Meta Pound 2016 Competitive Impressions

[Charoite]

Mewtwo and Toon Link weren't considered consensus high tiers before now. Tink was borderline high, and Mewtwo's position in light of his buffs was uncertain.

Mewtwo was still debatable, but toon link has getting good results for a while.

 

[wedl!!]

#dropyourmidtiers
#makebetterlifedecisions

B-but they're carried by DLC!!!

 

[Das Koopa]

Saj was definitely carried a bit. Pug more or less outplayed him the whole set but basic mistakes cause absurd punishes no other character can do as safely/reliably. Really stupid, but it's not like he'll win. Pink Fresh is a significantly better player with a much better chance of taking it.

 

[sedrf]

B-but they're carried by DLC!!!

A little defensive are we

 

[wedl!!]

this community is cancer

 

[Jehtt]

Who did Scatt lose to in winners?

 

[Y2Kay]

Who did Scatt lose to in winners?

Void iirc

 

[sedrf]

this community is cancer

That was out of no where

 

[Y2Kay]

That was out of no where

my lord she's joking man lol

 

[Shaya]

this community is cancer

Declaration of Indulgence

Saj was definitely carried a bit. Pug more or less outplayed him the whole set but basic mistakes cause absurd punishes no other character can do as safely/reliably. Really stupid, but it's not like he'll win. Pink Fresh is a significantly better player with a much better chance of taking it.

Eh, it was more frustrating to me to see that Marth got out buttoned/zoned/footsied just by Bayo down tilt and neutral air.... like, that's marth's poking niche moves right there and Bayo completely out classed him >_<
Truly going for max disjoint spacing only leaves Marth extremely vulnerable to side-b or witch time shenanigans, it's harsh.
And this is probably one of Bayo's more difficult match ups.

 

[deepseadiva]

I'm pretty impressed with Saj so far. Very patient and composed player, just watching his actions at the beginning of a match and after KOs. Not to mention its clear he's squeezing everything he can out of Bayonetta, the labbing is apparent.

I agree with Shaya Marth did look like trouble throughout the matches. Definitely not free by any means.

Meanwhile the other Marth in top 16, False, man that last match against Larry was sad to watch.

 

[Shaya]

Players who I'll be shocked (like, absurdly shocked, bar some noticeably extreme choking; shocked to the extent at which I'll rant about it for years to come) to ever see lose to Marth in tournament [wiiu] because he's still worse than anything he could produce in Brawl:
Larry Lurr
Tyrant
Mew2King
Nairo

He's finally showing competency as a threat, but he's still a mostly "conquered"* character at top levels of play by quite a large generation of still active and relevant players.

* I would say the same curse applies heavily to Olimar who is [still] strictly worse at everything than his Brawl incarnation as well. Perhaps Wario as well.

 

[|RK|]

Damn. Nairo doesn't seem so hot recently (even pre-nerf)...

 

[ARISTOS]

For all the ******** about , so far she has proven herself to be... just another top tier result-wise

Tournament is shaping up to be interesting and the nerfing of old threats is reshaping our meta as we speak. Players we thought of as dominant no longer look as such when their top tier tools are taken away.

 

[NairWizard]

this community is cancer

I just gotta say, the real cancer is people callously using the word cancer to refer to strictly non-cancerous things.

It's not about political correctness. It's about a real disease that ruins lives, people, think twice before you throw out that word.

(not calling you out in particular, as in my book you are a cool poster; it's an e-culture thing that I felt obligated to remind people about)

 

[Y2Kay]

Yeah, I actually had to miss my local today to accompany my grandmother on a Brest Cancer Awareness Marathon.

A few of my folks have had it, and it.....is some messed up, scary stuff. But, I'm sure you guys know this already.

Kinda wish people didn't forget how serious it is. Nothing this game or community could throw at me is nothing compared to it. It helps me stay a little determined though.

 

[bc1910]

So this tourney, notably does better than and does as well as . He also outplaced solo .

notably does worse than and slightly worse than . Shoutouts to who is either underrated or ScAtt is just amazing.

Not a bad placement for him considering the characters he outplaced. But I think he needed to get at least 17th. It's also very disappointing to see him lose to Sheik and Sonic (his two worst MUs) while Aba/M2 plough through the exact same players and characters. Very sad he lost to K9, it's not like he doesn't know the MU either, it might still be really bad.

In fairness I don't think this will be detrimental to his tier position but it looks like TL and Mewtwo are a cut above. MM should be considered as a new high tier rival as well.

Also, wow, no Diddy in top 16.

 

[wedl!!]

I just gotta say, the real cancer is people callously using the word cancer to refer to strictly non-cancerous things.

It's not about political correctness. It's about a real disease that ruins lives, people, think twice before you throw out that word.

(not calling you out in particular, as in my book you are a cool poster; it's an e-culture thing that I felt obligated to remind people about)

I never use the word cancer like that, I was just in a really bad mood and lashing out my pent up anger. My apologies.

 

[IsmaR]

Damn. Nairo doesn't seem so hot recently (even pre-nerf)...

He did manage to win Doubles, at least.

Hilariously enough, his partner played Doc last match.

 

[Browny]

I just gotta say, the real cancer is people callously using the word cancer to refer to strictly non-cancerous things.

It's not about political correctness. It's about a real disease that ruins lives, people, think twice before you throw out that word.

(not calling you out in particular, as in my book you are a cool poster; it's an e-culture thing that I felt obligated to remind people about)

Yeah it bugs me too, I get ashamed if I accidentally say it in that way and try to not say it.

To be fair though, 'cancerous' as an adjective is, and has been used as a way to describe bad things for many years
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/cancerous

People saying 'X is cancer' are completely wrong, because its not cancer, it has nothing to do with it. Describing something as cancerous is somewhat legitimate. If I am around people who describe various things in video games like 'r4pe' and 'cancer' I don't tell them to stop because its offensive because many of these stupid little kids take that as a joke 'I can say what I want' etc. But if you educate them that they are using the wrong word, and they look like an idiot for continuously saying the wrong word, that may work a little better. I think so anyway.

People love to rip on anyone who says 'alot' and it should be the same with people using cancer as an adjective.

 

[TheMiSP]

So basically this tournament reminds us of who the top tiers are (even tho Diddy isn't in top 16, but it's fine imo) and gives us a general idea of who the high tiers are and which of them gets more results/does better compared to the other high tiers.

 

[TDK]

"Yoshi has no results"

After almost a year of deriding him because of this (one top 8 in all of 2015) it looks like we're finally getting somewhere. Same with Mewtwo, Toon Link, and Greninja. Possibly Mega Man too, but I'm not sure if that's just ScAtt and we have another case of Brawl Pokémon Trainer and TheReflexWonder.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Similar as how the community used to call defensive/passive game "gay" and made a lot of people upset, the word "cancer" is spread and used with an unique meaning in the gaming context; it is not attacking individuals, nor has the intent of shaming gay people or people with cancer.
It's simply a word thrown out a bit too lightly, and might get into sensitive people, but it is always important not to take anything said in the internet as personal (unless specified).

Not to derail the thread any more I'll just add that it is near impossible to moderate the usage of words like that, so other than just frowning to their usage and recognize them as bad argumentation (I'm looking at you, "JANK"), we can do next to nothing about regulating its use. But we can be good posters and avoid using them.


On-Topic:
I really wish we get the whole Losers bracket on stream, it is stacked as hell and I'd love to watch all of these matches.

 

[Luco]

That'd be really interesting to see NAKAT go Ness against Pikachu, seeing as ESAM thinks it's one of Pika's worst MUs.

 

[NairWizard]

Similar as how the community used to call defensive/passive game "gay" and made a lot of people upset, the word "cancer" is spread and used with an unique meaning in the gaming context; it is not attacking individuals, nor has the intent of shaming gay people or people with cancer.
It's simply a word thrown out a bit too lightly, and might get into sensitive people, but it is always important not to take anything said in the internet as personal (unless specified).

Not to derail the thread any more I'll just add that it is near impossible to moderate the usage of words like that, so other than just frowning to their usage and recognize them as bad argumentation (I'm looking at you, "JANK"), we can do next to nothing about regulating its use. But we can be good posters and avoid using them.


On-Topic:
I really wish we get the whole Losers bracket on stream, it is stacked as hell and I'd love to watch all of these matches.

You're right that it's not meant to be aggressive or personal, and that's precisely why calling it out when it's seen is useful. Most people use the word without thinking about it. But when it's pointed out to them, they take care not to use it that way again the next time they want to express a similar sentiment. Believe it or not, having this discussion at all helps to mitigate the problem (if it didn't, I wouldn't bring it up).

e.g., it's because people "got upset" that the word "gay" has been mostly phased out of discussion in the context of smash and other game communities, which is entirely a good thing.

Being thick-skinned is practically a requirement for participating in Internet discussion, but that should never justify insensitivity (whether purposeful or not).


--

Since the off-topic cancer discussion has worn its course, I'd like to point out that (through ESAM) disappoints once again, for the same reason that he always does: he just can't KO at all. Getting your opponent to 110 quickly with strings and edgeguards and a strong neutral but then being unable to finish the job is a massive problem. Sheik players are feeling the sting of it too, but Sheik has one distinct advantage over Pikachu in this regard, and that's an aerial KO move in Bouncing Fish and up-air.

We like to focus a lot on grounded kill confirms especially from grabs but the ability to just throw out a move in the air and have it net a stock is also vital. You can't shield when you're in the air, you can only airdodge or aerial, both of which have limited durations, so if your aerial option is read/called out and responded to it doesn't save you from death. Consequently characters with trouble KOing on the ground can just hit you to the air (grabbing and throwing even works) and then try to read your option.

Of all the characters in this game with KO'ing trouble, Pikachu is the only one who lacks an aerial that reliably kills. Not even Yoshi or Bowser Jr. have quite the same problem. Mario comes close, but his up-smash is so good in so many situations that he manages to slide by on the KO issue even though on paper he looks like he has trouble KOing.

For Pikachu to kill you, he needs to read a roll or a spotdodge, which is much harder than reading an airdodge or an aerial option because his opponent can just stubbornly refuse to roll or spotdodge. Shield is strong enough to cover the absence of the other options, while (meanwhile) there's no "air-shielding." All Pikachu does by grabbing you over and over and over again is... build your Rage, and enable you to kill him faster.

The character really struggles to do much of anything meaningful, and it's obvious why.

 

[bc1910]

Pika did well this tourney. Two top 16 appearances (one solo, one secondary) and other Pika players making it out of pools isn't meaningful?

The character has clear issues killing and obviously isn't top tier, but he still looks like one of the best high tiers. His best placements are purely down to ESAM but that can be said of a lot of high tiers at this point such as Mewtwo/Abadango, Greninja/iStudying and Villager/Ranai. IMO this isn't a good tourney to cite if you're trying to argue against Pika being a good character.

Does anyone know if Abadango used MK or Mewtwo against Seagull and K9?

 

[Yikarur]

I love the character diversity
Sheik still best character? 8)

 

[Das Koopa]

random things before I go talking about brackets

1: ヽ༼ຈل͜ຈ༽ﾉ raise your abadongers ヽ༼ຈل͜ຈ༽ﾉ

2: Nairo was literally outplayed by Robin playing Robin. I think it's the ghost of his TBH5 Robin come back to haunt him in player form.

Anyway, I agree with Mew2King that Tweek has a good bracket to take the tourney, and I think if he can get past Marss he could potentially have an upset on Dabuz due to the matchup. It'd be even easier if Abadango goes Meta Knight for the Rosalina matchup and upsets Dabuz - he'd effectively be taking out a powerhouse without being a huge threat to Tweek, as Abandango would inevitably get beaten by Ally or VoiD imo. Since VoiD has Mewtwo experience, the latter's probably the worst one to go up against.

Bayo stuff:

I don't see how Pink or Saj (the Bayo mains) go much farther. I feel like Saj played sloppy towards the end of Top 32 bracket (that could be rectified with some sleep, of course - long days take tolls on players, especially for ones not used to going so far at such large events) and Pink has a tall, tall order ahead of him with Marss, Tweek, and Dabuz all probably waiting in the wings.

Bayonetta seems to be a character that has a high dropoff rate the deeper the tourney goes. We have 5 Bayos going into Top 96 and now we only have 2 in Top 16, one of whom is on Loser's.

Bayo clearly needs nerfing for game design reasons but she's not the SS+ tier character people are scared of, and I think people are failing to make a distinction of Bayonetta carrying players in certain area of a match by masking flubs and Bayonetta straight-up making bad players "good". I don't think the latter happens much at all, as Saj and Pink Fresh are hardly no-names or bad players. (Like I said, I think Saj played subpar vs. Pug, but that's tourney fatigue/matchup unfamiliarity with Bayo's toolkit allowing him to endure through missteps)


No Diddies in Top 16 is very surprising tbh considering how well he does on a regional level and considering the bonkers neutral game he has (maybe the best in the game, or shared best with Sheik?)

Mewtwo in Top 16 is a good showing because the "results" he had prior were a lot of 13th/9th placings at regionals iirc which doesn't prove anything about his viability, but Abadango thankfully proved Mewtwo is a decent-good character, even more impressive that he's coming from winners side.

"Yoshi has no results"

After almost a year of deriding him because of this (one top 8 in all of 2015) it looks like we're finally getting somewhere. Same with Mewtwo, Toon Link, and Greninja. Possibly Mega Man too, but I'm not sure if that's just ScAtt and we have another case of Brawl Pokémon Trainer and TheReflexWonder.

I think dead Sheik might be helping a lot of character's causes, including Yoshi's. Raptor probably would be in Top 16 but ESAM most likely has intricate matchup knowledge since he plays Yoshi on the side.

 

[NotLiquid]

After that insane Pink Fresh combo on Mr. R into the horizontal blast zone I do feel like I have to concede just a little bit to the tired old "what if better players played her" argument, and I mean that in the most positive way, because that was the first time in a long time where Bayonetta seemed to exhibit shades of being a crazily optimized beast. Not to take anything away from Pink Fresh of course because I still maintain that he's among a similar breed of players like Tweek who were great players held back by character picks, but right now he, and perhaps 9B and Saj, are really the only ones leading the charge with Bayonetta. As much as there's no denying how good she is on a surface level I wonder whether the lack of something like pocket counters featuring her, at least at a rate that mirrors Cloud, is slowing down her development proportionally - and some part of me kind of wonders whether or not many players shy away from her due to the stigma she's gained.

Inversely it's becoming more interesting to see players now deal with the matchup a little better. I suppose Top 16 will prove where Pink Fresh and Saj overall lie on the pecking order as players. If any of those two get into Top 8 I feel like it ought to lay to rest whether or not these players get by purely on character pick, but the idea that she's a toxic fixture on this game's meta is kind of losing sympathy to me. It's become no less disingenuous than the people who claimed ZeRo was only carried by playing a flowchart Diddy really well.

 

[Trifroze]

Pink Fresh is the only Bayo going into Top 16 through winners

Good news for meta health

Doesn't really change anything since a character doesn't have to get top placings to be bad for the meta. You could make a character that automatically wins the match immediately 10% of the time, but if this outcome doesn't trigger their actual tools are only average. Statistically this character would likely never win a large tournament but would still be terrible for anyone who's tournament run ends because of the 10% autowin mechanic.

 

[ShadowGuy1]

I think we have some take aways so far:

is a high tier, perhaps a higher high tier if Abadango makes winners Top 8, or top 8 in general
is a low key threat, will rise, but I want to talk about something else later on.
is NOT a tier of her own, but she is still an amazing character.
starting to get decent results, I think Smash god got 33rd or something like that.
is clearly at least a high mid. People have been sleeping on Megaman
is better than we all thought getting 17th
is getting results now, slowly with Raptor at 17th, but still its coming.
we had soo many Greninja player make it out of pools and do other things, so I think people will see him as a high tier, that or a high mid for sure.
despite what Mew2King said, he is still a shining character and is a top 5 threat as seen from Tweek.
despite Nairo getting like ninety something, Mars has been showing that the nerfs did not really hurt her all that much, making her a top 5 character
is still alive, but not as much as as we saw with Mr.R vs Pink Fresh
is still amazing and top 5 despite not getting top 16.
Hyuga is not a one time wonder, and is able to show all of us that Toon Link is high tier for those who disagree(i thought he ws high tier since Genesis)
has two reps in top 16. He is not top tier, but he is still a good character and is not underepresentated.
is a really nice counterpick for Bayonetta and is still striving in the meta.

 

[bc1910]

This is actually a disappointing tourney for Corrin. Her pre-patch results were arguably better and she only got 33rd as SMASH G0D's secondary. I think this is just more evidence of her almost-inevitable decline toward low high/high mid.

 

[ShadowGuy1]

This is actually a disappointing tourney for Corrin. Her pre-patch results were arguably better and she only got 33rd as SMASH G0D's secondary. I think this is just more evidence of her almost-inevitable decline toward low high/high mid.

I thought that was where most people placed her? I mean at Avalon, European major (I think it was a major) she got 17th with a Solo Main.

 

[bc1910]

I thought that was where most people placed her? I mean at Avalon, European major (I think it was a major) she got 17th with a Solo Main.

A lot of players put (or were putting) her between 10th and 15th, when realistically I feel she's more like 20th.

Avalon is a Netherlands national generally dominated by the same three players (Mr R, iStudying and S1-14), and two of them weren't in attendance. Gets about 125 entrants. You want top 16 minimum to really prove anything there, preferably top 8.

 

[Mario766]

Dabuz continues his undefeated streak beating Ikes.

But this time San took game 1 and got Onion Ringed all the way to the losers bracket only to face every Ike's nightmare


Meta Knight.

Oh

and Rango got Diddy'd.

That **** ain't fun. Can we stop getting Dabuz every 2nd round of pools early.

 

[teddystalin]

This is actually a disappointing tourney for Corrin. Her pre-patch results were arguably better and she only got 33rd as SMASH G0D's secondary. I think this is just more evidence of her almost-inevitable decline toward low high/high mid.

This is like saying Genesis 3 was a disappointing tournament for Greninja and clear evidence that he'll never be high tier - of course a character's results look bad when none of their best reps are at a tournament.

Still a little disappointing to see SmashGod leading with Kirby every set smh

 

[valakmtnsmash4]

https://twitter.com/AllyOrNotAlly/status/716284849645088768?lang=en

Classic Ally.
So zinoto has been saying diddy beats bayo pretty convincingly and everyone will have a pocket diddy by the end of the tournament. Bananas hinder bayo alot, and sonic's infamous lame play can hurt bayo too. I think you need speed and a certain level of being campy to do well against bayonetta.

 

[Jalil]

Pika did well this tourney. Two top 16 appearances (one solo, one secondary) and other Pika players making it out of pools isn't meaningful?

The character has clear issues killing and obviously isn't top tier, but he still looks like one of the best high tiers. His best placements are purely down to ESAM but that can be said of a lot of high tiers at this point such as Mewtwo/Abadango, Greninja/iStudying and Villager/Ranai. IMO this isn't a good tourney to cite if you're trying to argue against Pika being a good character.

Does anyone know if Abadango used MK or Mewtwo against Seagull and K9?

He used mewtwo against k9 and went 2-1. Idk bout seagull

 

[ShadowGuy1]

He went pure Mewtwo the entire time. So yeah.

 

[Deleted member]

Possibly Mega Man too, but I'm not sure if that's just ScAtt and we have another case of Brawl Pokémon Trainer and TheReflexWonder.

Mega Man is a significantly better character than Pokémon Trainer. This comparison makes no sense.