Thanks Nike, that pretty much sums that up. My only disagreement is I PERSONALLY feel like Snake is down with Wario, Marth, ICs, but ALL of the evidence shows otherwise, it's just my completely unbacked personal opinion on the character.
I know Snake is without a doubt Top 4, results and data all strictly support it.
I think Browny sort of implied this, but I feel the issue lies more with pika and oli moreso than wario and ICs. Based on past precedent A tier doesnt look unappealing, but the elephant in the room has been that oli and pika have been outperforming Wario/Marth/ICs at high levels, and have been doing so for quite some time. As a minor tangent I cant speak for olimar, but Ive also seen gradual improvement in pikachus general tournament performance as well.
Not to say that olimar and pikachu shouldn't be below marth/wario/ICs, but given that if one judges entirely on tournament perfomance oli and pika would likely be above them, there should be increasingly strong arguments as to why marth/wario/ICs (as a group) should remain where they are them. In fact I'd like to hear what those are.
Regarding Marth specifically, I do feel his advantaged MUs may be overrated (I say that with no authority on the subject). However one thing I think is underrated is his MU with metaknight. Almost for this reason alone I find him to be a slightly better character then wario, and definitely better than ICs.
I'd disagree somewhat that they've been outperforming the other three. What other Pikachus are getting high placings besides ESAM? What other Olimars besides RB (and maybe Dabuz?)? In before I get shot by people who rage at me because I forgot someone.
Yes, you can say the same thing for Marth, I suppose. (Who besides Mike, really? xD) In that regard, I think arguing it based solely on placement is a bit of a moot point, because there's no distinct winner in my eyes.
As for a straight argument against Pika and Oli being above those 3, my argument would be an appeal to the criteria for our tier list itself. It's not a Tournament Rankings list, nor strictly a match-up chart. It's a combination of the two.
Not speaking for Wario and ICs, I would personally justify Marth's placement based on his tournament success being slightly higher than Oli and Pika (monetarily), while having a more concrete MU spread.
As for Marth himself, and why we don't see him place better, this is my PERSONAL OPINION on the matter:
There are a few things that make Marth very difficult to play in high levels of competition:
1) Extremely Unforgiving Error Margin
2) High MU Knowledge Requirement
3) Why wouldn't you pick MK?
To elaborate:
I feel Marth has an extremely high error margin. He's not a character that succeeds well if you find yourself throwing auto-pilot fairs. You have to maintain an extremely high level of focus in order to play him properly. I'm aware this can be said for many characters, however I always feel this particularly strongly with Marth, compared to the other characters I play.
On MU knowledge: I forget exactly it was who said it, but what tends to happen in tournament is that most Marth mains don't lose to MK, because it's a MU that's extremely commonplace and important to learn. From my impressions, you see Marth losing to his uncommon, but close Match-ups: Diddy, Dedede, ROB, DK, Wolf, etc.
The third thing is that there tend to not be many high-level Marth mains because of how similar his character is to MK. MK has almost all of the same pros, except airspeed. He sacrifices airspeed for numerous other benefits that ultimately make him a very similar, but better character. For that reason, you see a lot of Marths switch to, or co-main MK. (Zex, for example) Those that DO tend to stick with him are either very dedicated, or not necessarily high level.
I won't talk about Europe, because my knowledge of their metagame is not enough to make generic statements, but in terms of high level SOLO Marths in the US, there's really only two: MikeHaze (our flagship player) and Neo, who is just now getting back into the game after a long hiatus.
There are numerous mid-high level mains like Chaz, Nike, Pierce, Bardull and probably a few others I've forgotten (don't hate me <3), but like most normal players, they don't see those high levels of success outside of a local/regional level.
This has gotten really long-winded, so I'll cut it off here, but that's just my personal opinion and impressions on Marth US tournament presence.
Do people not even check up on this thread?
ICs and Wario have been consistently winning more money than Marth. Yeah, the most relevant thing any of them (Not counting Oli/Pika, different debate) have done is be a secondary for ally in nationals recently lol. But winning more money overall has to count for something.
And on a personal note, ICs VS MK is like barely less than even (excluding dumb stages)
Where are you seeing this, Tarmogoyf? I'm looking at John's data, and his (% of each dollar won) indicates that while he is underperforming Wario and ICs somewhat, he's still above both Pikachu and Olimar.
