The Initial Culture Shock of Characters.

[Sky`]

When I first started playing this game, I got pretty far in tournaments because I played Peach. It was astounding how many people didn't know the match-up. As time progressed, Peach wasn't really the talk of the town, landing her self well below middle tier, and was said to be one of the lesser characters of the game. I and my fellow peach mains capitalized on this, and used her knowing that nobody would see her as a threat. As time went by, and as the peaches continued to place higher and higher, she began to slightly and slowly move up and up. However, it seems that prior to me dropping her as a Main (Due to the fact that Kirby is literally too much fun, Four days ago.), it was becoming increasingly harder and harder to retain those placings. It seems that the people whom I had beaten before were catching on to her ways, and quickly learning to punish all of her imperfections. However. With my Kirby, I have made great strides against those with the match-up down pact, as well as those who seem to be lacking the experience needed to fight a Kirby, something I could never do with Peach. It's because of this that I question the current tier list, and the perception of some characters. And my question to you is this. Do you think that some characters, if not the majority of them are excelling due to the fact that we just aren't familiar with that character? Or when we reach a certain point in our competitive peak, do we become indiscriminate to characters, in which we no longer suffer severe disadvantages due to the lack of knowledge about a certain character? Or maybe, some people just excel with certain characters, and are indiscriminate of tier restrictions .

What do you guys think?

 

[PKNintendo]

I think props to you. I suppose this happens alot from time to time with many players, Im just glad you had Peach for so long. Good luck with Kirby.

Oh, make sure you visit the Peach boards, correct some matchups etc.

 

[Niko_K]

It sounds like you need to mix it up. Learn different ways of getting things done. Become more unpredictable.

..Or you can be lazy and switch to Kirby!

 

[Jinkwai]

Go for another dark horse character, like Yoshi.

 

[Sky`]

It sounds like you need to mix it up. Learn different ways of getting things done. Become more unpredictable.

..Or you can be lazy and switch to Kirby!

Lololol.
Maybe people are misinterpreting this post.

I'm not asking for personal advice, I'm saying, what do yall think of the culture shock of characters?

 

[Hive]

no way! you're dropping peach, sky? sadness. you'll still match me sometime though, right? T.T
Why kirby, anyways? ^^ I for one think it would be horrible to take on traits of everything I swallow irl...

well, for what you're saying, I know that a lot of the reason people in tourney's have trouble with samus is mainly due to lack of experience against her.... I mean, its pretty much a factor a lot of samus mains have come to rely on. People with that experience play a lot better against her, it really shows... I actually think its probably as much of a factor to guessing the outcome of the matchup than, say, the person's usual skill level in tourneys...
unfortunately, I think as people come to play her more she'll probably go down or remain even in the tier lists... but I'll still play her regardless ^^ she's just that badass :D

 

[DanGR]

I've been saying this about Olimar for months now. Most are too lazy to learn the pikmin specifics and how Olimar works. Simply put, it's pathetic. I don't mind though. :]

 

[choknater]

I think Sky's right. It takes a while for some characters to develop their metagames. I can only imagine a time where more people started playing Sonic like Mr. 3000. Plenty of characters still have time to evolve their games. I think Peach has been taken pretty far and is a very adaptable character. After playing Edrees quite a few times, He's shown me that Peach can adapt to nearly any matchup (except maybe G&W hahaha.)

In time, almost nothing will be shocking to us... we will be more amazed at how the players themselves use the already known metagames and execute them in tournament.

 

[momochuu]

It happens to a lot of characters. When the game first came out, Snake was on the chopping block for being banned. But after a while, people learned the matchup, and he's not as broken as people first though. He's just really really good.

Same thing with Ice Climbers. Some people still john out the *** about them and how broken they are, but the reality is that they're not that good and have a LOT of badenviorn matchups. Some people have realized this and playing ICs well in a competitive environment is even harder because good people simply don't fall for the "run in and grab" strategy.

Pretty much, this "culture shock" happens for all characters as time progresses. People get smarter and things that worked before don't really work as people get smarter. ;-;

 

[Sky`]

So... I wonder who's gonna falter on the tier list then?

 

[Vyse]

Or maybe, some people just excel with certain characters, and are indiscriminate of tier restrictions .

Chudat, Azen etc.

I can't play MK very well. lol.
Diddy suits me more because I'm used to projectile lock down (Melee Falco main).

I've started playing Brawl Falco recently, and been seeing results like you've been too, 'sky. Found it much easier to take out Snake's with Falco, than with Diddy.

: 0

Though, Diddy will always be my main. Because I believe there's no end to his potential.

 

[Hive]

hmm... i think over time characters who are underplayed and have high learning curves will go up tiers.... as well as characters who have continually evolving metagames... (I really think... pokemon trainer, jigglypuff, and ganondorf will go up over time... ^^)

I think characters with staled metagames (since other characters will go up at more of a rate then them) as well as characters with a lot of people playing them, and characters who rely on shock value will go down over time... (I think marth and g&w might go down a bit, or at least have trouble holding ranks bc of how many people play as them (giving others matchup exp) and their metagames starting to run out of evolving room... possibly lucario too...)
... at least in my opinion. I obviously could be wrong ^^

 

[Tianxiazhai]

I think that... most people study the match ups of top characters, so they know almost nothing about low tier characters.
Like, i played Pichu in melee, and most people in my region thought pichu was a emo piece of crap. When i owned them, they realized that they had no knowledge of a character, and it because suprising.

Anyway, good luck on kirby.

 

[Plum]

Yeah, G&W is one of those characters that will fall over time. He will always be high up there just because he naturally has a lot going for him but his metagame has been VERY slow in development. Effectively his strategy has yet to change since the release of the game.

Olimar was definitely one of these characters. Took people long enough to realize how much of a tank he was and how is recovery is actually decent due to his amazing aerial mobility and abilities to take out an edge hogger if need be.

LOL at people who complain about the Ice Climbers. They have so much hype around them. Get Nana away... She is one of the easiest things to gimp in the entire game! She won't airdodge, DI properly at all, try to fight back... she is ******** on her own. Yes, one grab is a stock but they aren't Olimar or DDD. Going a game without getting grabbed is realistic with them.

 

[Saltix]

Sky, what happened with Falco?

 

[momochuu]

LOL at people who complain about the Ice Climbers. They have so much hype around them. Get Nana away... She is one of the easiest things to gimp in the entire game! She won't airdodge, DI properly at all, try to fight back... she is ******** on her own. Yes, one grab is a stock but they aren't Olimar or DDD. Going a game without getting grabbed is realistic with them.

This is why I never leave her alone for 2 seconds. They either kill both of us, or we aren't gonna die, lol.

My SoNa is pretty good anyway so it doesn't really matter. Lmfao. ;3

 

[Melomaniacal]

Well, I've always thought - and I could be completely wrong - that being successful in Brawl is, like, 70+% matchup experience. So in that sense, playing an unused character in your region could probably result in some success. I think that's actually what attracted me to competitive Brawl more - the fact that although you don't need a lot of tech skill, to be successful you need to have really good matchup experience, which you cannot get from practicing on your own.

I felt like - and this could be completely wrong as well - practicing on your own in Melee could get you further because, well... a combo's a combo. Of course matchup experience is extremely important in Melee as well, it's just I've personally feel it's more important in Brawl.

 

[Problem2]

I think match-up knowledge is very important in Smash Bros. What you experienced is how to take advantage of your opponent's lack of match up knowledge. Brawl in particular is mostly about knowing match ups. This is one of the reasons why we currently see a semi-diverse cast of characters used in tournaments, because people can get away with using worse characters because people just don't know what to do.

 

[Sgt. Baker]

People don't expect Ganon to be a threat. Just a big slow guy.....
Till I auto-cancle two D-Air's and U-Smash them for hefty percents :D

And I just picked up Fox too. People don't think much of him because many think of him as the lesser of the three spacies. I get people with him too.

So yeah, I love culture impact

 

[ExCeL 52]

... Why in the world would you drop Peach. She has alot of potential...
Four months and I still havent got closed to what I feel she is capable of.

Kirby = No.

 

[Browny]

culture shock sounds awfully similar to 'i dont know the matchup' johns

 

[Sky`]

I'm not dropping her, she's my second. =D

 

[Crystanium]

I'm not dropping her, she's my second. =D

Why not main her still, and use Kirby as a secondary character?

 

[Col. Stauffenberg]

Incidentally, I started playing around with Kirby a couple weeks ago or so.

We should do a ditto sometime Sky, since you hate my Lucario so much.

 

[BentoBox]

Brown shuga likes to swallow. It's fine. <3

That's one thing both his mains have in common :D

Also, people catching on to your ways should be an incentive to work that much harder, imo.

 

[LuigiKing]

I think you have a really good point. I end up doing better against people than I should just because they don't know much about Luigi. Pretty neet.

 

[Morrigan]

I think props to you. I suppose this happens alot from time to time with many players, Im just glad you had Peach for so long. Good luck with Kirby.

Oh, make sure you visit the Peach boards, correct some matchups etc.

What does that have to do with anything -_-

It happens to a lot of characters. When the game first came out, Snake was on the chopping block for being banned. But after a while, people learned the matchup, and he's not as broken as people first though. He's just really really good.

Snake was like low-mid tier, and Toon Link was at the top, remember?

 

[Yuna]

Yes, bad players will be unfamiliar with many match-ups, especially if they are rare and rarely fought. Heck, even good players will sometimes be unfamiliar with certain match-ups. However, the good players (i.e., the only one who matter when it comes to Tier Talk and stuff like this) will quickly adapt and learn.

If a character is considered bad by the vast majority of good players, it is because judging from all we currently know about them, they are bad. The good players will tear that character to shreds because they will have experience and familiarity with the match-up.

Some characters enjoy an inordinate amount of high placements due to unfamiliarity, true. But that's only for smaller tournaments or against shabby players. I've begun to find Zelda to not cut it even against bad players, so I'm going to switch to Marth.

They can be familiar with fighting Marth. Doesn't help much.

What does that have to do with anything -_-

Snake was like low-mid tier, and Toon Link was at the top, remember?

That was, like, for the first few weeks of Brawl's lifespan. It's obvious that mistakes will be made when assessing strengths when a game is first released, before we've even discovered all of the Ts, never mind the ATs.

 

[Fatmanonice]

Overall, I'd say that the current tier list is mostly accurate and that most of the highly placed ones are where they are at because they are genuinely hard to beat like Snake and Metaknight. Regarding what you said, I believe this is why some characters that people used to complain about all the time like Pit, ROB, and Wolf have taken a nose dive in the tier list.

Pit to Brawl is like Mario to Melee and it has been revealed that he's basically slightly above average because people have learned to mostly deal with arrow spam and how to better intercept his recovery. Wolf was practically destined to drop especially when development of his metagame has essentially been at a crawl since probably May of last year and, like Metaknight, many of his strategies are mostly universal. ROB's story is basically the end result of Brawl becoming more developed as a whole and how camping isn't as effective as it used to be. It's rather interesting how this has changed across the board for both on and offline play when some people were dead certain that Brawl would pretty much stay the way it did when it first came out. You can even see these changes for yourself if you compare videos from, say, last spring to last month.

Back to the character culture, I think it works to a point but mostly for characters that are below middle-middle tier. For example, Sonic can be really frustrating to fight if you don't know what you're doing and, if the early days of Brawl taught us anything, Ike can be very challenging if you're impatient and/or very predictible. There are times, however, when even less used characters are not that hard to beat simply because, underneath it all, they really aren't that great. Jigglypuff is definately the perfect example of this. You can have hardly any knowledge about the matchup and still do pretty well in most situations unless the person you're playing against is a complete and utter beast with the character. Overall, I guess it's about adjusting especially if you're up against someone who's good at using a particular strategy that's hard hitting like Diddy's banannas, short hopped lazers with Falco, King Dedede's chain grab, reverse fairs with Marth, "grenade jackets" with Snake, floating dairs with Peach, camping with Olimar, and, as several people have already mentioned, the Ice Climbers' chain grabs.

 

[ignore the fire]

This is definitely a relevant idea. I did very well with ICs against players much better than me, mostly because they don't know the matchup. This included an MK and Falco. In the same tourney, I got rocked by an Ike because I've never played a good one. Knowing a matchup is a huge factor.

 

[Snowstalker]

Killing people who think that Yoshi is insanely bad is the most beautiful thing in the game. God I love chaingrabbing MK's.

 

[Samuelson]

Sky, you'll still have problems with Marth and Lucario. I would pick up Wolf or DK for Lucario and Marth. They're both kind of underused and they do really well vs both of them.

 

[Dantarion]

Yeah, I agree on all of this. Players don't know how to play against underused characters. In some cases, this means you can beat someone with a character even if they are better than you overall, simply because they don't know what to expect.

This is the main reason I like to play as a lot of characters, I end up knowing the general strategy for all of them, so when I face a mario main, or a link main, i have a general idea of what to do against them.

 

[Ms.Username]

lack of matchup exp. ftw!!


thats why i use jiggs

 

[Natch]

Yeah, G&W is one of those characters that will fall over time. He will always be high up there just because he naturally has a lot going for him but his metagame has been VERY slow in development. Effectively his strategy has yet to change since the release of the game.

Olimar was definitely one of these characters. Took people long enough to realize how much of a tank he was and how is recovery is actually decent due to his amazing aerial mobility and abilities to take out an edge hogger if need be.

LOL at people who complain about the Ice Climbers. They have so much hype around them. Get Nana away... She is one of the easiest things to gimp in the entire game! She won't airdodge, DI properly at all, try to fight back... she is ******** on her own. Yes, one grab is a stock but they aren't Olimar or DDD. Going a game without getting grabbed is realistic with them.

I heavily disagree about G&W. With the discovery of Bucket Braking, his single biggest weakness-being piss easy to KO-is removed. G&W can now regularly survive past 150 with this new tech. This increased survivability is a big plus to G&W-I've been thinking about picking him up just because of it. Sure, his metagame might be a bit stale, but that's just because G&W is a very simple character, like Marth.

 

[goodkid]

I think you have it a little wrong. Just because you use a underused char doesnt automatically give you the win. Like you said before, its the player that wins, not the character. Smart opponents can find ways around your underused char. after about the first match, & all you have left is your smarts as a player. Of course there is shock when youve never played that char b4, but when the freshness fades youll have to find new tricks w/ ur smarts

 

[Nitrix]

I can totally relate with the OP. I main Diddy Kong, and it was MUCH easier to beat people when he was lower on the tier list. He is so high now that people are actually paying attention to him

 

[DanGR]

but that's just because G&W is a very simple character, like Marth.

lol. You made my day.

 

[Wylde]

I think people are creative and like to make up stories to get attention.

SEE, WE KNEW ALL ALONG THAT NO ONE THOUGHT PEACH WAS A THREAD SO WE TOOK ADVANTAGE OF IT.


You really just kept playing peach because you liked her, and you got lucky other peach mains figured out ATs for her. You never intentionally tried to abuse others lack of acknowledgement for her, nor did anyone ever think she was not a threat.

Quit making up stories.

 

[AquaTech]

It sounds like Mario and Olimar are making comebacks, from what I've heard.