I haven't really played and/or seen all the characters in action enough yet to have an educated guess as to where I believe all the characters might belong in a potential tier list; so I'm only going to try to place the characters I'm most familiar with in spots where they might end up. This tier list based on 1v1 matches with no items or final smashes. I'll also mention some of the reasons why I believe certain characters are placed where they are.
Potential Top:
Pit- Strong, quick attacks, decent speed, along with a really good projectile make pit definitely one of the best (if not THE best) characters in the game. About the only thing I can say bad about him is that his up B can be gimped. He's almost impossible to go off the stage and edge guard against, even with Metaknight!
Marth- Even though he definitely plays differently than the last game, he's still a force to be reckoned with. He still has good speed, quick attacks, and a decent range with his sword. The tip of the sword is still scary as hell! Characters with projectiles still mess up his approach, but good luck trying to get past his sword to get in close for a kill!
Toon Link- From what I've seen so far, Toon Link is a beast! All of his air attacks seem to have good speed, range, priority, and KO potential. He has good speed, some decent ranged attacks, a recovery that can get back from just about anywhere, and a good amount of moves with KO potential. He also has better reach with his sword than expected for a character of his height with such a small sword. About the only bad thing about him is his low weight.
Could be Top, could be High:
Fox- Yes, his upsmash and up-air were both nerfed a bit, but upsmash is still an extremely strong KO move. It can star KO Dedede at about 110%. Also, his other smash attacks are stronger now and are all pretty good KO moves. His bair is also a great KO move. He is also one of the fastest characters in the game (3rd I think?). Granted, his shine-spike isn't what it used to be, but with all these good KO moves that he has now, it seems less important.
King Dedede- I think a lot of people are going to be very surprised with the King. If you're playing any of the characters that can be chain grabbed, the match is basically over before it started. If you're one of the characters that aren't, you've still got a very difficult and frustrating match ahead of you. He is incredibly difficult to approach. He has one of the best keep-away games in the game thanks to his ftilt and incredible grab range. He even has a ranged attack to further increase his keep-away game! He's heavy, can float, actually has some quick, strong KO attacks (uptilt for instance), and is extremely difficult to edge-guard due to the invincibility frames in his upB. Expect a match far different than anything you've experienced when facing the King! Falco, Wolf, and the fliers seem to be extremely strong against him, however.
Wolf- This guy is a beast! Literally! He has quick, strong attacks with excellent reach, and has a good land speed for how hard he hits. I haven't really seen how good he is against some of the better characters, but I have seen enough to know that he's definitely a really good character. His recovery is horrible by the way!
Potential High:
Metaknight- This character can attack quick! He definitely has some of the quickest moves in the game! He will hit often, but his hits don't do a ton of damage. Although he doesn't have any long-range attacks, his neutral B protects him from most projectiles and is a great approach against anyone who tries to camp him. He definitely is one of the best characters at edge guarding thanks to his ability to fly and good range with most of his attacks. He definitely can hang with just about any character and put up one hell of a fight, although the characters I have listed above him seem to have a slight advantage over him in certain areas. His light weight and a limited amount of KO moves are about the only thing that hurts him.
R.O.B. This is another character that I think people will be surprised about. He's fairly heavy, has a good recovery, has some good long range attacks that can KO, and has some quick and powerful KO moves. I also need to mention that his dsmash is super-quick and makes him hard to get close to. He is also very good at edge-guarding with his long-range attacks, especially with his laser if you can aim it well. It comes out extremely quick and because of that is extremely difficult to air dodge. It's hard to tell at this point where he'll land on the tier list.
Snake- He's heavy (3rd heaviest?), has extremely good projectiles, lots of strong KO moves, and is generally a tricky character to play against. He's so incredibly different from any other character in this game that it's hard to tell where he'll end up landing in a tier list. There are so many different ways to play him! Playing against him is also another match that will be different from any match you've ever played. If he controls that pace of the match consider yourself done for! If you keep constant pressure on him and keep an eye on him and where he lays mines, however, it's going to be difficult for him to win. Really, he could end up anywhere on the tier list, for now, I think high is the best fit.
Falco- This is definitely a new Falco in this game. Almost all his attack moves are new, and his sideb now has better recovery range. He also has a new shine. His new shine also adds another element to his strategy. It has extremely good range and makes him much harder to approach. He is still pretty good at dishing out damage, but seems much harder to kill with, due to the slow speed of his fsmash, which is his strongest KO attack. He's still a decent character, but I currently don't feel he belongs higher than high tier.
Ike- This guy's power is scary! No character can make you pay for a mistake better than he can! His attacks aren't exactly the fastest in the game, so he won't be throwing/landing many attacks, but he only needs to land a few to kill. As you play smart with him and don't try to force openings that aren't there, you can expect to win some matches with him for sure! He's not the best character, but I think he's better than average.
Diddy Kong- Diddy's good land speed and quick attacks make him a pretty good character. His banana game is very good (and very annoying) against anyone not used to them. Once you get used to them, however, they're not much of a problem. Since this game makes catching and picking up items so much easier, it's easy to pick up and use the bananas against Diddy. They definitely still have their uses, just don't expect spamming bananas to be a winning strategy. He also lacks very many KO moves. Overall though, he's still better than average.
Could be High, could be Mid:
Zelda- Zelda is much better in this game than last! She has a lot of strong KO moves this time around and Din's Fire is now a beast! It's one of the best edge guarding moves in the game! Her smash moves for the most part seem very strong, deal lots of damage, but seem to come out slow. I think this is another character that's more suited for a smart player. While not for everyone, this character could be deadly in the right hands.
Sheik- With her air moves being so incredibly nerfed, don't expect to KO until higher percentages. It seems that upsmash and dsmash are now her best KO options, but they still need to be at high percentages to kill. Despite all of this, she still has an extremely good ground game and is definitely capable of dishing out a good deal of damage. Also, now that Zelda is better, it makes the character a little more adaptable. While she might not be a great character, I definitely think she's still better than average.
Mr. Game and Watch- G&W is a much better character this time around. He's not as light this time and has some extremely strong KO moves along with decent priority. He'll definitely be higher on the tier list this time, I'm just not sure where.
Pikachu- Pikachu has definitely improved since last game. Downb is crazy now, good luck attacking him from above, and his dsmash can deal out good damage fast! He's also still quick and shouldn't be underestimated. I think he definitly has some potential to be a decent character.
Potential Mid:
Mario- He just seems so...average, and I'm not sure what I think about his new downb...
Potential Low:
Link- He definitely has better range with his sword. His recovery seems horrible, and he now has less range with upb and his grab. His attacks are fairly slow, and don't seem to have much KO potential, and his new boomerang is pretty horrible. All the boomerang pretty much does is bring opponents closer and free to attack, ouch... Luckily, us Link fans have Toon Link!
Ganondorf- He's still EXTREMELY powerful and heavy, but that's about all he has going for him. His power makes him fun to play, but fun doesn't mean good. Hopefully someone can figure out how to make him playable, but right now he just seems WAY too slow in both move speed and running speed. If it's a power you seek to use, right now I would suggest using Ike instead...
Like I said earlier, these are just my current opinions. I'm sure they'll change once new glitches and techniques are found and once I look into some other characters more... Really when it comes down to it, any character could end up being the best.This game seems to be a little more balanced this time, so it's definitely hard to predict tier locations. Only time will tell who ends up where...
