Classic MAX INTENSITY CLASSIC MODE Discussion

[Kholdstare]

Discussion, strategy, and help for getting the best score and rewards for Classic mode when the difficulty is at maximum, including the bonus game and credits.

 

[UltimateXsniper]

I think I have something important. I don't think you can finish the mode on 9.9 if you have used a continue (including a ticket). I have tried a few times on a couple of different characters and i die on the last battle. After that battle it always stops at 9.8. even if I managed to get 9.5 or something close the battle before.

Also for anyone who plays Mario. Be patient with Giga Bowser. His moves are extremely slow but you can die from a good smash attack easily. Don't get greedy and sometimes going in for just a 2nd hit can punish you. If you have to be safe, spam fireballs and they actually do a decent amount of damage.

 

[Folt]

Is it me or is Metal Mario (Bowser Classic Mode Final Boss) actually kind of hard to knock out this time around?

 

[Kholdstare]

Is it me or is Metal Mario (Bowser Classic Mode Final Boss) actually kind of hard to knock out this time around?

It's not just you, I've been struggling with it myself.

 

[Folt]

It's not just you, I've been struggling with it myself.

Nice! I think it's great since it reminds me so much more of the 64 Metal Mario battle now.

 

[Pyra]

. I don't think you can finish the mode on 9.9 if you have used a continue (including a ticket).

Yep, I had that suspicion myself as well.
I struggle against the hands at that level and I've ticketed it after making it there at 9.7 and finished with a whopping +0.1 increase.

 

[Kholdstare]

I really hope that's a glitch and not intentional design.

 

[Pyra]

I really hope that's a glitch and not intentional design.

I have a feeling it was intentional, because the only time I was able to achieve 9.9 was with Young Link (because the Ganon fight isn't particularly difficult so I didn't need a ticket).

EDIT:
If anyone can get to the boss at 9.8 and beat it after using tickets, I'd like to see what happens after that.

 

[SonicMario]

I don't intend on doing 9.9 for everybody since I'm just not that good at Smash with everybody to do that. I do see that some characters are easier then others it seems. So if you just need to do it once so that Challenge is fulfilled on the board to get the Crown Mii hat and what not. I can at least make a recommendation:

I feel like Mega Man's one of the easier ones to get 9.9 with. Since he ends with a 1 v 1 match against Dr. Mario and then a Mewtwo right after in succession. You do fight a boss in Galleom before them. But Megaman's Projectiles for the most part took short work for me against him since his only long range attack is those missiles. I'm no Mega Man main, but things like his projectile forward Smash work wonders on even high level AI from keeping them away and KOing them.

 

[UltimateXsniper]

I've made another discovery. I've managed to get 9.9 before the final boss with Dr. Mario. You'll still be good with the 9.9 if you use tickets when you die. So yes it's possible to get 9.9 before the boss and you don't go down with the ticket when you're already at 9.9.

 

[SS2000]

So does anybody have any clue what determines how much the intensity increases with each stage you beat? I've seen it go up by as much as 1.0 before. But even beating a stage withing ten seconds and no damage getting a perfect has only been a 0.8 increase, and there have been "nice plays" with only a 0.6 increase. I haven't got a clue how this works.

Just another thing they made even worse with each game. In the good old days, you could just select the highest difficulty and even continue with it after losing if you didn't care about scoring. Then It's made so that higher difficulty costs you and continuing drops the difficulty. Now you can't even just flat out pick the highest difficulty but have to go through the headache of wondering if you'll get the lucky scores needed to reach it!

 

[spacyplaytpus]

I have a feeling it was intentional, because the only time I was able to achieve 9.9 was with Young Link (because the Ganon fight isn't particularly difficult so I didn't need a ticket).

EDIT:
If anyone can get to the boss at 9.8 and beat it after using tickets, I'd like to see what happens after that.

I was at the final fight on 9.8, used a ticket, and it just framed it at 9.8 when i beat it so it will cap you if you're not at 9.9 entering the fight

 

[JiggyNinja]

I don't intend on doing 9.9 for everybody since I'm just not that good at Smash with everybody to do that. I do see that some characters are easier then others it seems. So if you just need to do it once so that Challenge is fulfilled on the board to get the Crown Mii hat and what not. I can at least make a recommendation:

I feel like Mega Man's one of the easier ones to get 9.9 with. Since he ends with a 1 v 1 match against Dr. Mario and then a Mewtwo right after in succession. You do fight a boss in Galleom before them. But Megaman's Projectiles for the most part took short work for me against him since his only long range attack is those missiles. I'm no Mega Man main, but things like his projectile forward Smash work wonders on even high level AI from keeping them away and KOing them.

King K. Rool's route is also pretty easy. He's the first (and so far only) one I've beaten 9.9 with. His projectiles (especially that ridiculously powerful crown) are pretty important to zone out the AI. Once you've racked up damage, fish for a shield grab to D throw -> D smash.

 

[The Slayer]

I first got 9.9 by using somehow. Barely used him but if you can get a high intensity at the Hands, will cover you for a lot of damage.

 

[KingBroly]

What stinks about Classic Mode, and going for 9.9 with anyone, let alone everyone, is that not all Classic paths are balanced equally. Any character with both hands as a final boss means you likely have a hard trial ahead of you. If you have anyone else, it'll likely be a lot easier, but it really depends on how good you are with a character. And since the game feels kinda random in regards to upping the bonus, I'm not sure what the best strategy is.

 

[Diddy Kong]

I cleared it today with Lucina. Isn't really all that hard. Had no real problems with Master Hand and Crazy Hand either.

 

[abx]

Has anyone experience with using continues in the finale regarding the total score? Today I used even two gold cards when doing classic mode with Cloud and I have the impression that his score so far got reduced a lot. This would render the gold card concept useless for highscore hunting, only 1-stock runs having full potential. Still not confirmed, but I will keep an eye on this.

 

[Pyr]

Has anyone experience with using continues in the finale regarding the total score? Today I used even two gold cards when doing classic mode with Cloud and I have the impression that his score so far got reduced a lot. This would render the gold card concept useless for highscore hunting, only 1-stock runs having full potential. Still not confirmed, but I will keep an eye on this.

Can confirm. Using a ticket to continue doesn't lower your intensity, but it does lower the background score. Tested via a 9.9 run: Score was 1.6m, which was around what I'd get if I used coins to continue. Next run, without using continues, was a 1.9m. Same character and same damage output overall.

 

[HypnoBagels]

I have a feeling it was intentional, because the only time I was able to achieve 9.9 was with Young Link (because the Ganon fight isn't particularly difficult so I didn't need a ticket).

EDIT:
If anyone can get to the boss at 9.8 and beat it after using tickets, I'd like to see what happens after that.

I just did this with my brother as a team using Link and on the King K. Rool route just moments earlier actually. We got to the final boss, Galleom, and got pretty close to beating him when I died. We were at the 9.8 intensity, but after we defeated Galleom after using a ticket, it didn’t up our intensity. I came here looking for answers as to why, and I’m 99.9 percent sure it’s because we used a ticket. (2 times actually)

 

[UltimateXsniper]

I just did this with my brother as a team using Link and on the King K. Rool route just moments earlier actually. We got to the final boss, Galleom, and got pretty close to beating him when I died. We were at the 9.8 intensity, but after we defeated Galleom after using a ticket, it didn’t up our intensity. I came here looking for answers as to why, and I’m 99.9 percent sure it’s because we used a ticket. (2 times actually)

Correct, using a ticket will make you not reach 9.9. only exception is if you get 9.9 before the final level. However, your score will not be as high as someone who got 9.9 without using a ticket.

 

[Kairyu24]

I tried my first ticket on a lower difficulty, and unsurprisingly I didn't break even by a long shot.

How good are tickets when shooting for 9.9? I had a 9.6 with Ike before, but didn't really check the rewards. Seeing as the tickets are the same as the smash 4 fee to even play max difficulty, is it eventually worth it?

 

[Zimer]

I always play for score and you must clear all at 9.9 or closer avoiding receiving damage (lowest wins). I debuted with this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uApB7L_7UI8

 

[JiggyNinja]

So here's my thoughts:

Fighting both Hands alone is the worst. It is so much harder compared to a single boss like Dracula or Giga Bowser and I hate the routes that end with a solo hand fight. Trying to dodge both of their attacks is horrible, so your best bet is often to try to get 9.9 before the boss fight and coast through it with tickets.

My 9.9 wins:
Pikachu
Ganondorf
King Dedede
Mega Man
Ryu
Cloud
King K. Rool

Close calls:
Samus: 9.1
Fox: 9.6
Roy: 9.5
Chrom: 9.1

Just like SonicMario said, Mega Man is easy because of his abundance of projectile attacks, especially projectile Forward Smash. Spam it.
K. Rool has powerful projectiles, so opponents can be kept at bay relatively well. Once you've racked up enough damage, Down Throw -> Down Smash is an easy kill option.
Ganondorf has armor on Wizard Punch. Use it. I easily got 9.9 before the boss fight, so I still cleared this even though I had to use 2 tickets against the Hands.
Seconding The ΩS here, having a partner against the hands makes a HUGE difference. Ken has to do this alone, which is why I haven't cleared it yet.
The CPU does not deal with Gordos very well. Zone them out. I got 9.9 before the boss fight, so it was an easy clear.
Got through this with good play. He's a good fast sword character so he covers things well. Fsmash and limit break neutral B are good ways to get kills.
I think Pikachu's was just good play, I don't think I found any broken thing to exploit for him.

ETA: Charizard's Flare Blitz is the perfect finisher. Long range, and it armors through any projectile they'll throw at you. You can easily get 9.9 before the boss fight.

Little Mac's Neutral B (HAAAahhhh..POo-yah!) is good cheese. Another fairly easy 9.9 before the final boss. Good thing too because the Hands are hell with Little Mac's completely ****ty recovery.

 

[QrowinSP]

Does anyone know if there's any in game distinction between ending on, say, 9.5 and raising to 9.9 after the boss versus beating the boss at 9.9?

 

[JiggyNinja]

Does anyone know if there's any in game distinction between ending on, say, 9.5 and raising to 9.9 after the boss versus beating the boss at 9.9?

None that I know of. The reason I brought it up for my character breakdowns is because if you use a ticket before you reach 9.9, you are locked out of getting it; the max you can get then is 9.8. If you use a ticket when you're already at 9.9, you're still good.

Even thought the Hands can wreck Ganondorf and Little Mac because of their bad recoveries, it's easy to get 9.9 before the fight so the boss fight doesn't matter as long as you have the tickets to cover it.

So does anybody have any clue what determines how much the intensity increases with each stage you beat? I've seen it go up by as much as 1.0 before. But even beating a stage withing ten seconds and no damage getting a perfect has only been a 0.8 increase, and there have been "nice plays" with only a 0.6 increase. I haven't got a clue how this works.

Was that perfect a gimp KO? I think I'm noticing the pattern, and I think it just has to do with how much damage you do to the opponent, seated by how much damage they do to you. In wet-n-wild fights that I've ended quickly but took a ton of damage, I've got middling scores. When I've slowed down and tried to minimize the damage I take, my scores have gone up even though the fights seems to have taken longer.

Ridley just got added to my 9.9 completion list. The fireballs aren't as cheesy as some of the other exploitable things I've listed, but it's good enough to rack up damage while keeping your distance, then you go in for the kill with a smash. I managed to get 9.9 before the boss (both Hands), but I didn't even need it this time because I didn't die against them. Probably the most honest 9.9 clear I've had so far.

Other characters I'm trying to grind out stats for:
Bowser: Fire and Spin are good ways to track up damage. I do very well up to Diddy Kong who fights me much more aggressively, but Rathalos has consistently been my run killer. Having the boss fight be second-to-last instead of last means there's no way I can ticket through it.

(Dark) Samus: Missile missile missile missile missile Charge Beam. The strategy is obvious, I'm just not good at playing tag yet to avoid getting caught. And Samus's R.O.B. fight is total bull****. 6 enemies of Brinstar Depths of all places, the worst stage to be a projectile based fighter. Don't even bother with projectiles, you need to Screw them to death.

Richter/Simon: Cross, Holy Water, and Axe are ridiculously good zoning tools, I'm just not good enough at them yet. The narrow hitboxes on their aerials and utilt/usmash dont help matters either.

ETA: Link has great zoning tools to keep the opp pool bent at a distance away from you. I was able to get 9.9 before the boss fight.

I really like these routes where you can clear the difficulty before the boss fight, because then you can just check out and coast through it.

In contrast to the one's I've cleared, I'm having a hard time winning with the Fire Emblem swordsmen (and woman). They have 0 zoning capability, so it's impossible to keep your distance unless you're super lucky with item drops. You're forced to put yourself in danger at close range.

 

[Aurane]

If you want to clear 9.9, do Wolf's Classic. That route is hilariously easy.

 

[InfiniteRE]

My easiest attempt at 9.9 was with Ganondorf. If you can handle a couple 2v1s and 3v1s than you will be alright, because with ganondorf I had the easiest time with the hands at the end.

 

[JiggyNinja]

If you want to clear 9.9, do Wolf's Classic. That route is hilariously easy.

No.

Ganondorf, Little Mac, and Charizard have it easy because they can armor through everything the opponent does with stupidly powerful attacks that kill everything in 3 hits, max.

Mega Man and King Dedede are hilariously easy because of easily spammable lethal projectiles.

Wolf doesn't have anything anywhere near that good, so he requires actual play to get through. Wolf's is definitely average difficulty.

 

[Aurane]

No.

Ganondorf, Little Mac, and Charizard have it easy because they can armor through everything the opponent does with stupidly powerful attacks that kill everything in 3 hits, max.

Mega Man and King Dedede are hilariously easy because of easily spammable lethal projectiles.

Wolf doesn't have anything anywhere near that good, so he requires actual play to get through. Wolf's is definitely average difficulty.

I have literally no skill with Wolf or Smash in general and I did it the first time. Different views I guess.

 

[JiggyNinja]

I have literally no skill with Wolf or Smash in general and I did it the first time. Different views I guess.

More skill than I've got. I managed to 9.9 Wolf's route a few days ago, but Snake is lethal and stopped me several times.

The AI in the game is psychic, and has an inhuman ability to cross you up to avoid your forward smashes and hop over down smashes. I will say categorically that it is not possible to clear Wolf's route with "literally no skill".

So far, Ganondorf, Little Mac, and Charizard seem to have required the least amount of skill because the AI is so stupidly bad at dealing with super armor.

 

[Admiral Pit]

The only 9.9 I've done, but also took some retries, was (what a coincidence). He's not that hard I reckon. I mean you deal with many of the single battles easily if you know how to Pit well. Bayo may only be a problem sometimes, or if the enemy is getting lucky with items. Once you're out to battle Palu later on, you'll be accompanied by Dark Pit, who will also join you in the boss battle, and he's not that bad of a partner either. The one true downside of the Pit route is that the boss is against both hands.
A strategy that I've been trying to do is target one of the hands until it becomes stunned (your ally will likely do D-smash against the downed hand for good damage), then try to target the other hand to stun it. Pretty much I try to repeat this to not only reduce the amount of hand combo attacks that happen, but it can help your ally live longer. Don't use N-air or U-air much though, and focus on D-air and B-air only because multi-hit attacks can leave you more open.

Now I don't intend on going for 9.9 on other characters, but that's just based on the characters I use decently, and I'm glad Pit was pretty decent.

 

[JiggyNinja]

Use your range to the fullest extent possible. Cross and Holy Water are critical, especially confirming Holy Water -> Fsmash for damage and kills. Fair is a fast aerial with great range, get used to spacing it and controlling its angle. Dark Pit is the worst of the fights because he's so squirrelly and the stage has so many platforms to get him over and around all your attacks. I managed to get a good fight against him one run (0.7) and cleared 9.9 before the boss fight.

It cannot be overstated how important spacing is for the Belmonts. They are the exact opposite of rushdown characters. Don't get in the opponent's face, space yourself just outside of their melee range. Use the whole length of that Vampire Slayer to smash them, and all your Specials to frustrate their approach. For 5 of the 6 fighters, it's perfectly possible to kill them without yourself getting touched.

Tried Pit, and got 9.7 after a few tries. Need to get a little better.

Add Chrom to my 9.9 clears. I had 9.7 before, I just had to get better using him. Save Fsmashes to punish the CPU when they're focusing more on your partner than you. Dash attack is a good option for aggression. Just be good and learn how to not get hit.

 

[UltimateXsniper]

Anyone find Piranha Plant to be ridiculous? Like the battles themselves don't seem too hard but the CPUs seem to be really good. This Dark Samus kept dodging my attacks and even parries a few times and this was around near 6.0 range. It was also bad enough that she caught an item I threw at her 1 foot away. Daisy and Isabelle both coming in hot and rush me down and Daisy in particular being very aggressive. Ken and Incineroar were also annoying especially Incineroar as Ken usually dies first and Incineroar likes to side B whenever I least expect it.

I find the run hard but I got it to 9.9 while Piranha Plant has now took me to 2 mil points, being my highest score yet.

 

[JiggyNinja]

I haven't noticed the CPUs in Piranha Plant's routes being more effective than others. I got 9.8 for it right now. The CPUs in Ultimate are stupidly cheap anyway, you just need to get used to their quirks.

 

[channel_KYX]

Little Mac's Neutral B (HAAAahhhh..POo-yah!) is good cheese. Another fairly easy 9.9 before the final boss. Good thing too because the Hands are hell with Little Mac's completely ****ty recovery

May I ask how? The cpus towards the end completely wreck my face. They certainly don't ko me, but I take so much damage that I get point increases of around 0.6.
DK was hell, I was at 120 %.

 

[JiggyNinja]

May I ask how? The cpus towards the end completely wreck my face. They certainly don't ko me, but I take so much damage that I get point increases of around 0.6.
DK was hell, I was at 120 %.

I just tried again and got 9.9 on my 4th attempt.

In general, use your fast tilts and side B to rack up about 40% damage, then run away and fish for a kill with neutral B (straight lunge). The CPU has no respect for it, and will usually just let it hit them or fail to punish it if it misses. Also use tilts or smashes out of your dash instead of dash attack. DA has way to much end lag, a dashing f tilt or u smash is much better.

Incin: beware alolan whip. I rage my first attempt after getting hit by that 3 times in a row.

Ryu: it's a walk off, you should have no trouble nailing him. One well placed Lunge can knock him into the blast zone.

Mii Brawlers: Horde battles are all luck. One time you might nail them all right off the bat with a single Lunge, other times theyll just be little ******* that WONT STAND STILL FOR TWO ****ING SECONDS JUST LET ME PUNCH YOU ALREADY!!

Cpt Falcon: Standard fight.

Little Mac: harder, but the same tactics still work. You just need to be more careful about when you choose to attack. It's a walkoff so you might have an easier time outside the ring.

DK: He's a *****. It's just like Falcons fight but better. Take advantage of your tilts as much as possible. Try starting your lunge just after knocking him away with an f tilt or jab so he has less opportunity to punish the chargeup. A regular stage instead of a walk off also makes this harder.

CPUs in this game are stupidly cheap and can do frame perfect punishes if they wish, so a lot of this depends on what kind of groove you get into. When I say it's easy, I mean relative to the rest of the cast. It's nowhere close to 100%. Just now I've maybe gotten two 9.9s in about 15 attempts.

 

[Hydreigonfan01]

Is it me or is Metal Mario (Bowser Classic Mode Final Boss) actually kind of hard to knock out this time around?

I did that Classic Route and when he became Metal Mario immediately after he just fell off the stage and SD'd when coming down to fight me. It was very anti-climatic.

 

[JiggyNinja]

I've made a lot of progress since my last update. Here is my overview.

The Scoring

There are two things that appear to affect the score you get at the end of a round: how long the battle lasted and how much damage you received. If you finish the battle quickly and don't take much damage, you get a good score. If you take a long time and receive a lot of damage, you get a very bad score. If you take long time and receive little damage, you get a moderate score. So on and so forth. I'm not sure where the exact cutoffs are, but you usually don't have to feel too rushed for time.

The maximum score you can get from a round appears to be related to how high your score it already. For the first round starting at 5.0, I have never seen a score higher than +0.9. On later rounds with an overall score over 8.0, I have gotten rounds that scored as high as +1.3. With such an abundant amount of potential points, it is very possible to get 9.9 in the first 6 fights, possibly even the first 5.

If you die and have to buy a continue, it is impossible to increase your score to 9.9 no matter how close you are to it. If you are 9.8 and have to continue, you will be stuck at 9.8. Using coins will remove a portion of your score (0.7 at the higher scores, which is all we care about here). Using a more expensive Classic Mode Ticket will let you continue with no decrease in score. Most importantly if you are already at 9.9 when you die, using a ticket will let you keep the 9.9 score; it won't be taken away from you. I've used this method to clear a large amount of the routes here. Tickets can be bought in the Vault Store for 5,000 gold coins, or gotten as a reward for completing Classic Mode or some Challenges.

General Strategies

Reducing the amount of damage you take in these fights is the easiest way to improve your score. Characters with long reach and powerful projectiles have an advantage in these fights, but every character is able to benefit from more conservative, defensive play. The most important this is to not just charge in with constant aggression. It's often safer to let them come to you and get punished than to run in and let them punish you. The enemy will approach you. Even a projectile fighter like Samus isn't going to infinitely camp you out.

Know every character's good Out of Shield options. Grabs and Up Specials are usually pretty good. Just know all the good options your character has. It's easy to forget if you're switching between them all of them time.

Route-specific strategies (by group)

Super Armor
Ganondorf (Neutral Special)
Pokemon Trainer (Charizard's Side Special)
Little Mac (Neutral Special)
Piranha Plant (Down Special)

These characters each have a powerful attack with super armor. The CPU does not respect super armor, so it is trivially easy to catch them with a kill attack. Of the three, Ganondorf's route is probably the easiest because of his overall raw power. Almost every attack he has hits like a truck, and his Warlock Punch is the most powerful CPU-killing tool that I've found in the entire cast so far. The CPU will happily jab you through the entire armored windup, just to get sent blasting off like Team Rocket. The basic strategy is the same for all four; rack up a modest amount of damage through normal means, then go for the kill with your armored attack.

Powerful Projectiles
Richter
Simon
Mega Man
King Dedede
King K. Rool
Link
Ridley
Piranha Plant (Side and Neutral Specials)

Because the damage you take is such a big factor in the scoring, characters with powerful projectiles they can easily throw out can keep the opponent at a safe distance while racking up damage, then go in for a kill. Play lame.

Melee fighters
Donkey Kong
Bowser
Chrom
Ike
Incineroar
Lucina
Roy

This group has it the hardest out of any that I've cleared Classic Mode with because they basically have to get up close and personal with the opponent in order to do anything.

Bowser's route is just horrible. I think 0.4 is the best I ever got on Rathalos, so it's damn near impossible to get 9.9 before the boss fight. Hopes of cheesing the Marios with Bowsercide were dashed.

The "Get Good" group
Cloud
Daisy
Fox
Inkling
Ken
Lucario
Peach
Pichu
Pikachu
Ryu
Wolf
Greninja
Diddy Kong
R.O.B.
Rosalina & Luma
Bayonetta
Palutena

I didn't notice these guys having anything super busted or super safe. Their projectiles aren't as powerful or spammable, so you'll probably have to alternate between zoning and close quarters. Basically just fight normally.

Bayo might be better than I think she is, I'm **** at using her and don't really know the mechanics of her specials very well. I had a hard time beating it with her, but someone more used to her quirks will probably find it easier.

Current close calls (9.0 or higher)

Robin - 9.8
Dr. Mario - 9.8
Young Link - 9.8
Wii Fit Trainer - 9.7
Pit - 9.7
Yoshi - 9.7
Dark Pit - 9.6
Marth - 9.6
Ness - 9.6
Mario - 9.6
Snake - 9.5
Captain Falcon - 9.5
Samus - 9.5
Jigglypuff - 9.3
Dark Samus - 9.3
Villager - 9.2
Corrin - 9.1

There's nothing worse than getting a deathless 9.8. It just pisses me off so much.

Jigglypuff's play style is so weird, I keep being too aggressive and losing trades. I need to channel my inner Hungry Box and play more lame. Also, Sing -> Rest is a great finisher. I just need to get better landing my Rests.

Marth's route is pretty normal, but the team of ****ing Mii Gunners on Castle Seige is ****ing hell.

I don't know why Young Link's route seems so much harder than Link's. I cleared Link's a long time ago, but YL is still not coming together.

 

[Luigifan18]

I've made a lot of progress since my last update. Here is my overview.

The Scoring

There are two things that appear to affect the score you get at the end of a round: how long the battle lasted and how much damage you received. If you finish the battle quickly and don't take much damage, you get a good score. If you take a long time and receive a lot of damage, you get a very bad score. If you take long time and receive little damage, you get a moderate score. So on and so forth. I'm not sure where the exact cutoffs are, but you usually don't have to feel too rushed for time.

The maximum score you can get from a round appears to be related to how high your score it already. For the first round starting at 5.0, I have never seen a score higher than +0.9. On later rounds with an overall score over 8.0, I have gotten rounds that scored as high as +1.3. With such an abundant amount of potential points, it is very possible to get 9.9 in the first 6 fights, possibly even the first 5.

If you die and have to buy a continue, it is impossible to increase your score to 9.9 no matter how close you are to it. If you are 9.8 and have to continue, you will be stuck at 9.8. Using coins will remove a portion of your score (0.7 at the higher scores, which is all we care about here). Using a more expensive Classic Mode Ticket will let you continue with no decrease in score. Most importantly if you are already at 9.9 when you die, using a ticket will let you keep the 9.9 score; it won't be taken away from you. I've used this method to clear a large amount of the routes here. Tickets can be bought in the Vault Store for 5,000 gold coins, or gotten as a reward for completing Classic Mode or some Challenges.

General Strategies

Reducing the amount of damage you take in these fights is the easiest way to improve your score. Characters with long reach and powerful projectiles have an advantage in these fights, but every character is able to benefit from more conservative, defensive play. The most important this is to not just charge in with constant aggression. It's often safer to let them come to you and get punished than to run in and let them punish you. The enemy will approach you. Even a projectile fighter like Samus isn't going to infinitely camp you out.

Know every character's good Out of Shield options. Grabs and Up Specials are usually pretty good. Just know all the good options your character has. It's easy to forget if you're switching between them all of them time.

Route-specific strategies (by group)

Super Armor
Ganondorf (Neutral Special)
Pokemon Trainer (Charizard's Side Special)
Little Mac (Neutral Special)
Piranha Plant (Down Special)

These characters each have a powerful attack with super armor. The CPU does not respect super armor, so it is trivially easy to catch them with a kill attack. Of the three, Ganondorf's route is probably the easiest because of his overall raw power. Almost every attack he has hits like a truck, and his Warlock Punch is the most powerful CPU-killing tool that I've found in the entire cast so far. The CPU will happily jab you through the entire armored windup, just to get sent blasting off like Team Rocket. The basic strategy is the same for all four; rack up a modest amount of damage through normal means, then go for the kill with your armored attack.

Powerful Projectiles
Richter
Simon
Mega Man
King Dedede
King K. Rool
Link
Ridley
Piranha Plant (Side and Neutral Specials)

Because the damage you take is such a big factor in the scoring, characters with powerful projectiles they can easily throw out can keep the opponent at a safe distance while racking up damage, then go in for a kill. Play lame.

Melee fighters
Donkey Kong
Bowser
Chrom
Ike
Incineroar
Lucina
Roy

This group has it the hardest out of any that I've cleared Classic Mode with because they basically have to get up close and personal with the opponent in order to do anything.

Bowser's route is just horrible. I think 0.4 is the best I ever got on Rathalos, so it's damn near impossible to get 9.9 before the boss fight. Hopes of cheesing the Marios with Bowsercide were dashed.

The "Get Good" group
Cloud
Daisy
Fox
Inkling
Ken
Lucario
Peach
Pichu
Pikachu
Ryu
Wolf
Greninja
Diddy Kong
R.O.B.
Rosalina & Luma
Bayonetta

I didn't notice these guys having anything super busted or super safe. Their projectiles aren't as powerful or spammable, so you'll probably have to alternate between zoning and close quarters. Basically just fight normally.

Bayo might be better than I think she is, I'm **** at using her and don't really know the mechanics of her specials very well. I had a hard time beating it with her, but someone more used to her quirks will probably find it easier.

Current close calls (9.0 or higher)

Robin - 9.8
Dr. Mario - 9.8
Young Link - 9.8
Palutena - 9.7
Wii Fit Trainer - 9.7
Pit - 9.7
Yoshi - 9.7
Dark Pit - 9.6
Marth - 9.6
Ness - 9.6
Mario - 9.6
Snake - 9.5
Captain Falcon - 9.5
Samus - 9.5
Jigglypuff - 9.3
Dark Samus - 9.3
Villager - 9.2
Corrin - 9.1

There's nothing worse than getting a deathless 9.8. It just pisses me off so much.

Jigglypuff's play style is so weird, I keep being too aggressive and losing trades. I need to channel my inner Hungry Box and play more lame. Also, Sing -> Rest is a great finisher. I just need to get better landing my Rests.

Marth's route is pretty normal, but the team of ****ing Mii Gunners on Castle Seige is ****ing hell.

I don't know why Young Link's route seems so much harder than Link's. I cleared Link's a long time ago, but YL is still not coming together.

Whoa, hold up. You seem to be confusing score with Intensity.

 

[JiggyNinja]

Whoa, hold up. You seem to be confusing score with Intensity.

Indeed I am, because it's the only number I even pay attention to. I barely notice the actual "score".