Official Next Smash - Speculation & Discussion Thread

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

Dark Samus has electrical attacks, which affects things like Spirits and such. Richter's difference is also elemental, which affects certain items.

Daisy, no matter how you slice it, isn't on that level either. She's the most similar of the Echoes. And they are hardly "Costume Premium". The whole point is that they're characters who share the same bodyshape and are very easy to create using the base, while sharing the same core attributes(with minor tweaks at best, but can't be too different. Ken is an interesting case where despite his differences, he's not changed up that much. That said, his particular Echo label is a tad arbitrary, but he doesn't break the rules set in place either. His mechanic is exactly the same kind Ryu uses, but does have a few unique attributes).

The core difference with Dr. Mario is most of his attributes are changed up(though the fact he's a previous clone in Melee may be part of why), so his differences are higher than Ken data-wise. Are these enough that he should be labeled a regular clone? Not really. The Melee veteran status combined with the rest is a bit more understandable, though. Besides, if you take a look at the Tier lists, you'll notice that Ken and Ryu aren't nearly as far apart as Dr. Mario and Mario. And that's due to more functionable differences as is. That doesn't necessarily mean it should've been a different label either, but the differences are clearly higher. If Ken is the epitome of "how many differences can still be an Echo", Dr. Mario obviously wouldn't be labeled one due to more differences. And yes, it's an arbitrary limit.

Ironically, Dr. Mario did have a different weight at one point, but it's a pure PAL thing. Why they didn't keep it who knows.

 

[Arcadenik]

Ironically a mod does try to make her play differently

Snifit? Nice! That pays homage to Mario Party 3 where Snifit was Daisy’s partner in Duel Mode. I like it.

Some ideas for Daisy’s moves

Dash Attack - Flowerbed Return from Mario Power Tennis
Side Smash - Baseball Bat, Tennis Racket, Golf Club from Mario sports spin-offs
Down Smash - Crystal Smash from Mario Strikers Charged
Grab - Grappling Vine from Super Mario Bros. Wonder

B - Superball from Super Mario Land
Side+B - Snifit from Mario Party 3
Up+B - Propeller Flower from Super Mario Bros. Wonder
Down+B - Carrot from Super Mario Land 2
Final Smash - Sky Pop from Super Mario Land

 

[Guynamednelson]

Ironically a mod does try to make her play differently

Timestampped because the obvious changes don't start until her up air. Also the video doesn't show off that her side-B has a chance to misfire.

And in case you're wondering how the mod handles other non-Ken echoes:

• Lucina and Dark Samus have unique movesets
• Dark Pit is Brawl Pit with his Electroshock Arm side-B, and his neutral B's animation is changed to use his Dark Pit Staff
• Chrom is...based on his SSBU self which is enough to distinguish him from PM Roy, really.
• Simon has a different down air and down tilt involving his whip, sets it on fire for his F-Smash, and Richter has a different Holy Water based on how it works in Rondo/SotN

 

[Perkilator]

Funnily enough, my idea of a Daisy overhaul takes inspiration from Wonder to the point of making Daisy more of a semi-clone.

 

[superprincess]

Snifit? Nice! That pays homage to Mario Party 3 where Snifit was Daisy’s partner in Duel Mode. I like it.

Some ideas for Daisy’s moves

Dash Attack - Flowerbed Return from Mario Power Tennis
Side Smash - Baseball Bat, Tennis Racket, Golf Club from Mario sports spin-offs
Down Smash - Crystal Smash from Mario Strikers Charged
Grab - Grappling Vine from Super Mario Bros. Wonder

B - Superball from Super Mario Land
Side+B - Snifit from Mario Party 3
Up+B - Propeller Flower from Super Mario Bros. Wonder
Down+B - Carrot from Super Mario Land 2
Final Smash - Sky Pop from Super Mario Land

Including a reference for the sake of being a reference never leads to coherent moveset design. Daisy in SSB has flower particle effects, as she does in most games. The crystals from the 17 year old Mario Strikers game would be really random and dated. I like the Wonder stuff, namely the Propeller Flower, but the Land references are really disjointed from who Daisy is currently. Her Sarasaland past is long forgotten, as is her short-lived connection to Snifit, who appears to be a baddie and part of Bowser's army these days. He would be just as random as Toad in Daisy's moveset.

Funnily enough, my idea of a Daisy overhaul takes inspiration from Wonder to the point of making Daisy more of a semi-clone.

The specials are really solid, I especially like the Bubble idea. It's not the first time I've brought it up, but it's be such a fun move in Smash. Idk if having the smash attacks and specials use the same powerups is the best idea though.

Also if we're going for a Wonder themed kit, I think the Grappling Vine as a grab would be a really cool way to differentiate Daisy from Peach. Mario and Peach get normal grabs, whereas their P2s get tethers!

 

[Swamp Sensei]

My one issue with Daisy is that she HAD one major difference from Peach. It was her turnips. They behaved differently.


AND THEY PATCHED IT OUT!!!

Like even if it was an oversight, just keep it in. Daisy deserves SOME differences and the turnips were a game changing one.

 

[NintenRob]

My question is this, if Daisy were an alt, would she still be able to the same flower effects, unique taunts and victory animation and unique idle and run. The things that show her unique personality

 

[Swamp Sensei]

My question is this, if Daisy were an alt, would she still be able to the same flower effects, unique taunts and victory animation and unique idle and run. The things that show her unique personality

Maybe. Female Byleth does this. It's just not as fun as Daisy's.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

My question is this, if Daisy were an alt, would she still be able to the same flower effects, unique taunts and victory animation and unique idle and run. The things that show her unique personality

As long as they don't have any actual physical differences, yes. Same exact attributes(and at worst, an animation might seem slightly misleading).

That's the only way it works. Her very few slightly different animations are so hard to tell that if they worked identically to Peach's, it'd work out.

That said, I think it's better she's separate for a better costume set too. Also, yes, give those Turnips back, please(oddly, it made Daisy worse than Peach a bit more noticeably. So the major difference made her worse. Funny that).

 

[Louie G.]

I think Daisy as an echo is okay, but I really think her prominence as of late boosts her up to being a moderately high priority returnee next game. They really seem to be leaning into her harder as one of the main crew now, with a presence in promoting the theme park / she has a wristband and of course her recent appearance in Mario Wonder. I'm uncertain how late she was added last time around, but perhaps being planned from the get-go will work in her favor.

Falco feels like the most apt comparison to Daisy in my opinion. In the Star Fox series there isn't a whole lot distinguishing these two in terms of what they can do, how they fight or anything. But the Star Fox crew all has such dynamic personalities, you can garner enough from that to create more unique ways of attacking, more dynamic animations, etc in line with the way Falco is characterized. He was definitely more different in Melee from Fox than Ultimate Daisy is from Peach, but I hope that same amount of flexibility is offered to some echo fighters. They should remain derivative, but begin to work as foils instead.

So with that in mind, I would personally advocate to remove Daisy's float and give her a bit of a stronger ground game / make her more of an all-rounder. And maybe she'd have a few new attacks where she's putting up her dukes. Maybe Daisy is in some ways the punch to Peach's kick. I recognize this does demand more work and rebalancing, but that is to say I think she's a character who kinda warrants it by now. It's okay if she remains as is, I won't lose sleep over it, but I'd like to see Peach get her own Luigi as well.

We could split hairs over which changes would be best, what would suit her character etc but I just wanted to share my stance on the matter. Personally, even if Mario Land isn't as much of a defining thing with her anymore, I do like the previously suggested idea of her using carrots instead of Peach's veggies. Unlike Peach there would be no RNG, and the carrots would be heavier and take a bit longer to pluck. Leans harder into Daisy's emphasis on physical strength, her projectile has more impact at the expense of throw distance. Stuff like that.

 

[Ivander]

Maybe. Female Byleth does this. It's just not as fun as Daisy's.

That's really the thing. None of the other Alt characters, like Alph and the Koopalings, nor genderswaps were given their own unique animations from the Default until Byleth. Heck, I thought there was an article regarding Lucina where part of the reason she was made a clone and not a costume for Marth was because of her being given different idle animations and/or whatnot and removing the tipper was extra.

So maybe at the time, they really thought it necessary to make her an Echo Fighter to give her new idle animations and whatnot. Maybe they didn't want to potentially give a costume an advantageous hit box by accident or something.

 

[Laniv]

WRT Daisy: Hey, remember how Peach's custom side-b in Smash 4 left the flower effect if it landed?

It's a start.

 

[Idon]

That's really the thing. None of the other Alt characters, like Alph and the Koopalings, nor genderswaps were given their own unique animations from the Default until Byleth. Heck, I thought there was an article regarding Lucina where part of the reason she was made a clone and not a costume for Marth was because of her being given different idle animations and/or whatnot and removing the tipper was extra.

So maybe at the time, they really thought it necessary to make her an Echo Fighter to give her new idle animations and whatnot. Maybe they didn't want to potentially give a costume an advantageous hit box by accident or something.

I seriously doubt that considering we have an alt costume that makes a guy see-through:

Anyways, they absolutely could have made her an alt costume vs an echo. There is zero distinction between the properties of her as an echo vs her as a an alt costume when looking at other costumes that have every property difference that can be stated for her.

The way I see it, is making her an echo throws Daisy fans a bone as they can now claim she is a whole character now and with that comes a full set of 8 colors, which, for some reason, is now a limitation that characters have despite smash 4 having >8 colors for certain characters.

 

[Kirbeh]

With the Daisy talk, I felt like giving a semi-clone rework a shot.

Spoiler

Possible changes for Daisy in a scenario where she gets upgraded from an echo into a semi-clone.

Attribute Changes

• Loses Peach's Float
• Gains a wall jump inspired by the Wall-Climb Badge from Super Mario Bros. Wonder
• Gains a tether grab in the form of the Grappling Vine from Super Mario Bros. Wonder
• Gains a slight boost to strength and speed compared to Peach.
• Faster fall speed

Moveset Changes

Neutral Attack: Royal Chop/Royal Palm/Rump Bump - Daisy performs a quick horizontal chop, followed by a short, open palm strike and finishes with a hip thrust.

Down Tilt: Heel Kick – While crouched, Daisy turns around and thrusts her leg outward. Similar to Luigi's own D-Tilt in concept, but with greater range.

Up Smash: Ribbon Dance – Keeps the concept of the previous move, but now Daisy twirls while raising her leg to better create the “dance” part of the move in a sort of ballet inspired kick.

Forward Air: Daisy Dropkick – Daisy performs a dropkick.

Up Air: High Heel – Daisy performs a high kick in a wide arc.

Down Air: Heel Stomp – Daisy performs a single strong stomp. Doesn't spike but can be used to gain a bit of height on contact.

Grab: Daisy extends the Grappling Vine to grab opponents.

Forward Throw: Flower Dance – A giant swing style throw where Daisy twirls around swinging the opponent before launching them forward. Animation wise, it's more comparable to Sora's Back Throw rather than the more traditional Mario & Luigi giant swing Back Throws.

Up Throw: Serve Toss – Similar in function to Peach's Hand Toss up throw, however, after tossing the opponent up, Daisy will swing at them with a tennis racket to launch them higher.

Down Throw: Daisy Drop – Identical to Peach's previous down throw.

Neutral Special: Bubble – Daisy blows a bubble using the power of the Bubble Flower from Super Mario Bros. Wonder. The bubble will quickly fly forward and pop on contact, dealing light damage. Daisy can also jump off of the bubble to gain extra height and aid in recovery. (I didn't include the ability to outright trap opponents as I felt like that might be a bit overpowered.)

Up Special: Boost Spin Jump/Parachute Cap – Daisy performs a spin jump that propels her upwards, producing a swirl of flower petals at the initial point of the jump. After the jump is completed, she'll pull out a cap and use it like a parachute to slow her descent and glide.

Down Special: Return Shot - Daisy uses her tennis racket to receive and send projectiles back at opponents. I was originally hesitant on making a special based on Mario Tennis, but I think a reflector is a good move on its own and the means through which its represented is a good callback to her first playable appearance. Plus, I feel it also serves as a nice contrast with Peach whose down special is used to produce projectiles. So, while it's just generally useful, I also just like the idea of Daisy being able to launch Peach's turnips back like a pseudo game of tennis, but you know, with a turnip.

 

[Idon]

With the Daisy talk, I felt like giving a semi-clone rework a shot.

Spoiler

Possible changes for Daisy in a scenario where she gets upgraded from an echo into a semi-clone.

Attribute Changes

• Loses Peach's Float
• Gains a wall jump inspired by the Wall-Climb Badge from Super Mario Bros. Wonder
• Gains a tether grab in the form of the Grappling Vine from Super Mario Bros. Wonder
• Gains a slight boost to strength and speed compared to Peach.
• Faster fall speed

Moveset Changes

Neutral Attack: Royal Chop/Royal Palm/Rump Bump - Daisy performs a quick horizontal chop, followed by a short, open palm strike and finishes with a hip thrust.

Down Tilt: Heel Kick – While crouched, Daisy turns around and thrusts her leg outward. Similar to Luigi's own D-Tilt in concept, but with greater range.

Up Smash: Ribbon Dance – Keeps the concept of the previous move, but now Daisy twirls while raising her leg to better create the “dance” part of the move in a sort of ballet inspired kick.

Forward Air: Daisy Dropkick – Daisy performs a dropkick.

Up Air: High Heel – Daisy performs a high kick in a wide arc.

Down Air: Heel Stomp – Daisy performs a single strong stomp. Doesn't spike but can be used to gain a bit of height on contact.

Grab: Daisy extends the Grappling Vine to grab opponents.

Forward Throw: Flower Dance – A giant swing style throw where Daisy twirls around swinging the opponent before launching them forward. Animation wise, it's more comparable to Sora's Back Throw rather than the more traditional Mario & Luigi giant swing Back Throws.

Up Throw: Serve Toss – Similar in function to Peach's Hand Toss up throw, however, after tossing the opponent up, Daisy will swing at them with a tennis racket to launch them higher.

Down Throw: Daisy Drop – Identical to Peach's previous down throw.

Neutral Special: Bubble – Daisy blows a bubble using the power of the Bubble Flower from Super Mario Bros. Wonder. The bubble will quickly fly forward and pop on contact, dealing light damage. Daisy can also jump off of the bubble to gain extra height and aid in recovery. (I didn't include the ability to outright trap opponents as I felt like that might be a bit overpowered.)

Up Special: Boost Spin Jump/Parachute Cap – Daisy performs a spin jump that propels her upwards, producing a swirl of flower petals at the initial point of the jump. After the jump is completed, she'll pull out a cap and use it like a parachute to slow her descent and glide.

Down Special: Return Shot - Daisy uses her tennis racket to receive and send projectiles back at opponents. I was originally hesitant on making a special based on Mario Tennis, but I think a reflector is a good move on its own and the means through which its represented is a good callback to her first playable appearance. Plus, I feel it also serves as a nice contrast with Peach whose down special is used to produce projectiles. So, while it's just generally useful, I also just like the idea of Daisy being able to launch Peach's turnips back like a pseudo game of tennis, but you know, with a turnip.

View attachment 386057

Big fan of this idea of Daisy having more "oomph" into her general attacks and caring a little bit less about acting elegant. Very cool ideas all around.

... Honestly, I'll be fine with anything that switches her using a random blue toad as a bodyshield at least lol.

 

[Scrimblo Bimblo]

I suppose Daisy is an Echo instead of an alt costume because she's a fairly major character they wanted people to know is fully playable. Look at how many people forget that Alph is even a thing in this game.
It's not like Richter has all that many differences compared to her anyways...

As long as they don't flood the roster I think Echo fighters are actually pretty brilliant. It's all characters who wouldn't have been in otherwise (bar maybe Ken) and while they can feel a little like a compromise, they still get their own animations and voice lines and the Smash redesign which is always a treat... Plus, of course, you can play as them.
And sure, they're essentially alt costumes, but considering them as their own characters gives a bit more respect to their stories and identities I think.

 

[fogbadge]

I don't like that Daisy has zero differences from Peach

she's shorter

 

[NintenRob]

At the end of the day, Daisy is a different character to Peach with her own distinct personality. For me, that's enough to warrant her being an echo over costume

 

[Idon]

At the end of the day, Daisy is a different character to Peach with her own distinct personality. For me, that's enough to warrant her being an echo over costume

That's a low enough criteria such that every name change costume applies. And at this point, why not.

This goes back to the original point of the distinction being entirely arbitrary.

 

[Guynamednelson]

she's shorter

Technically no, they just made her idle animation look like she is.

 

[NintenRob]

That's a low enough criteria such that every name change costume applies. And at this point, why not.

This goes back to the original point of the distinction being entirely arbitrary.

I mean, Smash doesn't really do character alts very often anyway.

Koopalings are 7 different characters so having each of them would be excessive.

People already want Alph to be an echo (but also Olimar has no personality in Smash so you could put any captain over him, but maybe they should instead give him personality)

I guess the Heroes. But Dragon Quest protagonist are generally pretty muted and don't show much in the way of personality.

Oh and Steve and Alex, but they're literally just the default skins in Minecraft, I'm not even sure they even qualify as characters. Because they're just skins, you can even make Zombie and Enderman playable, no hassle.

The rest are just boy girl versions of the same character.

 

[superprincess]

Daisy being an alt of Peach would be a horrible idea. By virtue of being a Mario character, she's one of the most recognizable faces on the roster. You'd throw that out the window just because her gameplay is the same as Peach's?

I'm not defending the outcome, it's pretty jarring that some characters are such blatant copy & paste jobs. I'd like Daisy to get a few differences here and there, but even if she doesn't, demoting her to an alt would be a level of disrespect that Smash hasn't shown to any character ever.

 

[Gengar84]

I don’t really see any benefit of a character being an alt rather than an identical echo other than saving screen space for the roster. A Daisy level echo wouldn’t really take much more time or resources and we could have extra outfits for each. I’m okay with either approach given that the end result is mostly the same but I think major characters like Daisy should keep their own slot. Someone like Bill Rizer and Lance Bean are fine as alts because they play identically in their home series and I’d be happy to just see them get in at all.

 

[fogbadge]

From what I can tell from this conversation and all the subtext the best solution would be to cut Daisy. From all games

 

[Gengar84]

I will say that if we needed to cut the roster by a significant amount, I’d much rather the existing echoes, clones, and semiclones demoted to alt outfits than cut entirely. I’d rather have them keep their differences but I can accept losing those if it means being able to stay at least in some way.

 

[DarthEnderX]

I don’t really see any benefit of a character being an alt rather than an identical echo other than saving screen space for the roster.

Identical Echoes shouldn't exist.

Which doesn't mean current identical Echoes should be changed to Alts. It means they should be given changes to no longer be identical.

Daisy would be so EASY to fix too. Peach already has those alternate special moves from Smash 4. Just give Daisy some of those.

From what I can tell from this conversation and all the subtext the best solution would be to cut Daisy. From all games

Daisy is better than Peach. Cut Peach.

 

[superprincess]

Both princesses are more iconic than your favs and should stay ♡

I'll also note that besides Peach (obviously), Daisy is the most recurring female character in video games. Ever. Smash really had issues with its female representation until Ultimate, so I wouldn't be so confident in wiping Daisy off the CSS.

If you're looking for echoes to cut/turn into alts, look over to Dark Pit. He had one excuse (the Final Smash being Three Sacred Treasures) and even that doesn't hold up anymore due to Pit getting Lightning Chariot.

He's so inoffensive that I wouldn't even cut him, but some of y'all seem dead set on wanting to "trim the fat" when said "fat" takes a couple weeks' worth of work.

 

[DarthEnderX]

Both princesses are more iconic than your favs and should stay ♡

Can't argue with that.

 

[fogbadge]

I will say that if we needed to cut the roster by a significant amount, I’d much rather the existing echoes, clones, and semiclones demoted to alt outfits than cut entirely. I’d rather have them keep their differences but I can accept losing those if it means being able to stay at least in some way.

nah even that would be a waste. Some characters have way better costume options than just becoming a separate character

 

[Gengar84]

nah even that would be a waste. Some characters have way better costume options than just becoming a separate character

There’s no reason we need to stick to the 8 outfit limitation for the next game. If those characters have a lot of costume potential, give them extra alts. That said, I don’t really want anyone to be demoted, I’d just rather that than not get them at all.

 

[Perkilator]

There’s no reason we need to stick to the 8 outfit limitation for the next game. If those characters have a lot of costume potential, give them extra alts.

I’m still pissed at Ultimate’s 8-alt limitation, especially considering Little Mac had 16 alts in Sm4sh and Wario, despite having 12 alts in Brawl, was demoted to 8 in the same game.

 

[Gorgonzales]

He's so inoffensive that I wouldn't even cut him, but some of y'all seem dead set on wanting to "trim the fat" when said "fat" takes a couple weeks' worth of work.

I don't like having to do classic mode twice for some characters to get 100% completion.

 

[Gengar84]

I don't like having to do classic mode twice for some characters to get 100% completion.

I can see that as a good thing too though since that means there’s more content to enjoy if you like playing through a ton of them.

 

[fogbadge]

There’s no reason we need to stick to the 8 outfit limitation for the next game. If those characters have a lot of costume potential, give them extra alts. That said, I don’t really want anyone to be demoted, I’d just rather that than not get them at all.

well the usual reason is limited space but I take your point

 

[superprincess]

Y'all also seem to forget, or not know, that Tekken, which is another Bandai Namco developed fighting game, had identical characters with separate CSS spots, those being Kuma and Panda. They've been part of the series for ages, and only got differentiated in the recently released Tekken 8.

 

[Gengar84]

well the usual reason is limited space but I take your point

I think Ultimate actually has way more space than they ended up using. I play with mods and I added 50 extra outfit slots with their own models for certain characters with most of them having at least 10 extra. I also added over 2,000 extra songs. There are a few issues this creates though. The more content I add, the longer it takes the game to initially boot up. Second, it crashes after cycling through a set number of extra costumes but I usually get a good amount of time before that happens. Other than that, the game has no issues running fine and the battles all play perfectly fine too.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

The only time "going through Classic twice" was legitimately dumb was with things like Zelda/Sheik or Pokemon Trainer in Brawl. There was no reason not to give all the Trophies at once. All-Star was the same issue during Brawl. Melee didn't have this issue either, notably. Brawl is worse about it since that's 39 times, instead of a simple 25. It could've been easily a little over 30 instead, but nope.

Daisy at least is an entirely different slot, and they have completely different Classic Mode in Ultimate too. You're given a quite different experience Classic-wise.

There's no doubt she needs better changes, though.

But yeah, as I noted before, the fact she has any kind of differences is what makes her an automatic "can't be a costume". The Byleth costumes do not change anything but how they "look". It has 0% effect on gameplay. Even 0.0000001% counts as different. It's definitely not arbitrary. It's just poorly realized instead. Even the tiniest chance of a different result means one costume has an advantage over another. That's not really acceptable with how Smash works. Now, if we had something akin to EX Costumes that could get different results? That'd be absolutely fine! But we don't. The game is not designed that way.

 

[fogbadge]

I think Ultimate actually has way more space than they ended up using. I play with mods and I added 50 extra outfit slots with their own models for certain characters with most of them having at least 10 extra. I also added over 2,000 extra songs. There are a few issues this creates though. The more content I add, the longer it takes the game to initially boot up. Second, it crashes after cycling through a set number of extra costumes but I usually get a good amount of time before that happens. Other than that, the game has no issues running fine and the battles all play perfectly fine too.

do you mod directly to the cartridge ?

 

[NintenRob]

Smash really had issues with its female representation until Ultimate,

Until Ultimate?? Smash 4 added a ton of female fighters

Villager
Wii Fit Trainer
Best character Rosalina
Palutena
Miis
Robin
Lucina
Wendy technically
Corrin
Bayonetta


Which was a huge jump from Samus, Peach, Zelda, Samus again, Zelda again, half of Ice Climbers and maybe Jigglypuff?



Ultimate did nicely build on this though with

Female Pikachu
Pokemon Trainer
Inkling
Isabelle
Daisy
Kazooie (sort of)
Byleth
Min Min
Pyra
Mythra
Alex

 

[Gengar84]

do you mod directly to the cartridge ?

It’s through an SD card. That might have something to do with it. I suppose I never thought that point through. Still impressive how much content the game is still able to handle but I guess it doesn’t really show how much more could have fit on the cartridge itself.