On the topic of Fox/Falco hate

[TheReflexWonder]

What is wrong with his design?

If there were a problem with a character's design, wouldn't it be better to change that? If the problem is fox's usmash is poorly designed (which i don't think it is) then changing how it works is better than leaving it the way it is and making it worse.

I believe the problem lies in his relative mobility and lack of commitment. A disparity in those aspects between characters makes it so that people have to play around Fox, in similar ways to Sonic being overcentralizing, but, those are big selling points that make people want to play Fox in the first place. Dashdancing mechanics are probably the biggest culprit overall, but, it is so ingrained in competitive play that most people would see it as a travesty for it to be changed, even more so if it were actively nerfed.

With the most univerally powerful options not being created equal (by any stretch of the imagination), normalizing those aspects seems intuitive, but, it's a hard road to take. The "flavor" of a small handful of characters compared to a large majority of the cast is also at stake (it would be really weird if, say, Dedede ran as fast as PM Donkey Kong), so at least in the case of simplicity, it seems to make more sense to bring the handful of fastest characters down a notch than to bring most other characters up by one or two notches.

 

[CyberZixx]

I personality don't mind his design. I like chacters that require good tech skill but the player is rewarded for it. Like Akira in Virtua Fighter. Some think that Fox's upsmash is too strong for how easy it can be to connect with. Which is counter productive to his design of a challenging but dominant character if you master them. I kinda agree with that mindset but can live with it.

 

[Scythe]

is it just me or there less lag after fox's upsmash? Kels spams that **** in pm over and over but doesn't play like that at all in melee. Maybe people aren't used to punishing it yet in pm something. Random thought.

 

[Oro?!]

With the remnants of Brawl shielding with regards to shield knockback, I think Fox UpSmash is definitely way safer than Melee. A lot of options that could punish it in Melee, might be just short because of the shield knockback. Also people are ass at punishing it in PM.

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

Yeah plus you dont need to JC it anymore. He moves a lottt farther with the slide than in melee. It does have less relative priority, though. In melee it beat or traded with everything, but in P:M i've had certain moves straight up beat it (snake dair for example).

It was pretty safe in melee too, but for example falcon could knee OoS to punish. So far i've just wrote the "safety" off as lack of perfection in P:M mechanics/knowledge atm.


Really, i think the only problem with it now compared to melee is that you no longer have to JC it. This makes it a lot easier to get maximum distance and control your usmash in general. In melee I had worked hard to get my dashdance/pivot usmash game down and even grip changed when doing JC usmash. Now people can easily just dash->usmash and it takes much less skill, which I guess is where a lot of the complaints about it being too good for being too easy.

 

[Deleted member]

again, marth is only particularly good at low level play. once you hit a certain threshold of ability, he becomes very easy to defend against and you can make favorable trades to get ahead of him for a very long time.

i told dr pp that playing marth in this game is like playing melee marth on DL64 for every match so that's probably a good way to describe why he's worse. i'm not saying that marth is bad or that i want him changed or anything, he's just a pretty mediocre character once you know what you're doing.

 

[CyberZixx]

again, marth is only particularly good at low level play. once you hit a certain threshold of ability, he becomes very easy to defend against and you can make favorable trades to get ahead of him for a very long time.

i told dr pp that playing marth in this game is like playing melee marth on DL64 for every match so that's probably a good way to describe why he's worse. i'm not saying that marth is bad or that i want him changed or anything, he's just a pretty mediocre character once you know what you're doing.

Pardon my lack of knowledge but I don't get the DL64 comparsion. I thought the reason Marth did not like that stage was due to the height of the platforms not being controllable. I am clearly missing something here.

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

DL64 wasn't liked because the platforms aren't abusable with fsmash and otherwise the size of the stage made it hard for marth to trap people. Im not really sure I understand what he means, but something along those lines is what i'd guess.

 

[Dan Salvato]

In my opinion, a move that fits these criteria is not good design for a fighting game:

• Comes out frame 1
• Has invincibility
• Cancellable frame 4
• Starts combos
• Prolongs combos
• Combos into itself
• Sets up kill combos
• Provides infinite pressure combos
• Spikes
• 1-frame pressure escape
• 1-frame punish
• Cannot be CCed
• As a bonus, reflects all projectiles

We can talk about how "good" the characters are compared to the rest of the cast, but a move with so much brainless utility does not fit into this game, in my opinion.

 

[Scythe]

i guess wolf's shine is safe then cool

 

[Deleted member]

Pardon my lack of knowledge but I don't get the DL64 comparsion. I thought the reason Marth did not like that stage was due to the height of the platforms not being controllable. I am clearly missing something here.

Marth is much worse on DL64 because he cannot leverage stage control to the same extent as he can on smaller stages. Hitting through platforms is good at lower level play, but at higher level play your sword attacks will be respect-blocked and the lag will allow your opponents to escape that position. What I'm referring to is that good Marth play is indicative of keeping the opponent in a poor position indefinitely until he can KO them, but on larger stages and in a game with better recoveries this is much harder or not possible. For each time the opponent lives where they otherwise would not have, that player has another chance to hit Marth. The extended lifespan of the opponent translates into Marth being hit more, losing more stock, and winning fewer games. Thus, he is worse. A good player will exploit this heavily, and it makes Marth a fairly mediocre character once you know what you're doing. I think he's about average, but with proper game knowledge and good counter-picking decisions I would certainly not put Marth in the top 10, and how other players rate Marth as a character can tell you a good amount of that player's personal ability.

i guess wolf's shine is safe then cool

I would say you missed the point but you've clearly been missing the point intentionally for some time now.

 

[1MachGO]

If Fox deserves all the complaints he gets, why would I be more likely to find someone seeking MU advice for Falco, Sheik, or Jiggs (powerful match pace controllers) than I would for Fox?

 

[CyberZixx]

I agree with everything you just said. Many of the new stages are not good for Marth and it is harder to edge guard than in melee. For instance fighting Diddy on that Huge DK stage is the kind of thing he never had to deal with in melee. So you think the reason he is often put in top 10 or even top 5 is due to the quality of Marth's out there?

 

[JOE!]

If Fox deserves all the complaints he gets, why would I be more likely to find someone seeking MU advice for Falco, Sheik, or Jiggs (powerful match pace controllers) than I would for Fox?

While fox is the best, the characters here approach him in overall "goodness" but with more polarized traits.

 

[Scythe]

I agree with everything you just said. Many of the new stages are not good for Marth and it is harder to edge guard than in melee. For instance fighting Diddy on that Huge DK stage is the kind of thing he never had to deal with in melee. So you think the reason he is often put in top 10 or even top 5 is due to the quality of Marth's out there?

that's just diddy's recovery being dumb, nothing to do with marth.

 

[CyberZixx]

that's just diddy's recovery being dumb, nothing to do with marth.

Diddy was my extreme example. That stage and many other characters would work as well.

 

[Kink-Link5]

I wish every character could get free recoveries onto the stage.

 

[Deleted member]

that's just diddy's recovery being dumb, nothing to do with marth.

obviously the traits of the rest of the cast compared to marth has nothing to do with ranking the characters in terms of relative goodness like...a tier list.

/suicidal gestures

I agree with everything you just said. Many of the new stages are not good for Marth and it is harder to edge guard than in melee. For instance fighting Diddy on that Huge DK stage is the kind of thing he never had to deal with in melee. So you think the reason he is often put in top 10 or even top 5 is due to the quality of Marth's out there?

I think it's more like they don't know what they're doing, so they think Marth is better than he is. I don't think Marth is a bad character, I just don't think he's all that good either. Which is fine.

 

[The_NZA]

@Saveet
Maybe I'm wrong but I feel like DI matters a lot more for horizontal hits than Fox's usmash. If you di those fsmash's that you mentioned from the farthest end of GHZ, I promise you Ness wont die to them at the percentages you listed. I should know.

Then again, you chose a stage with some of the smallest horizontal blast zones. The informativeness of your post was appreciated, but honestly, even you have to admit your methodology is pretty biased on weighing the strengths of Fox's usmash.

 

[Raccoon Chuck]

Fox and Falco are toughies, but come on! Sheik's the new Meta Knight as far as I'm concerned.

 

[ShadoWPassoS]

Marth is much worse on DL64 because he cannot leverage stage control to the same extent as he can on smaller stages. Hitting through platforms is good at lower level play, but at higher level play your sword attacks will be respect-blocked and the lag will allow your opponents to escape that position. What I'm referring to is that good Marth play is indicative of keeping the opponent in a poor position indefinitely until he can KO them, but on larger stages and in a game with better recoveries this is much harder or not possible. For each time the opponent lives where they otherwise would not have, that player has another chance to hit Marth. The extended lifespan of the opponent translates into Marth being hit more, losing more stock, and winning fewer games. Thus, he is worse. A good player will exploit this heavily, and it makes Marth a fairly mediocre character once you know what you're doing. I think he's about average, but with proper game knowledge and good counter-picking decisions I would certainly not put Marth in the top 10, and how other players rate Marth as a character can tell you a good amount of that player's personal ability.

Man...it has been so long since i saw so much bull**** in one post.

DL64 maybe is not the best stage for marth, but is far from bad. Marth is fast, but he is not that fast, so he needs to have some space, some safe range for his sword, if he is to close to the opponent, his sword will be less effective and he will be in bad positioning compared to faster close range characters, like fox,falco. So larger stages isn't bad for marth, is acctualy good for footsies and spacing. This is what people fails to understand.

larger stages is harder for anyone to kill than smaller stages, the possibility of keeping a better pressure at small stages is a plus to marth, and not a meaning that he sucks at larger stages.

A good player will exploit this heavily, and it makes Marth a fairly mediocre character once you know what you're doing.

This is the most stupid thing that i ever read. There is nothing to "exploit" even without the good pressure of smaller stage, marth's move set is far from bad, he is still pretty fearsome, only a fool would underestimate marth. For you to say that marth is a mediocre character, you must really think that almost every character in the game have a better move sets, which is completely ridiculous; which makes me believe that you are not a good player at all.

and how other players rate Marth as a character can tell you a good amount of that player's personal ability.

 

[Handorin]

Mango said on the last Melee it on Me (or whatever scar's podcast is called) that he thinks Marth is the best character. Just sayin.

 

[Phaiyte]

This whole thread is silly. The huge reason why "noobs' " opinions aren't really taken into account as much is because they simply lack the raw knowledge of better players, and that is nothing but a fact. As elitist as it sounds, it isn't necessarily meant to be rude, just common sense. If you've never gone hunting or even shot a gun before, why should you be able to tell someone else how to handle those situations? Fox and Falco are amazing characters and nobody can deny that. But in no way should they be considered flat out OP. How often do they win tournaments currently? I've been out of the loop for awhile and I could be wrong, but as far as I remember it was mostly Bowser, Link, Wolf, and a couple others on the scene.

Against a more knowledgeable player, if you try to do not much more than usmash with Fox all day, you're gonna have a bad time.

 

[TheReflexWonder]

Mango said on the last Melee it on Me (or whatever scar's podcast is called) that he thinks Marth is the best character. Just sayin.

In Project M?

 

[Handorin]

Melee

10Melees

 

[Kink-Link5]

Mango said on the last Melee it on Me (or whatever scar's podcast is called) that he thinks Marth is the best character. Just sayin.

What was that event where Mango won going Marth the whole way through?

 

[Mithost]

This whole thread is silly. The huge reason why "noobs' " opinions aren't really taken into account as much is because they simply lack the raw knowledge of better players, and that is nothing but a fact. As elitist as it sounds, it isn't necessarily meant to be rude, just common sense. If you've never gone hunting or even shot a gun before, why should you be able to tell someone else how to handle those situations? Fox and Falco are amazing characters and nobody can deny that. But in no way should they be considered flat out OP. How often do they win tournaments currently? I've been out of the loop for awhile and I could be wrong, but as far as I remember it was mostly Bowser, Link, Wolf, and a couple others on the scene.

Against a more knowledgeable player, if you try to do not much more than usmash with Fox all day, you're gonna have a bad time.

I don't think people were saying they were "flat out OP", but alright. The discussion was about how certain moves (upsmash) were slightly over powered when put on fox, a character that already has a bunch of really good setups (upthrow>upair) and objectively the best character design in melee without Upsmash.

My point on this was that I wouldn't mind if fox had his upsmash and dominating moves IF the newly made characters didn't get nerfed to mid-tierdom if they get something that emulates the stuff fox has. Sonic's Side B was "too dominant", so they nerfed it. Fox's shine is "too dominant", yet it remains intact. I understand balance, but I believe that major nerfs were taken instead of minor ones. Did you know that Link got nerfs to his bombs from 2.1 to 2.5? In 2.1 they used to pop up in the air if you threw them into a boomerang when it was coming back to you. In 2.5, it bounces off to the side in a similar fashion to hitting a good shield. I really don't think link needed that nerf.

 

[Deleted member]

Man...it has been so long since i saw so much bull**** in one post.

You don't know what you're talking about. That's fine though, that's what the forum is for.

Marth is not fast in this game. I would say he's above average, but speed itself is a relative concept. The speed range for the characters in this game is much more normalized in Project M compared to Melee. Marth's speed in Melee was certainly good, but in this game he retains his same frame data against a relatively faster cast. Relying on his speed as a primary means to win in this game is still an acceptable strategy but you have to take it with the realization that it's not as good as it once was.

Good Marth play does not need much space from his opponent because you rarely want to space sword attacks from neutral because swinging from neutral is in itself bad in the first place. Generally, the smaller the stage for Marth the better. DL64 is as bad for Marth as he's going to be, once again because the comparison for goodness or badness is relative. On an equal note, to say that every character has a harder time killing on larger stages misses the point entirely. For an easy comparison, let's say both Fox and Marth can kill on FD with <move> at 100%, but on DL64 Fox can kill with <move> at 120% and Marth kills with his <move> at 160%+, clearly this is a bad exchange for Marth. This basic and applicable example clearly illustrates the adverse complexities of the character with respect to stage choice.

A character is hardly the sum of its move set, but if you've been playing for a week then I shouldn't need to tell you that. Suffice to say that how the character interacts with other characters, how those interactions are weighted by character favoritism/popularity for X number of reasons, the character's ability to circumvent polarizing weakness, etc. are all much more important (e.g. by this entire thread: Fox).

For me to say that Marth is a mediocre character, I must believe that approximately half of the cast to be relatively better at winning tournaments than Marth is. And I do believe that. You can post satirical pictures indicating skepticism or say that you think I'm a bad player, but at the time of this post I'm pretty sure that I'm considered the best Marth player for Project M.

Edit: For years and years, I thought Marth was the best character in Melee. This is not Melee.

 

[Scythe]

do you even enter pm tournaments? Anyways Dart is the best MW pm marth right now, not sure how he compares to the rest of the country.. Afaik there aren't too many out there.

 

[Kink-Link5]

Good Marth play does not need much space from his opponent because you rarely want to space sword attacks from neutral because swinging from neutral is in itself bad in the first place. Generally, the smaller the stage for Marth the better. DL64 is as bad for Marth as he's going to be, once again because the comparison for goodness or badness is relative. On an equal note, to say that every character has a harder time killing on larger stages misses the point entirely. For an easy comparison, let's say both Fox and Marth can kill on FD with <move> at 100%, but on DL64 Fox can kill with <move> at 120% and Marth kills with his <move> at 160%+, clearly this is a bad exchange for Marth. This basic and applicable example clearly illustrates the adverse complexities of the character with respect to stage choice.

This is exactly the idea that makes the stage good for Charizard as well. Even ignoring killing percents aside, Marth's booty recovery means he won't be living to what would otherwise be his "surviving" percents.

 

[ShadoWPassoS]

Marth is not fast in this game. I would say he's above average, but speed itself is a relative concept. The speed range for the characters in this game is much more normalized in Project M compared to Melee. Marth's speed in Melee was certainly good, but in this game he retains his same frame data against a relatively faster cast. Relying on his speed as a primary means to win in this game is still an acceptable strategy but you have to take it with the realization that it's not as good as it once was.

I think Marth's speed is good, you are just saying that he is not "fast" because you are comparing to the new buffed crew. As you said its a relative concept. But i don't see a problem here. The cast has been balanced for the melee mechanics, of course some will be faster to balance the game, but i still think marth's moves are better than most of then, and therefore far from "mediocre".

Good Marth play does not need much space from his opponent because you rarely want to space sword attacks from neutral because swinging from neutral is in itself bad in the first place. Generally, the smaller the stage for Marth the better. DL64 is as bad for Marth as he's going to be, once again because the comparison for goodness or badness is relative. On an equal note, to say that every character has a harder time killing on larger stages misses the point entirely. For an easy comparison, let's say both Fox and Marth can kill on FD with <move> at 100%, but on DL64 Fox can kill with <move> at 120% and Marth kills with his <move> at 160%+, clearly this is a bad exchange for Marth. This basic and applicable example clearly illustrates the adverse complexities of the character with respect to stage choice.

This is not about good or bad play, its about play style. You probably don't play others fighting games at high level, do you ? if you do, you are just ignoring the fact that spacing is something very important, even for smash. Not from neutral, but from Fairs to keep pressure without being grabbed, or get hit as you land, for exemple. You say DL64 is a bad exchange for Marth solely in the ability to score a kill, but is not that simple. in DL64 im able to do chaingrabs because it is large, it is also easier to escape from pressure. In a smaller stage like battlefield or yoshi story i have to exploit the vunerability frames of the raising animation. which is not hard, and you could say that is more effective, but this stages are also dangerous, you could die with fox up smash/Uair at 80%, he could hit 2 shines and you would be already off the stage, in a very bad postion.

You can say that marth's problem is not with the size of the stage, but the size of the limit.

A character is hardly the sum of its move set, but if you've been playing for a week then I shouldn't need to tell you that. Suffice to say that how the character interacts with other characters, how those interactions are weighted by character favoritism/popularity for X number of reasons, the character's ability to circumvent polarizing weakness, etc. are all much more important (e.g. by this entire thread: Fox).

Move set is very important, and some of things you just said are part of the move set mechanics. Let me make it clear if you don't understand. (fighting games oriented)

How the character interacts with other characters ? how his moves behaves on hit against others, how it behaves when other character hits at the same time, therefore the priority of attacks, how it behaves when the enemy block, and etc.

How a character will minimize his weakness ? with the character proprieties witch essentialy is: character speed, character attack speed, and character ABILITES.

Yet you are trying to say that marth is BAD ?

For me to say that Marth is a mediocre character, I must believe that approximately half of the cast to be relatively better at winning tournaments than Marth is. And I do believe that. You can post satirical pictures indicating skepticism or say that you think I'm a bad player, but at the time of this post I'm pretty sure that I'm considered the best Marth player for Project M.

Edit: For years and years, I thought Marth was the best character in Melee. This is not Melee.

So lets see if i understand your logic. Marth is not the same as he is in melee because you belive the buffed crew is better than him ? is that it ? or did he somewhat got nerfed ? in his moves, his survival, etc ? Project M makes him die easier? lol

If you don't mind i would like you to show me some of the "better at wining tournaments" than marth and why.

 

[Bryonato]

Does it not make sense to judge a character's goodness based off of how well they compare to the remainder of the cast...? Don't see why that is hard to understand. I don't think Umbreon is saying Marth is bad, he's just saying there's a lot more good characters and even the "bad" characters aren't that far behind Marth.

 

[Oro?!]

Marth IS bad on DL64. He is probably also terrible on Rumble Falls. Good things most tourneys have multiple bans and the majority of stages have short platforms and small blastzones.

 

[Deleted member]

"Play style" is a dangerous excuse to justify sub-optimal play. You should do yourself a favor and adopt the notion that anything other than the best decision is a mistake. You have no idea what you're talking about and you're just saying things.

If anyone else wants me to explain anything else further for the sake of the public audience, I will do so on request. I don't see a fruitful reason to debate with someone who is not willing to learn.

 

[Scythe]

I think that are a great deal of characters now that are on marth's level but he is still above them tier list wise.

 

[JOE!]

@ShadowPasso:

What Umbreon is saying is that while Marth is still as good as he was in melee, there are a whole new slew of stages and characters to interact with that make him more "average" than his showing in melee.

A good analogy would be say, if Marth were a sports car. He has great performance and in the tracks in melee vs the other cars he generally outperformed all but the high-octane racers with the Shine, Needle and Sleepy logos.

Project M introduced new tracks and other cars. Some tracks allow other cars to perform just as well as the Marthmobile or even better (the dirt road track favors the ATV types nore than the sports car), and other cars are simply at his level but through different means such as more acceleration, better fuel economy, etc. Marth is just the same, but the playing field he used to blaze through has changed for him, and there is new competition beyond the same handful he raced against last time.


@petpeeve:

Little off topic, but going back to the thread's main topic, am I the only one who gets annoyed when people say things such as "oh, grab them out of shield" "characters are X and Y at Z". Uhm, who?

It grinds my gears when this is used to say why certain situations are the way they are since nearly every character has a different attribute for the situation you speak of. Who exactly can escape that pressure? Who can grab in that situation reliably, who can't? Who do you think is better or worse than who?

Anyways, expanding on the matchup question posed earlier:

Fox has a good option for nearly every situation, not always a great one, but he always has something he can do to press an advantage if done well. This is what makes him the best, as while other characters will go head to head with him, he will eventually press something that will give him an edge (which is why the silly-strong Up smash is a topic of ire, he has so much going on for him that such a reward is a bit excessive given how he can attain it).

Falco, Shiek, Puff, etc have good options for most things, ok in some, and GREAT in some. The GREAT areas are what cause people to loathe the MU with them as that GREAT could overpower their character's options / abilities more severely than most things Fox can do, thus pressing an advantage much more severely and causing a frustrating matchup.

While Shiek is fine, and Puff is another topic altogether, I think we may have come to a conclusion about fox in that he just needs a little less reward given the "ease" of his activity? That said, why not look at the other spacey for a bit and discuss what people see wrong with the bird?

 

[Phaiyte]

I don't think people were saying they were "flat out OP", but alright. The discussion was about how certain moves (upsmash) were slightly over powered when put on fox, a character that already has a bunch of really good setups (upthrow>upair) and objectively the best character design in melee without Upsmash.

My point on this was that I wouldn't mind if fox had his upsmash and dominating moves IF the newly made characters didn't get nerfed to mid-tierdom if they get something that emulates the stuff fox has. Sonic's Side B was "too dominant", so they nerfed it. Fox's shine is "too dominant", yet it remains intact. I understand balance, but I believe that major nerfs were taken instead of minor ones. Did you know that Link got nerfs to his bombs from 2.1 to 2.5? In 2.1 they used to pop up in the air if you threw them into a boomerang when it was coming back to you. In 2.5, it bounces off to the side in a similar fashion to hitting a good shield. I really don't think link needed that nerf.

Taking care of Fox is about as easy as taking him to a stage with a high ceiling. I don't know if HT64 is played much in tournaments, but if I'm against a Fox and I'm not Fox, I'll take him there every time. Bowser, Marth, and several other members of the cast have plenty of advantages over him in so many different stages. Fox simply excels at gimping and vertical kills. You play around that, your win rate will sky rocket. Usmash is in fact a great kill move and nobody's going to argue with that. But it's not like any good player over centralizes on that single move unless he's up against the slidier characters like Luigi and Lucas, because those particular characters slide a lot on a shield hit making it relatively safe, but it's not like it's safe to just spam it over and over. Luigi can over prioritize it with a Fair and Lucas can do the same with good spacing and a Fsmash to parry. Bowser can literally power through it with a side B. When you're playing the game, don't think about what a move can do to you all the time. That's a waste of time and won't get you anywhere. Think more about what you can do to those moves. There are plenty of options. Use them.

 

[ShadoWPassoS]

"Play style" is a dangerous excuse to justify sub-optimal play. You should do yourself a favor and adopt the notion that anything other than the best decision is a mistake. You have no idea what you're talking about and you're just saying things.

If anyone else wants me to explain anything else further for the sake of the public audience, I will do so on request. I don't see a fruitful reason to debate with someone who is not willing to learn.

I knew that you would say that. I understand your robotic view of "optimaizing what is good", but let me just ask you something: there is only one way to play at high level ? funny that you are so worried about doing the "best decisions" all time and yet you have a quote that says: "Playing to win is a terrible philosophy". lol

And don't get me wrong, please, i'm willing to learn, tell me why half the crew are better than marth, please.

 

[Deleted member]

in order, yes, then no.

 

[JOE!]

so wait, you bring up that "blahdy blah are better", then dont say who?

*points up to pet peeve post...*