an overall fan of deduction and mysteries. Seeing a moveset for Holmes made me intrigued, I can't lie tho, seeing it was his self from Fate made me go "oh". But going with an open mind, I actually loved Sherlock. His specials alone work so well with the essence of the character, from cleverly faking his death, utilizing and upgrading his lasers in smart ways to literally deducting what move the foe will use so he can get an explosion off, it feels so right for a Sherlock moveset. I ain't familiar if this is how Fate treats all of it's characters, but even tho the magnifying glasses sound silly at first, they just work really well and add to him an extremely unique way to fight with Side Special. And every other move keeps the same high standard that the specials had. One I weirdly really liked was Jab, giving him two depending on how far he is from the foe feels really intelligent like he knows how to reach you and when he should attempt to. His smashes are also top tier, and genuinely so it's the entire moveset, not to mention how many references to Sherlock are in there for Move Names and little parts of the text talking about his vast history. I guess it's weird that Watson isn't here but that might be a Fate thing,, idk. But yeah Sherlock went above and beyond my expectations, he gets a 4.5 out of 5.

 

[GolisoPower]

Looks Like Team Rocket's Shooting For The Stars
Team Rocket by Slavic

Ohhhh mother of god, I have been gut punched with nostalgia as I was reading through this set, and it hits different now that the decades-long Ash Saga has finally come to an end in the Pokemon anime.

While Jessie & James (Or Musashi & Kojiro if you grew up in Japan) only affect some of the moves in the set, with the rest being only Meowth moves, the changes between the two are just significant enough to warrant the swapping mechanics. First we have their Neutral Special, with Jessie's being a directly-commanded hitgrab projectile that keeps the foe locked in place in Arbok's grasp and James being a Piranha Plant-style poison cloud with the added benefit of creating an explosion upon the use of a fire move on it, which fortunately this set has to exploit that little trait. Those put together make for a great way for the two to command the immediate midrange and ensure no approaches will go unpunished. Their Side Special has Jessie use Wobbuffet in a more defensive maneuver that counters a foe's physical attack with a ridiculously strong damage reflector whereas James uses his resident vore practitioner Victreebel to devour his opponent (or James himself if he's unfortunate enough to whiff) and rack up damage quickly. I'd say this is another point of contrast between the two Team Rocketeers, personally, and I do love a bit of variety. This is where the diverse Specials end: Down Special, shared between the two, makes for a game of Guess Who as they possess a singular hit of super armor taken from their more recent recruit Mimikyu's ability while also obscuring who's swapping with who. I do love this level of deceit that can be had with this Special as you could be charging in and expecting to evade being Victreebel's lunch only to be caught in the clutches of Arbok. As expected of the most tenacious villains since Bowser. Lastly, it wouldn't be Team Rocket without their signature hot air balloon, which serves as their Up Special, being a combination of the Animal Crossing characters and Diddy Kong's Rocketbarrel. The deflating balloon makes up for its unpredictable flight path with heavy damage and knockback.

The attacks all have a bit of faithfulness to the source material between both source material and character. The Smash attacks are the only attacks that are affected by switching between the two and are also quite distinct in application, to boot. Meowth is solely the star of the show for most of the normals, and even the ones involving Jessie & James both become leverage for his attacks. I personally like the amount of teamwork between the two, and a shining example of a villain's power of friendship. I personally like how F-throw is aimable once initiated, especially when it's not much of a cargo throw like Donkey Kong's. D-throw is also a pretty funny yet surprisingly useful move that helps Team Rocket recover a good chunk of damage with a good victory feast. Everything about this set is just absolutely beautiful and skirts dangerously close to toppling King Radical as my pick for this JamCon. Slavic, this is the happiest I've ever been reading a JamCon set in a long time...likely until I get around to reading Holmes. But regardless, you did really good here.

A Cruel Toadstool
Toedscruel by PeridotGX

So I did notice that you tried to make a set for Regigigas last contest which ended up Dodongo'd, so seeing a complete moveset from you is a pleasure. I can tell up front that you really love making the Specials in particular and I can respect that line of thinking, you have a good start with what you have right now. I don't have much to say that others haven't exactly said, but I'd say you're in the right direction here. If I could give you advice, I'd say give a quick peek at how normals are done in other sets just so you have a better idea of what you want out of your normals. Like, Ganondorf's Side Smash is generally good for killing in general, but Pac-Man's is more about defense with its innate projectile-destroying properties, for example. How do you want them to stand out from the rest, how do they matter in the moment-to-moment part of the game, all that stuff? Again, REALLY love what you've sown here so far and am looking forward to seeing how you grow, you know?

 

[AwfulBeast]

Hey Babe, time for a new moveset from Mr. AwfulBeast himself, this time being the final one being posted to MYM26.

The Actual Azura Moveset

 

[Katapultar]

Popping in last two movesets before the inevitable end-of-contest rush.

 

[bubbyboytoo]

Reports a' my death were BULLCRAP!

(image source)​

 

[GolisoPower]

Was This Set Good? Elementary, My Dear.
Sherlock Holmes by FrozenRoy & WeirdChillFever

You two...have no idea how happy I was learning that my first SSR in Fate/Grand Order got a set. I had some ideas about him myself but never really got anywhere so seeing him come to life was a treat and a half. It's an interesting blend of his FGO and OG literary versions. While he has a lot of FGO mechanics and attack animations from his Ruler form, he also seems to have some completely original moves that play into the source of inspiration. He basically has 3 pairs of Magnifying Glasses that he can augment with Neutral Special to have either greater damage (Buster), quicker frame data (Quick), or stronger shield damage (Arts). This is basically Monado Arts on crack for the simple reason that he can apply any combination of the three across all three pairs and really feels like people can either go all-in or min-max to adapt to a certain character they're fighting. Side Special is an effective buff where he uses one of his Magnifying Glasses to basically generate a Bayonetta Bullet Art hitbox that continues even while Holmes is moving, adding to some insane shield pressure and dominance in both mid-range and close-range engagements. The Up Special actually faking his death is an absolutely amazing shoutout to his supposed climactic final battle with James Moriarty and is an absolutely fun Up Special that makes me think of TF2's Up Special move. (If y'all know, y'all know) And the fact that the fake corpse can still carry over the Side Special laser while it's active is extra devious. You just do not fight Holmes at mid-range, no sir. And lastly is Down Special, a unique trip mine that detonates if a certain input is used in that area. While it takes a while to cast and can be hard to track because it disappears, it lasts an extremely long time and amps up psychological pressure on the foe once it's out and about. All those together make Holmes a very technical fighter who very much hinges on the player's creativity.

I do love that the set acknowledges that this is an FGO Holmes set, as evidenced by some of the moves and an actual application of some of his attack animations, and that some of his attacks can affect is Side Special, but I do feel like having Down Smash disabled while the laser is active may be kinda overkill? I mean, Grab has a decent workaround in which you can deactivate Side Special manually so there's some good to be had. Maybe change it so Down Smash gets a slight range extension or something? Just a suggestion. But anyways, I do feel like this is an amazing attempt at making Sherlock Holmes, and again, I am SO happy my boi managed to get a set here. Froy, WCF, amazing work!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now then...lemme think about who to pick...

Spoiler: Who Do I Pick...?

...
...
...
...you know what?

Spoiler: I've Made My Decision.

My vote goes to Sherlock Holmes. It was dangerously close, not gonna lie.

 

[n88]

Ah, that last-minute rush.
Don'tcha just love the anticipation?​

 

[Arctic Tern]

AZURA (AwfulBeast)

Azura immediately makes a splash with her central mechanic, Locket’s Tide, which buffs her movement stats if she deals enough damage. Unlike other, similar damage-based buffs, this only works if she actually hits the foe, with it decreasing if she herself takes damage, thus leading to an ebb and flow in terms of gameplay where her advantage and disadvantage both come quickly. In addition to this, Azura can also expend the meter for Locket’s Tide on her NSpec, which normally creates a bubble, in order to pop it and use the hitbox to extend her combos. The stat amps from her mechanic get a good amount of interplay, like using the lowered traction for a DACUS and using the higher fall speed to make the combos out of FAir more consistent. Lastly, it also buffs a lot of Azura’s moves in interesting ways, such as allowing her to hold out her obligatory Fire Emblem counter and adding a dragging windbox to her comboing NAir.

That’s not to say there’s not much to the set beyond Locket’s Tide, far from it. Azura’s SSpec is a neat and appropriate spin on Corrin’s SSpec, with follow ups allowing her to use her bubbles as projectiles and start aerial combos off of a pin. Her FSmash has a legitimately neat effect where the tipper doesn’t kill, but instead just leads straight to her powerful grab - and that itself has a neat gimmick where with her mechanic in play she can better position herself for a specific throw with her pummel. Azura’s normals are more basic, but there’s still plenty to like about them, the standout move being FTilt and the sweetspot that deals inwards shield push to better set up for a grab. While she does have a strong combo game, it feels a lot trickier to accomplish compared to other characters, which is acknowledged in the set and something I appreciate. Azura’s concepts aren’t as exciting as Astor, but they are overall put to better use and better balanced then Lana’s, putting her as the middle of the three in terms of quality.

CHRISTMAS ROSE (Kat)

Christmas Rose is, as the set itself describes, “Bad Against Shields: The Character” - whenever he hits a shield, he experiences extra endlag as well as dealing less shield damage than normal. This naturally makes him fairly underpowered, and is my primary criticism of the set; the way it works means he just can’t play the same neutral game as every other character can, and would make him fairly frustrating to play at higher levels. On the other hand, being underpowered is fitting for a comic relief character like Christmas Rose, and his kit actually has some interesting means of getting around this. Most notably is his NSpec, which makes all of his thrusting attacks ignore shields entirely if fully charged and gives him a move that can kill at 80% from centerstage if every hit connects. Christmas Rose can also summon his adventuring party to serve as meat shields via SSpec and passive projectile pressure with DSpec, with one of them having a piercing projectile of his own, so he does have a neutral game.

With such an overriding mechanic, the rest of Christmas Rose’s set naturally revolves around the intricacies it provides. His setup encourages jump in approaches, where he has a long lasting NAir to cover, since foes can’t shield in midair, and his DTilt is mainly meant for making pressure situations through its low upwards knockback. Christmas Rose also has several ways to punish shielding too often, such as shieldpokes, a laggy FSmash that comes out as soon as the charge is released, and good fall speed for tomahawk grabs. Finally, the throws themselves are fittingly the most powerful part of the set, where he can remove the opponent’s shield regeneration, gets a variety of kill confirms, and can potentially give his next sword move a massive damage/knockback buff. All of it adds up to make Christmas Rose a fighter who is certainly underpowered, but can actually win if you put in the effort, a fun way of making a joke character. The only real complaint I have that doesn’t have to do with the central mechanic is that there’s little to no focus on how such a strong grab game can affect his foe’s habits, since the grab naturally goes through shields, but aside from that it’s a nice, smaller set that makes the most of its very weird central concept.

WITCHCRAFTER SCHMIETTA (Kat)

Schmietta, being a blacksmith, is a weapons-based fighter, using her NSpec to create 4 different types of weapons. She can have up to 5 of them at any time, and they can all be stored for later, but using any of them requires resources and they can only be used a few times before they break. The weapons she makes are very diverse, and can be buffed with Schmietta’s DSpec, which applies various buffs depending on the specific weapon she wields. The actual attacks of the weapons work off a tap/hold variant, and a lot of them are really neat, from a spammable dagger slash that works as combo glue, a spinning sword slash with varying hitboxes depending on when in the duration it hits, and an ax that reduces the gravity of foes hit by it. Last but not least is the SSpec, which has Schmietta throw her weapon to puppeteer it or blow up to use as a projectile - including her standard weapon of her massive tongs, which is stronger overall at the expense of costing her most of her kit if it is destroyed, though she can get it back.

Already a group of very exciting concepts, but the other moves get a lot of mileage out of them. Several of Schmietta’s tong attacks have a command grab hitbox at the tip of their range, a neat application of the unconventional weapon that gets used in different ways in every move that has it. Her FSmash is an absurdly powerful move with no endlag that creates a fire pillar she can use her projectiles behind, at the expense of her tongs. More than one of Schmietta’s attacks changes completely depending on the weapon she has equipped, and every version of both the moves with this property has different use cases. Lastly, her grab allows her to have any of her weapon moves act as if it was enchanted with DSpec and make her tongs follow the opponent if it is puppeteered away from her. All of the power and versatility Schmietta has is balanced out by her slow frame data, needing to use her weapons to truly compete in close range with most every other character.

The primary complaint I have is that it doesn’t use the great concepts at play here to their fullest potential. Puppeteering a weapon is nice, but Schmietta is capable of using another weapon to defend herself during this - while particular strategies are noted, there are way more tactics just by virtue of the many different weapon combinations. The ax has effects where the foe briefly becomes unable to fall and takes more knockback, but moves that benefit from them aren’t explicitly stated. Lastly, DSmash can potentially summon two weapons to use their held attacks at the same time, but particularly neat combinations aren’t even mentioned. Still, in a set this filled with cool ideas, it’s inevitable that some would be lost in the pile, and what is there is still a very, very good set.

THE SCOUT (Bubby)

About freakin’ time.

The Scout is, as you’d expect, a super fast hit n’ run kinda guy, with the speed and mobility to make it work. He has all of his most iconic weapons, such as the Sandman and Bonk!, which are put to pretty fun use here; the Sandman applies a mobility debuff at the lower ends of its range that works well with his gameplan and the Bonk! actually allows him to attack during it, at the cost of a mobility debuff and cooldown once it wears off. Scout also has his two guns mapped to his SSpec, an unusual input but one that allows him to use it for run and gunning as in TF2. Lastly, the Force a’ Nature gives him a unique mobility option that also serves as a spacer to set up for the stun effect of the later edges of the Sandman projectile, though the 10 Units of set knockback at the grounded version is a bit nuts - that’s really, really far, more than many characters can reasonably recover from. Other than that, though, they’re all solid Specials that suit Scout’s character quite well.

The rest of the inputs are fairly basic, but serve their purposes well enough. Scout’s got plenty of combo moves and a few hard read tools that work well with his Bonk! Invulnerability like his obligatory Home Run FSmash. There are some standout moves, however, such as the Dash Attack, which can be extended to let him get out of dodge and has some niche combos if canceled at ledge, and NAir, which has a sourspot that if timed just right lets him combo into most any of his kit. Aside from relatively lackluster throws, Scout’s main issue is not exploring the depth of his options; UAir logically serves as a landing threat but this is not mentioned, and there’s no mention of how his extra jump can be used to juke out movements (especially notable as his double jump is the core thing that makes him so tricky to hit in TF2). But overall, this set is a very accurate look on how his playstyle would adapt to Smash, and a nice calm before the storm of last day sets.

Comment block link here!

 

[Arctic Tern]

It's the last day of the contest. To commemorate the occasion, I have one last set for you.

"There is only one thing you need to do here. You will slam down the gavel and say the word 'guilty'. That is your role!"

 

[WeirdChillFever]

“Past, present, future…

This moveset is a ship, sailing downstream through time’s river. To find all the secrets of the Desert Colossus and enter the Spirit Temple in full, you must wait for time’s flow to pass. For now, enter with the pure heart of a child at this day of closing, and the port of the ship will reveal itself next opening.”

 

[Slavic]

​

Two Pokemon marched with despair through a dark woods, nervously keeping watch over the burning eye that had materialized over the forest where they dwelled. It appeared a few weeks before, and since then the forest had felt... wrong. The sun didn't shine the same, the woodland creatures were acting bizarre, and strange beings came running to and fro through their home. They couldn't comprehend the overwhelming evil that loomed beyond the eye, nor would they anticipate what the entity had in mind for the land. But they could sense the malice emanating, making even these carefree Grass-types uneasy.

On this particular walk, the two Pokemon had to shield their eyes as a blinding light filled the woods. Oddish had pressed its face against the forest floor, leaves folded over its head, while Vileplume's flower tipped heavily over her eyes. Eventually, the two adjusted to the light, and to their surprise it had not come from the eye in the sky. In fact, the burning shape seemed to squint and shy away from this light. If not from this creature, then...

The Pokemon's simple thoughts were interrupted by a commanding voice, echoing off every tree in the region and reaching beyond to the tower that housed the eye.

I, SATSUKI KIRYUIN, AM RISING UP TO OVERTHROW THE EVILS OF SAURON!

Enjoy another Slavic / FrozenRoy joint set!​

 

[dilliam]

All that has been acquired will be inherited to the next life.
Your soul will continue this traveling eternally.
Into the infinite and eternal future.

The following moveset is FINISHED!!!!!!! YEAHHHHHH​

 

[majora_787]

I made a similarly cheesy post in my Omega moveset, which was my 50th moveset. I guess I'll paraphrase part of it again, because why not. I'm like a week out from 15 years since I first wrote Twilight Princess Skull Kid and posted it to Make Your Move 3. I didn't expect to still be doing this after MYM13. Even after I talked myself up to writing Goobbue, I sure didn't expect to write 10 more movesets after that. But it's been a lot of fun. I might go as far as to say, for the first time in a while, I look forward to doing it again.

All that aside, here's a moveset.

A sapphire star--a pyre for the fallen, and a beacon forging a path beyond the night sky...​

 

[UserShadow7989]

"Just a moment, I'm preparing some tea to celebrate the contest's end. There are more guests than I expected, so please wait patiently."

"If you cause any problems, I won't hesitate to show you the door."

 

[n88]

​

In a stunning reverse Froy rescue joint, Oddish now:

• Is finished.
  • And less than 30k!
• Has a co-author.
  • It's me!
• Lives on Google Docs.
  • It's here!
• Is still living its most horrible shriek-filled life.

 

[ComicWaterz]

THE FUTURE KING OF THE PIRATES ARRIVES TO MYM 26

Luffy Moveset​

 

[ForwardArrow]

One last set for the road.​

 

[FrozenRoy]

And with that, the submission period of Make Your Move 26 has drawn to a close! We ended up with a total of 125 sets, a crazy number considering this contest went on for a scant four and a half months! That's a lotta sets to read, so let's get down to copper tacks here.

Reading Period will end on 11:59 PM PST, October 1st​

That's two months of reading, and I can tell you right now that the expectation is for voting period to last roughly two weeks (so around October 15th or so). If everything goes well, this would allow us to start the next contest on October 31st for a true Make Your Move Halloween!

Of course, that's only if things go well, and with such a stuffed full contest it would be understandable if we ended up needing more time. But consider that a potential incentive for y'all to keep on top of reading (and, frankly, for me too)! Go on out there and get on reading! As usual, I'll be handing out reading lists to anybody who wants them, so don't hesitate to ask me! As usual, edits are allowed during this period, so don't worry about it. Best of luck everyone!

 

[Katapultar]

Spoiler: The Scout

The longer Bubby project of this contest, Scout has quite the timing in popping out alongside KholdStare’s big TF2 project, so we effectively got 2 Scout movesets this contest. Side Special is probably my favourite move here: the item-lover in me is fond of Side Special’s Daybreak-esque control scheme. Wasn’t expecting to see the iconic Scattergun implemented this way, but I like the reasoning where putting the guns on the Side Special lets Scout maintain his speed momentum to remain faithful to TF2’s gameplay and just feel good gameplay-wise. Up Special and Up Air likewise have their movement based on Scout’s momentum.

Neutral Special works paradoxically well for Scout’s gameplan when he can easily flee to make space for it - the move would work very well when B-reversed. I also like that Scout can’t shield while he’s juiced up - it gives foes a near-consistent defense against his invincibility in their shield. Post-invincibility debuffs also mean that Scout has to be wise in how he juices, to say nothing of the long cooldown. Scout’s quick melee powerset naturally isn’t conducive to exploiting the juice’s full invincibility compared to other characters (imagine if someone like O. Dio or Black Alice had Scout’s Down Special!), but I’m glad to see the front-loaded F-Smash getting some mileage out of it. Finally, I enjoyed some of the trivia and little design touches on this set - the icons, brief design notes and even baseball trivia, which all gave the set some extra quality-of-life.

Though he was built up to be your final entry this contest, I wouldn’t say that Scout was a Sana or an Asbestos. It’s mostly that Scout felt fairly basic and that none of his moves really stuck out to me past his Specials, which made it a bit hard for me to vibe to him compared to other solid entries this contest. To be fair, Scout doesn’t have the raw potential or creative liberties of a fighter like Sana or other VTubers, and kind of has to be implemented in a few specific ways to remain faithful to his series.

I also agree with Tern in that Scout’s melee game wasn’t quite as fleshed-out as it could have been, which could have brought him up a fair bit. To give you a few suggestions: Dash Attack’s low-profiling of Scout would make the move good at shield-poking, and I could see Scout’s Forward Smash being great at bullying shields (ala Wolf’s Forward Smash) when it’s stated to have really low end lag. Nonetheless, it’s neat to see this set come out, and I’m sure FA is happy that someone else in MYM is now associated with Scout as a character. You might be happy to hear that Goldenglow has trumped Sana as my personal favourite set of yours thanks to those edits, so you definitely got out a winner in my books this contest.

Also, is it strange that I scrolled down and read the Saxton Hale Assist Trophy as soon as I opened up Scout’s document?

Spoiler: Manfred von Karma

!!! Modern Von Karma set! The original von Karma set was super iconic to me (being a character I particularly associated with Warlord, due to his personality) and contributed to getting me into the Ace Attorney series alongside being a modern meme, so I’m super stoked to see the man get a modern set. Haven’t been this hyped to read a set in a long time.

• Flavour-wise, I love that this set goes into full detail about Karma’s backstory as opposed to the original set - and the fact that the freaking cops make a return as well! No need to wait 30 seconds to summon them this time around!
• I actually like that all fighters have a quick set of universal throws they use against cops instead of getting access to their regular throws. It prevents the fighter from having to commit to their actions for a while, and prevents them from abusing any throws that might be potent in FFA situations against Karma. Might steal that ideal for myself. I approve of how the cop minion is handled in general - a means for Karma to exert pressure, but not oppressive or able to take stocks reliably on their own.
• It’s hilarious and hilariously in-character that Karma can bully the cop, like he’s a stand-in for Karma’s own personal Gumshoe.
• Sweet, Nightmare Judge for the kill!

• Neutral Special’s reliance on photographing a damaged Von Karma to gather evidence reminds me of MYM12 Karma’s Side Special. The way the move works is simple but cool in that it forces long-ranged fighters to approach Von Karma, and can also punish foes for comboing him as they can give him a ton of evidence! No to mention discourage foes from attacking cops. Just as you say: “the presence of the accomplice ensures immense control of the opponent’s actions and movements, all without ever actually producing a hitbox.” A very fitting centrepiece for a character from a law-based game.
• Flavour-wise, I’m a big fan of Von Karma using his own experience of being shot against his opponent. Pat of me suspects that you included the blood puddle as a jab against all those old MYM11-13 sets that incorporated blood puddles in various tacky fashions, especially when this puddle has no direct gameplay effect.

• “The von Karma line demands perfection, and this reflects in the narrow timing window of this move.” Heh.
• I love how both Von Karma sets we’ve gotten have the taser as one of their Specials, its application being a simple but useful move in their arsenals.
• Awww, no handcuff tether for the Up Special. I do like the inspiration for this more “direct” recovery, though. It does feel a bit tacky for Von Karma to straight-up Flame Choke his cops directly into the ground, only because it would look over-the-top compared to just throwing them visually-speaking.

F-Smash reminds me of MYM22 Hugo and Izuna among other sets where the move has multiple options based on how it was angled. Those types of moves rock, so it should come as no surprise that this move rocks too. I rather like all the implications behind each of its uses, particularly the upwards variant to go into Karma’s air game and the fact that he doesn’t have to go through with all of the F-Smash hits so he can mess with shields. No to mention how the up and down variants can set up cops to perform specific attacks in a tasteful way - none of these guaranteed to hit, but make life harder for the opponent after they’ve been popped up or tripped.

• U-Smash’s paper animation reminds me of old Karma’s U-tilt. It’s a simple move, but works for Karma’s gameplan and ties in with his evidence mechanics. I do like how it’s an alternate big kill option in the place of the Judge if Karma is dealing with faster characters.
• D-tilt reminds me of Fairy Knight Tristan’s U-tilt, where it has a held variant that’s reminiscent of Volcano Kick.
• Oh yeah, N-air references the Ace Attorney anime!
• D-air’s upgrade is neat, particularly in how its extended duration feeds into Von Karma’s good anti-air game. I rather like that, while Karma’s upgradable attacks are scattered throughout his set, players can tell whether they can be upgraded by the fact that they all utilize papers. Expending limited resources to make your attacks more powerful brings to mind a big reason why I liked Scáthach as much as I did.
• Oh, nice, an “anti-shield” grab! We don’t see grabs that get stronger if you used them after shielding an attack often.
• Very happy to see Karma’s breakdown animation being weaponized. I do like the angered version’s extended duration being usable to set off the Judge’s delayed hitbox or play around with cops.
• B-throw’s windstream sure does bring Tulin to mind. On one hand, Von Karma having the magic wind mage powers necessary to keep wind in play for a few seconds feels like it crosses the line into tacky territory. On the other hand? I kind of love seeing something so bonkers on a non-magical character from such a cartoony, over-the-top source material, probably because I have a high tolerance for tackiness when I lived through that era of MYM. Windstream doesn’t affect my view on this set negatively, in any case.
• I like the dynamics of Karma’s non-angered U-throw technically being better than his angered version in some aspects, meaning he’ll want to fish for his grab instead of just shielding attacks.
• D-throw’s angered version works nicely to make the accomplice more of a threat. It is a bit weird that Von Karma only uses forensics when he’s angered, but I get how the stronger indirect status effect needs to be gated behind a condition for balance reasons.

• Oh man, von Karma’s Final Smash is downright sadistic. It has a much more delicious flavour than the MYM12 mechanic booster Final Smash.
• “AARGH! 3 minutes have passed!” Heh. This reminds me of Nox’s Down Special on a small scale. I’m sure that Froy will appreciate the existence of this time-conscious taunt.

All and all, Manfred von Karma felt like something of a middle ground between your bigger and smaller sets. I was a particularly big fan of his cop minion, F-Smash and the way Neutral Special tied in with von Karma’s mechanics to create an intriguing gameplay scenario, along with the moves that got upgrades with evidence. On the flipside, some 2/3rds of von Karma’s moveset and most of his Specials were comparatively simple - good stuff, just not mind-blowing or on the same level as Neutral Special to warrant a more frontrunner set feel.

To be fair, the cops and Judge’s delayed hitbox aren’t easy to get exciting melee mileage from by themselves, and Ace Attorney characters are difficult to translate into fighting games. Nonetheless, I’m very satisfied with the set we got here, and just seeing you pump out a set for the Ace Attorney franchise to fill in for the legendary man Smady himself. Like Hades, it was really fun to see an old flame get revived and polished-up, and compare the old and new sets. The last leg of this contest is going nuts, but I’m confident that this legendary lawyer should be able to stand his ground in the post Heavyweight Male Antagonist-era.

Spoiler: Minami

Don’t need to tell you that I was hyped for this set when I’ve prioritized her among the last-day entries, especially given Vania & Fatla served as motivation for you to finish them. I admittedly never looked at mechanics or moves you had in the preview, so we don’t know the contents of each other’s sets until we read the finished product.

• Now that Minami has a moveset and the contents of her lore have been “canonized”, I’d love to see Minami’s charge get named and fully fleshed-out as a character.
• Not going to lie, I smiled when Yin got brought up in Minami’s personality section.

Switching mechanic is nice here, with the obvious synergy of Mina being a speedster and Nami being a slowster. That’s going to take a while to sink in as I read this set. Where this set gets a bit more unique with the switching mechanic are the switch-in bonuses that the two get (burst movement, weak armour), which is balanced out nicely by the 3 second cooldown so you can’t just switch over and over. And then there’s the Specials summoning the dragon on stand-by while the one you’re controlling performs the Special! If anything, I wonder whether Nami’s one-time switch-in armour should only stay in for a few seconds, just so she doesn’t feel too oppressive for opponents to deal with in neutral when she has some mean punishes.

• Neutral Special weirdly reminds me of Berkerley and Cartwright’s Nspec, both tag team OCs that start out on a short move. The trap/tag-team take on Bowser’s Fire Breath is balanced out nicely by the foreshadowing of Minami’s Smashes being nerfed when only one of the two can act.
• Side Special is some classic US stuff where you can input a move to have Minami perform at the end of her attack to replace the final hit of the movement attack, letting her mix-up and match for different attack combinations.
• Heh, carving a design into your Down Special block reminds me of one of Niva’s taunts. Nice characterization.
• Down Special is getting into some sweet MYM territory with its mobile construct aspect, and the ability for one of the Minamis to ride on it and attack. It gets more interesting with the varied shape of the blocks between each character, and how those shapes are explained to help the other Minami (canceling heavy Nami attacks by using the wider Mina block is particularly delicious, while Nami block is a tall wall that’s easier for Mina to bounce foes off of - very, very clever). Also the fact that Mina can reposition the ice block with her burst movement.

• Oh sweet, F-Smash gets leverage for making heads appear at two different points via burst movement. I wonder if the nerfed attack should only deal 0.5x as much damage, but still gets 0.8x as much knockback - slower Smashes in your movesets tend to have very high damage values compared to heavyweight attacks in Smash.
• Being able to switch between your Jab hits to 50/50 opponents is cool!
• F-tilt is funny where Mina’s attack has worse end lag if it misses, able to be fired off repeatedly for pressure, while Nami’s ends quicker if it misses.
• Nami D-tilt is a particularly fascinating move: it can be used as a mid-ranged attack or set off from a distance, even if you go into a non-attacking option or get hit. You can mix in with Mina’s attacks, making use of her burst movement to better follow up on it, and incorporate on the ice block. Took me a moment to figure out how the move worked (I misunderstood the wording as Nami rushing forward herself, but that was just me), but it was golden from there.
• Nami U-tilt is definitely welcome as a Volcano Kick style move on a “tag team” character, and effectively a more predictable solo Smash attack for her. I also rather like that Nami doesn’t have quick and reliable coverage on various inputs to make up for her armour and for general balancing on the duo’s tag-team nature.

• Mina N-air is rather neat for its sheer utility.
• “Knees bent and clothes fluttering in the wind as they always are when she's falling through the air,” Nice animation touch.
• Mina F-air reminds me of Jodie and Hina F-airs with its projectile-like capabilities, so I naturally like it. Its range also means it gets great use out of your burst movement.
• (My mind isn’t fully comprehending how one performs the Ice Block tricks Nami can do for comboing, but it is cool and helps to justify this set being in your higher echelons)
• Ah, reflavoured freezing mechanics. Another trait the dragons have in common with the leviathans….
• The throws are pretty simple here, but they work well enough for what the dragons are aiming for.

All and all, Minami is a very strong set and handily ends up being your big entry this contest. This primarily comes down to the coolness of Mina’s burst movement and Ice Blocks as a move, as well as the switch-in concept being well-executed from a balance standpoint. My only, very minor complaint is that the end-lag canceling application of Ice Blocks is less utilized than I’d like, only mentioned on Nami’s D-air iirc. Not a deal-breaker anyway, and it does leave the concept open to exploration in future sets. I actually prefer King Radical by a very small margin, but that’s not to speak ill of Minami when the former is practically a guaranteed Super Vote this contest, even with the last remaining sets I have to read.

 

[Slavic]

Dr. Facilier by dilliam

It's been a long time since I've read one of your sets, dill, and I have to say you've definitely stepped your game up since then! Facilier is a huge Disney villain and a fantastic choice for the JamCon, and a pretty fun read to boot. The start of the moveset is actually really strong, the Specials form a really solid base with using debt as a form of resource which is a neat concept. The shadow puppet fighter, the predictive tarot (which I guess sounds like something Randall did this contest as well), and especially granting the foe a wish in exchange for a curse... the Specials really manage to capture just about everything from Facilier's abilities. The Smashes, though perhaps not as strong as the Specials, carry the set further decently well while tying in the earlier concepts. And while the rest of the moveset consists of brief attack descriptions, they do still manage to paint his character through his attacks well.

I don't have a ton to say about Facilier, but I do think, with how bad racking up debt is for Facilier, the things he can do to accrue debt should be perhaps more powerful than they are. He can't effectively spam his debt-options, either, as the nature of the debt forces him to land non-debt-accruing attacks if he knows what's good for him. If still concerned about the balance, always possible to bump the debt value up and make them riskier to use. I do think the tarot's effects get lost in the shuffle a bit, and essentially are only brought up for the Smashes the strongest effect of the tarot changes. Combined with the shadow able to throw out standards and be 'pinned' to a cursed foe, there's a lot of mechanical parts to the set and I think a second go-around with expanding on each of the ideas would help Facilier out in edits a ton.

While most of the standards that don't have a debt effect are incredibly short, I do like a decent amount of the effects provided by expending debt. I do think the inputs chosen that can be buffed are a bit scattered, but that's more a personal preference thing. I will say Up Air's effect is really bizarre for the input, possibly one of the strangest move choices to summon a creature in a way that makes it pretty limited. The grab game brings up the rear with a nice little boost, though, with a neat concept for a grab and starting off with a throw that ties the moveset together nicely. I will say Down Throw's effects are actively insanely strong for being performed off a grab, especially one that can be done remotely with grab + special. The numbers on everything except the shield capacity should be lowered here, killing at 75% off a throw is ridiculous, even with the prerequisite of granting the foe a wish.

Also, as an off-note, it is a little disappointing he doesn't turn the foe into a frog for some kind of unique stun animation or effect, as tacky as permanently transforming the foe can be.

Dr. Facilier does an impeccable job at capturing the villain's personality and powers, the presentation is on point, and he's definitely a fun read. The Specials promise something great that the rest of the set struggles to deliver on, unfortunately, as is the nature of Jamcons. Hopefully you do go back over Facilier with some heavy edits because there's a lot of promise here if you'll put the time in and I could see this set being very votable with some elbow grease. Still, this is a great step forward from you, dill, and makes me excited to see what's in store for your future.

 

[WeirdChillFever]

Anime Girl called Drenthe (New Jersey by n88 )
Well this sure is a set when it comes to the character choice, though this is just what all non-Fire Emblem anime is to me so I’m not super phazed. Good news is that the set is also big and also pretty great, so even if the shock of the character choice isn’t sure to knock you out, the set itself will.

I’ve always had great respect for bullet hell sets. Jersey isn’t really a bullet hell set in the same vein, since the bullets are too slow to really overlap most of the time, but NJ has a lot of projectiles at her disposal. The positioning and creativity never stops being satisfying: Every projectile has its own little trick, it’s own range and niche to fill: Something not all projectile-based sets can boast. On the other hand, the amount of projectiles isn’t a big mental strain on the reader: They make sense and most of them are intuitive and/or follow the same 3/4th Bob-Omb explosion regimen. The movesetting sensibility also applies to the amount of projectiles: Not everything is one and there’s a nice division between melee attacks and the Commissioned artillery. Applauding the restraint on Recommissioning too: It can be alluring to tack all sorts of MYMisms to extra versions of moves, but NJ decides to keep it mostly consistent with either follow-ups and repeats or homing capabilities; each tonally consistent with the projectile type.

The balance is hit-or-miss at times though: NJ has few melee attacks. While NJ mostly deals with the fatigue of reading a zoner set by aggrandizing the attacks in range and coverage, it does make the pool of close-up moves very shallow, leading to little combos or synergy between the various moves. Down Throw sort of alludes to this on its own, too. I get that it’s by design, but something about locking or balancing awesome moves behind big end lag means that they’re not going to be exceptionally useable in an actual gameplay context.

 

[UserShadow7989]

(Shadow Naoto comment in prior post)


Citizen V by n88

A highly technical character whose moves have hidden complexities, giving the initial false impression of a straightforward do-gooder all-arounder but in truth being a fairly underhanded fighter. There's some easy examples in Up Smash having him outright perform a spot dodge first and Down and Forward Smash having identical start up animations, but nothing emphasizes the point more than his Neutral Special.

I really like Neutral Special's mix-up shenanigans with a possible prone, shield bait, or footstool out of it, combined with the option to cancel into it easily from the start up of other attacks (at the cost of the move being very unsafe in most circumstances). The variety of ways he can use it- below him during his acrobatic flip from Dash Attack or after Forward Tilt being stand-outs to me- gives what's otherwise a solid and grounded kit lots of little tricks that you can pull at any moment.

Down Special's super state is a fun mechanic, especially tied to taunt cancel-ing as it is; my only nitpick is that NSpec being locked out for a bit after you score a KO/until you use a Final Smash (most of the time a strictly good thing to have) which ends the super state is a little rough; perhaps he can use this Final Smash by repeating Down Special, since it has no use while the super state is already active? Then again, this is a Final Smash, so having it on tap is probably better 99% of the time, I'm just that one weird guy that gets more mileage out of Little Mac's normal NSpec than KO Punch. I do like that the shield weakness prevalent through most of the set is alleviated or outright reversed for his inputs with his Down Special active.

If I had to nitpick something, the grab game a touch bland, but it's serviceable, and that actually plays well into the above. Citizen V was a strong entry and would probably win a normal Jamcon without much difficulty, but we've got some real contenders this time around.



Alternate Gabriel by GolisoPower

This here's an interesting choice for a set, and it got me to look up the source material, so I'd say that's a success for a set. The core mechanic is a ton of fun, and ties into the Hugo-ish state of the set nicely, as foes are encouraged to use big attacks to clear away Alternates quickly but will suffer dearly for it if they hit 100 UI before clearing it from their last 10 moves. It's a strong concept to build around.

I love Dash Attack’s role in being a surprisingly competent approach/interception tool, subverting counters and being fairly safe on shield, FTilt’s switching shenanigans, Forward Smash’s directional teleport, Up and Down Aerial serving to reposition the Follower on top of their normal uses- honestly I’m a fan of a lot of the individual ideas in the set and how they fit together.

The mindgame twists of certain inputs and mixups fit the character nicely and help build toward its mechanic, and it's a shame they get more sparse after the standards section. It’s good that the set doesn’t go overboard, but allowing a little bit of flexibility in some cases would be nice (such as being able to hold up or down aerial to both increase the distance the follower moves and delay the hitbox slightly, for example, or some more simple mix-ups). There's also a decent number of grab hitboxes with extended cooldowns and between that and the regrab timer, I feel he might have a little trouble with limited input options in a given scenario, but I don't think it's a huge issue.

Minor note, but I caught a typo in Down Special: “Using Down Special normally will cause Gabriel to resummon an Alternate to his location while smashing Down Smash”.



Tinker Knight by majora_787

The mechanic chart reminded me faintly of an old abandoned OC set I had for a character that's since changed drastically, where she would change her set depending on one of a few forms she took- couldn't get a set of forms and input distribution I was happy with, and I was iffy on the plan to let her force the transformations on others to modify their movesets and force bad match-ups (old MYM for you)... That's not remotely relevant, but just wanted to share that moment of nostalgia.

Onto Tinker Knight himself, as I should have been from the beginning of this comment- starting off as a week if slippery character who can escalate to powerful upgraded forms in itself isn't new, but having a choice of three mecha to pilot and the option to then put them on autopilot to fight alongside you instead of just being a one-way upgrade is a smart twist on a neglected genre of set.

I do have a few concerns- I'm fine with alloy color drops being rng, but I would note which moves are good for gathering them, and allow shield damage to count for alloy production if it doesn't already- having to inflict 30% on foes with perfect rng (and likely a lot more than that since it's a 1 in 3 chance of dropping a given color) or 60% to get the top tier benefit (again, likely a lot more than that) feels pretty rough, especially since the possibility is raised of him having all three running around at once if he's particularly good. I'd perhaps drop it to 2.5% per material, and either letting certain moves have a higher chance of getting a specific color, or do something like let him get 1 alloy of x color from y corresponding taunt as a last resort 'I need ONE more alloy you motherless gatcha machine!' option.

In the same vein, I'd buff up the 20 alloy buffs a touch. Blue's armor feels a little weak, especially the small bump from getting 20 materials (which is fairly rng-based and can take a good while to set up)- perhaps it should subtract that damage amount and armors through the attack if it is reduced to 0? Red can just have a slightly bigger multiplier as a treat (since those are already pretty good), and I'm not sure about Yellow but it's probably just a simple bump. On a note related to the mechs, I'd mention how Tinker Knight can play off of/into his mechs when they're acting autonomously, not really needing to be repetitive with 'can hit opponent into this attack with y input' but just noting stand out moments of synergy (like the electrodent being particularly scary while your mechs are doing their things, by the by I LOVE the electrodent).

As a side note regarding the extras: I love how you handled his boxing ring title, and it’s neat to think about his strategies for handling the bonus stage (hope you get red or yellow alloys from those blocks and not blue!).



Grim and Gnarly (AKA Frowning Friends) by @BrazillianGuy

An unexpected turn of events, but a welcome one! This is certainly an interesting introduction to Smiling Friends for someone only faintly familiar with the material through memes and second hand knowledge, and one that does well to sell it.

The specials are a fun mix of the duo’s shenanigans in the show, while also giving them a simple core strategy: down special serves to debuff the opponent’s jumps, while neutral special and Mr. Man are potentially very dangerous tools that are difficult to deal with if you lack your jump, and Up Tilt is an oppressive response to short hops in if timed right. Combined with their oppressive ledge guarding game, they’re fittingly built to drag foes down to their level and then kick them when they’re down.

While the inputs could use some damage percents, even just spitballing some numbers, it's overall a solid enough entry in every other way. The set makes sure to note what moves lead into and from what. It weaves its handful of tricks into each other nicely and calls attention to when they're especially useful without degrading into noting it over and over for every little thing (something I'm very guilty of), and the inputs are all individually interesting while still serving a role in the set's moment to moment gameplay.

The later throws and the aerials end the set on a high note; Neutral Aerial’s two hitboxes and Up Aerial’s semi-Peach Float into aimable projectile are contrasting but interesting options that stood out to me in particular for some reason or another, one coming down to a simple use of facing and risk vs reward and the latter having a fairly unique effect.



Dr. Facilier by dilliam

A longtime MYM favorite character finally gets a modern set, and boy does this do him justice. Right away I loved the Specials at the center of the set. Aside from being a sucker for the shadow and its various applications, the Down Special where you choose three moves to perform within a time limit for increasing benefits at the cost of telegraphing the plan to your opponent? That’s beautiful and I wish I'd seen it more.

While Side Special didn’t immediately hit it off for me, I loved the thought into the buffs given to opponents- none of which give foes a sizable benefit in disadvantage, meaning as long as things go to plan you’ve gotten a big boon and left the foe holding the bag.

All of this trickery of course comes at a cost with his central mechanic, which exists to ensure he doesn't just spam the stronger versions of his inputs and incentivizes him to wheel and deal while putting his dukes up and actually fighting the foe mano e mano, something ambituous sets can often forget to do. It's still plenty of room to make use of them, he just needs to be smart about it, fitting for the character. I love the Smashes and their upgrades in particular, with DSmash and upgraded FSmash’s interaction with Cursed foes being simple but cool.

Beyond that, the Aerials and Throws are a bit one note, but eh, time crunch. The former are interesting enough, and some quick tweaks like letting Facilier mess with foes’ DI by having two quick throws going opposite directions would spice them up just fine.



Team Rocket by Slavic

I love every special and smash- the Pokemon assists, the disguises especially, their standard getaway vehicle (writ small), the smashes (Jessie’s Up Smash a stand out among stand outs). The animations play a part in my appreciation for the set, all conveying character and adding a touch of humor that conveys why so many love these larcenous lunkheads- their crouch even bringing out a bush to hide in. The whole set is ripe with flavor and clever little tricks on each individual input.

Befitting the lovable boobs, Team Rocket have a focus on trapping foes or catching them with their pants down- hiding their actions in the smokescreens, subtly swapping who is taking the lead with their specials and smashes, setting lingering traps, putting on disguises to soak a hit and get the better end of a trade or two (this in particular might be my favorite part of the set!), and all of it feels well planned for how each bit plays into everything else, moves feeling individually creative without ever failing to fit into the overall picture.

The Pokemon of the team all pull their weight, but no more than their headliner Meowth, who also provides the set with a grounded and functional set of fundamentals, moment to moment gameplay attacks that ensure that however big brained your plan for the encounter of the day is, they're perfectly capable of just throwing hands (er, paws) in a pinch- it's just not something they're as good at as other characters, so they need to rely on their scheming to get things done.

Notes: Someone probably mentioned this, but I’m fairly certain "30 seconds" is meant to be "30 frames" in DSpec. Total down throw healing math means it should cap at 27, not 28.



Toedscruel by PeridotGX

Good to see you taking another crack at Make Your Move! Toedscruel is a neat pick, and this serves as a fun start to a set for a fun new member of the latest Pokemon generation, though only the Specials are fully realized at the current moment. What's here seems reasonably well-thought out, with Spore being a fittingly central move to the set that can force foes to work around its presence while not being horribly oppressive in theory. The other Specials, while not providing an immediate gameplay angle, are all pretty cool in their own right- I'm a fan of Wrap, and Seed Bomb for a recovery is pretty clever.

That said, there’s not much to say on the set in its current form; my only advice is to ensure that inputs will play off of the Specials in some way- leveraging reach or such- and make sure that just sitting in/camping behind your spore AoE doesn’t become the bulk of your gameplay.



Sherlock Holmes by WeirdChillFever and FrozenRoy

“Irregardless” being used in Side Special immediately rustled my jimmies.

On a more relevant note, this set's Special section made me fall in love with the character and what the set was doing with him right off. His odd magnifying glasses apparatus is used as a central set piece (hah), and NSpec helpfully applies different buffs to different parts of his kit by affecting the moves using a given pair of magnifying glasses. SSpec adds to the fun, letting you trade out the use of them in certain attacks for a passive hitbox of sorts, USpec lets you create it a distance away from yourself, and DSpec creates some dangerous traps that (amongst other neat details) can be set off by the passive hitbox, ensuring the set isn't a one-trick pony with how the mechanic is used despite the fact it's woven into so many of its inputs.

And woven well, at that; there’s Forward Smash that immediately continued to impress right out of the Specials section, which can use any two pairs for its attack for great effect (angling its aim adjusting which are used), making it a highly versatile mix and match tool on top of its powerful sweetspot being an effective kill move and its large coverage making it a way to set off multiple DSpec traps at once. Up Smash can even combine all three magnifying glasses for a full set of buffs, while Down Smash is powerful but requires all three be available and not in use from Side Special.

The set also takes care to give him some effective if not all that impressive inputs based on Holmes' own mixture of cane and fist fighting techniques, ensuring he always has basic competency regardless of how you've portioned out your buffs and your usage of Side Special while still leaving mismanagement of your resources a pitfall players need to be mindful of. You CAN go all in on Side Special, but you need to consider the risk and reward carefully.

The end result is a well-made set where nothing feels out of place and it all fits together beautifully. Insert clever 'case closed' pun here.


My nomination for the "False" Jamcon of Make Your Move 26 is Sherlock Holmes by WeirdChillFever and FrozenRoy . Shout out to Team Rocket for putting up a heck of a fight, and honestly every other set in the Jamcon while we're at it. I kept having to reconsider what was my current 'favorite' of the submissions as I read through, all the way up to the end.

 

[WeirdChillFever]

Vallamari Inkantation (Azura by A AwfulBeast )
Finally, the best Fire Emblem girl has received a set! Being biased in favor of the character is a double-edged blade (might even cut your heart in two) because it means I’ve had Ideas about making a set for her in the past (though nothing to the extent of an MYM set).

First of all, I really liked the nod to Corrin’s Side Special in Azura’s Side Special. It fits her perfectly as a dancer and I’m always a sucker for taking inspiration from buddies already in Smash. It also ties well into a really well developed melee, no move is truly bad.

Locket’s Tide, similarly, is a clever move. Changing mobility stats is an underrated aspect of some meter or comeback mechanics, and Azura needing to land hits herself rather than it being an actual comeback mechanic is a good way to make it more than a meter. One thing I am uncertain about is whether the Locket’s Tide movement changing is gradual or happens only when the meter is at 100%. The Locket’s Tide mechanic says the movement “starts to change”, but most melee moves refer to “when Locket’s Tide is ready”. Personally, I would love if Azura picked up speed gradually throughout.

Please, for the love of all you hold dear: Refer to inputs by their input, not the move name. It makes things unnecessarily complex to digest and to properly parse the connections between the moves. I can remember “You can combo Down Tilt into Up Tilt and start a Neutral Air chain.” I cannot remember ”Soul Surge comboes into Sky High Lance to go into Blessed Beatdown chains”

Most of the time, I felt myself wanting more. I’m usually not a fan of giving suggestions, because the set should stand on its own rather than competing against the moveset I’m constructing in my head, but where the melee is at least always solid and mechanically sound, I was hoping for a bit more of a splash. The ebb and flow feel of the set could come out more, because when it does shine, it shines brightly (such as in the grab game).

The Songstress Bubbles are nice, for example, and spark some really nice interactions, but the times where that happens are not as frequent as they could be: Azura, being so focussed on mobility, could gain from having the bubbles being a mobility tool at all times, rather than when interacting with certain moves. Extra shield push and the occassional shield pulling moves are really neat and give Azura a character-gameplay identity (ebb and flow), but sometimes the “flow” is missing and Azura mostly wants to keep opponents out when not at Locket’s Tide. Having more moves that reel opponents in would be a good counteract to that.

I’m really not sure how much of this advice is fair to give and how much is me casting aside your vision of the set and writing my own: Regardless, Azura is a cool set that I never found myself groaning in increasing discomfort at. Nice job!