The Official SBR-B Brawl Tier List v3.0

[Tien2500]

Yeah, it's possible. The game doesn't load both of them before the match, so when you down B, it starts loading again. Pausing it lets the character load fully and you instantly come out. I think PT is the same, but not sure.

In PT dittos this doesn't work. I don't think pausing does anything either.

 

[Brinzy]

I'll take your word for it.

 

[mountain_tiger]

Din's helps a little, but mortar sliding will destroy that in an instant. Fsmash has the same range as the first hit of his ftilt. Nayru's is her lowest ranged attack, next to Farore's, which isn't really an attack. With smart play, you can use the invincibility to get an attack in, but this hardly limits Snake. He demolishes her up close, and she is best up close. That's all that needs to be said.

Mortar Sliding is very annoying, but there are ways of getting around it. Manoeuver (sp?)yourself and space yourself against it. Granted, doing so isn't an easy task most of the time. And by Nayru's, I mean short hopping and usign her forward momentum then doing the attack. Snake demolishes her up close in terms of range and power, yes, but not in terms of speed. That's what DSmash and DTilt are for.

She's edgeguarding him far less often because she needs an obscene % to get the Dsmash to work right, nevermind trying to land it. Snake just needs her offstage once and he can C4 one part of the stage, Usmash to have you covered in the air, and grab the ledge to get a guaranteed punish on recovery.

100% is an obscene %? And also, you can make her recovery a tad less predictable by DIing upwards, and then when you have some forward momentum use Din's to glide forward (though you do need a decent amount of vertical height to do that, but when applicable it's useful for mixing things up.

She can't run past him, she can't outrange him because he has stupid hitboxes, she still loses to him in the air, she dies ridiculously early against him, she can't approach him, she can't run away from him, she can't grab him, she can't do anything that's safe on block against him... she can't do ANYTHING.

Snake has one of the slowest air games in Brawl. It's strong, but you can outprioritise it with Nair. And mind telling me why she can't grab him? Yes, her grab is slow, but 11 frame start-up isn't THAT bad. That's only like 1/6 of a second. I'll admit that she does die pretty early against him.


The matchup is defintiely in Snake's favour, but IMO it's more like 40:60 Snake's advantage. It's nowhere near 20:80.

 

[Red Arremer]

You are aware of the fact that Snake's tilts and grab come out with minimal lag, right? Snake's Grab, Jab, FTilt and UTilt are quicker than pretty much every option of Zelda.

 

[Nanaki]

Stuff

This is me not arguing. I replied to someone else, not you. I only lied a little bit.

Continue whining about something that will never happen now, I can hear your frustrated crying from here. It does not affect me in the slightest.

And to confirm, I was counting you in the "smart" group, not the wave of idiocy. I didn't once insult you in my post. You, however, took the low road. Hooray for you again!

Hey, if it weren't for Sheik's relatively light weight, and difficulty to kill, she'd have an advantage on Snake. I'd be willing to say factoring in Transform and having a solid Zelda would even make the matchup even.

But that's just me.

Those are some pretty big weaknesses against Snake, though.

 

[mountain_tiger]

You are aware of the fact that Snake's tilts and grab come out with minimal lag, right? Snake's Grab, Jab, FTilt and UTilt are quicker than pretty much every option of Zelda.

Zelda's DSmash comes out on frame 4. USmash comes out on frame 5. DTilt comes out on frame 7.

I know that Snake's tilts are fast. But are they as fast as thsoe options listed above? (They might be, I hoenstly don't know.)

 

[Nanaki]

Zelda's DSmash comes out on frame 4. USmash comes out on frame 5. DTilt comes out on frame 7.

I know that Snake's tilts are fast. But are they as fast as thsoe options listed above? (They might be, I hoenstly don't know.)

Ftilt comes out on frame 4, utilt on frame 6.

Edit: Jab is frame 3, grab is frame 8.

 

[Gindler]

You are aware of the fact that Snake's tilts and grab come out with minimal lag, right? Snake's Grab, Jab, FTilt and UTilt are quicker than pretty much every option of Zelda.

Yeah, but it's not like snake's just spam Ftilt................oh wait.....

Zelda's DSmash comes out on frame 4. USmash comes out on frame 5. DTilt comes out on frame 7.

I know that Snake's tilts are fast. But are they as fast as thsoe options listed above? (They might be, I hoenstly don't know.)

I think it's frame 5, might be 4 I forget I just remember it's 1 frame slower than yoshi's jab.

 

[Ryusuta]

This is me not arguing. I replied to someone else, not you. I only lied a little bit.

Gotcha. I like rationalizing, too.

Continue whining about something that will never happen now, I can hear your frustrated crying from here. It does not affect me in the slightest.

I'm not whining. I'm just making observations.

And to confirm, I was counting you in the "smart" group, not the wave of idiocy. I didn't once insult you in my post. You, however, took the low road. Hooray for you again!

(You obviously didn't look at the hidden text following that. )

But you DID also insult the majority of people here by saying that most of them are stupid. Tell me... how does that make you any better than how you thought I was being? Because you hedged your bets and spoke in generalizations?

I was trying to be facetious so you'd catch onto that fact; not directly insulting. Sorry if I didn't make this clearer.

 

[Zankoku]

Meta Knight has the same weight problem, and I don't see that causing the matchup to be debilitating. Sheik doesn't have quite the disjointedness of a sword, but keeps equal range and has the added ftilt lock for guaranteed damage in 30-40% blocks. Speed keeps her from getting hit too often, as well.

The **** hits the fan if you've failed to KO Snake by 120% with a tipper usmash, when you're forced to approach but nothing you land will kill or follow up, at which point the optimal solution would be to go Zelda.... if you know how to use her. Luckily, Zelda's normally poor matchup against Snake isn't so terrible when she only has to play the part of landing one attack.

 

[Ryusuta]

I think it's a little bit unfair to compare Sheik to Meta Knight in that way. Meta Knight has the advantage of disjointed hitboxes, unbelievably hard-to-punish moves, range that's bigger than his own hurtbox, and an insanely good recovery.

Don't get me wrong; I agree with what you're saying in principle, but I think that comparison might be a little much.

 

[mountain_tiger]

Ftilt comes out on frame 4, utilt on frame 6.

Edit: Jab is frame 3, grab is frame 8.

So there's not much difference overall. The question now is which character has more priority overall? IIRC, it's quite high for both characters.

 

[tocador]

The **** hits the fan if you've failed to KO Snake by 120% with a tipper usmash, when you're forced to approach but nothing you land will kill or follow up, at which point the optimal solution would be to go Zelda.... if you know how to use her. Luckily, Zelda's normally poor matchup against Snake isn't so terrible when she only has to play the part of landing one attack.

Sigged and QFT

 

[tocador]

So there's not much difference overall. The question now is which character has more priority overall? IIRC, it's quite high for both characters.

Double...

But the fact is, Snake moves are disjointed and have larger range, so even if they clash(wich will prolly be or maybe a hit in favor of snake) he will have a adv ^^.

 

[Brinzy]

Mortar Sliding is very annoying, but there are ways of getting around it. Manoeuver (sp?)yourself and space yourself against it. Granted, doing so isn't an easy task most of the time. And by Nayru's, I mean short hopping and usign her forward momentum then doing the attack. Snake demolishes her up close in terms of range and power, yes, but not in terms of speed. That's what DSmash and DTilt are for.

Dsmash comes out on Frame 4, and it comes out at max range on Frame 5. Dtilt comes out on Frame 5.

Snake's ftilt is Frame 4 and has far more range than these two attacks. At most, she clashes, but she still can't do anything else to him at that range.

Of course you can deal with Mortar Sliding. My point is that it invalidates Din's like hell if you're trying to get him to not camp, because he can slide, hit you in your lag, and go right back to what he was doing.

100% is an obscene %? And also, you can make her recovery a tad less predictable by DIing upwards, and then when you have some forward momentum use Din's to glide forward (though you do need a decent amount of vertical height to do that, but when applicable it's useful for mixing things up.

If he's at the edge, sure. Except this is Snake, and he's probably pushing ZELDA to the edge because he has the best stage control in the game, as far as I'm concerned. Dsmash from like, somewhere between the edge and middle of FD does not give you enough time to edge guard him effectively.

I know how to recover as Zelda - using Din's to recover at ANY time is a definite NO. That alone just hurt your credibility by a ton.

Snake has one of the slowest air games in Brawl. It's strong, but you can outprioritise it with Nair. And mind telling me why she can't grab him? Yes, her grab is slow, but 11 frame start-up isn't THAT bad. That's only like 1/6 of a second. I'll admit that she does die pretty early against him.


Nair doesn't even beat them out because his ****ing legs are all over the place and Zelda's magic can't cover it effectively. You have no business trying to nair a Snake aerial as Zelda. First Peach's fair, and now this.

You can react to her grab with Snake and then use one of your many quick and powerful options up close, or you can just not be in point-blank range and beat her around. Her grab sucks.


The matchup is defintiely in Snake's favour, but IMO it's more like 40:60 Snake's advantage. It's nowhere near 20:80.

Play some good Snakes with Zelda and try to tell me this.

 

[Zankoku]

I think it's a little bit unfair to compare Sheik to Meta Knight in that way. Meta Knight has the advantage of disjointed hitboxes, unbelievably hard-to-punish moves, range that's bigger than his own hurtbox, and an insanely good recovery.

Don't get me wrong; I agree with what you're saying in principle, but I think that comparison might be a little much.

The only things you listed that Meta Knight has way over Sheik in the matchup against Snake are disjointed range and strong recovery. For all intents and purposes against Snake, the relevant attacks that Sheik has are just as difficult to punish, and again, she can tack on guaranteed chunks of damage much more quickly than Meta Knight.

What really gives MK an edge is, in my opinion, his edgeguarding options. Sheik jumps high, but not that high. Stupid offscreen Cypher.

 

[Nanaki]

Meta Knight has the same weight problem, and I don't see that causing the matchup to be debilitating. Sheik doesn't have quite the disjointedness of a sword, but keeps equal range and has the added ftilt lock for guaranteed damage in 30-40% blocks. Speed keeps her from getting hit too often, as well.

The **** hits the fan if you've failed to KO Snake by 120% with a tipper usmash, when you're forced to approach but nothing you land will kill or follow up, at which point the optimal solution would be to go Zelda.... if you know how to use her. Luckily, Zelda's normally poor matchup against Snake isn't so terrible when she only has to play the part of landing one attack.

That's somewhat over-simplifying the differences between MK and Sheik, but I'll go with it. You certainly know more about Sheik than I do. Maybe the matchup isn't as bad as I thought. I was under the impression that Sheik had similar problems getting back onstage that Zelda does, but at least her recovery is more versatile.

more stuff

Most people don't consider themselves idiots, and therefore weren't likely to be directly insulted by my overarching generalizations. I left it up to the individual to decide who the 'idiots' are. Would I make a good politician, or what?

And it certainly seemed like you were directly insulting.

Whatever, the internet happens. We have differing opinions, big deal. Good luck with your goals of making the SBR public-viewable. I'm rooting for you, but I don't see it happening.

 

[Ryusuta]

Thanks, Scorptile. I definitely have a lot of respect for what you had to say, and one way or another, it made an interesting topic of conversation. And neither of us seem any worse for wear from it, so all to the better. As they say, "No harm, no foul."

 

[Zankoku]

I was under the impression that Sheik had similar problems getting back onstage that Zelda does, but at least her recovery is more versatile.

Zelda's recovery is terrible. It's linear in a wholly unhelpful way given the distance it covers, it's difficult to grab the ledge because she can no longer interrupt her recovery to grab it (like she could in Melee), and it has ridiculously long landing lag if you don't Wind straight into the ground. It can be described the same way that Melee Ganondorf's recovery could - sure, you could make it back to the stage from anywhere, but you're so vulnerable along the way that you're just going to be launched out again immediately.

If Snake doesn't go for the edgehog, Sheik can safely return with her chain's tether, and her Vanish recovery is at least more maneuverable when started and not as vulnerable on landing, especially if you set up the proper height to have zero landing lag.

 

[Nanaki]

Thanks, Scorptile. I definitely have a lot of respect for what you had to say, and one way or another, it made an interesting topic of conversation. And neither of us seem any worse for wear from it, so all to the better. As they say, "No harm, no foul."

Agreed. You certainly know how to argue effectively. The Smash community is bettered by your presence.

Now we need to have an argument that we're on the same side of

Edit: @ Ankoku: I was aware that Zelda's recovery sucked terribly, I was just thinking Sheik had much more of a problem recovering against Snake than MK does. I suppose I worded it poorly.

Edit Again: And the multiple options (tether, vanish maneuverability, etc.) was what I meant by more versatile.

 

[BSP]

This has been very interesting to read. I have to agree that the snake : zelda matchup is heavily in snake's favor.

 

[Elyssa Xey Hexen]

I find this entertaining to think that even 80 pages later, Zelda is still finding it's way into the majority of the discussion.

 

[The Nameless Wanderer]

This needs more talk on why Mario needs to go up .

Srsyl though, he does <.<.
Hes got one of the best gimping games, great combo and juggling ability, Useful projectile, good OOS options.

Although, he may have range problems, but he always finds a way to get in.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Understand that a tier list is a comparative list.

Everyone's position is in relation to everyone elses.

It's not a question of whether someone should be higher, but who should they be above.

That said, who do you think Mario should be above?

 

[DMG]

Mario should be above Luigi because he is older than him.

 

[Matador]

Mario still has to prove he needs to move up. His representation and tourney rankings have been terrible lately.

 

[Ray_Kalm]

Mario still has to prove he needs to move up. His representation and tourney rankings have been terrible lately.

King Dedede's ranked 3rd in tournament representation, yet he always seems to drop each time a new tier list comes out.

 

[Deleted member]

But the point is that he has lots of results, which certainly prove that D3 is top tier material.
On paper D3 looks a bit worse than he is.
Mario looks like hes good (according to some people) but hes low on the tier list partially because he doesnt have the results to back him up.

 

[Shaya]

I claim Sheik will be at least B tier by the end of brawl's lifetime.

Whilst Sheik was nerfed from Melee, she still has excellent character design -> she has so many options that it's only SOME of the top tiers that completely outdo her in this regard. It's the fact that whilst Sheik has many options they're not BROKEN options that is holding her back.

Characters such as Wolf and Zelda were considered good at the start of brawl purely because their base-value options were seen as GOOD; but as brawl has developed it has been obviously shown that they have minimal options in the grand scheme of things. Hence they'll keep dropping.

Characters such as Sonic, Pokemon Trainer and Sheik have a stupidly large array of options, but are held back by those options just not being broken.

It is 100-fold more interesting and fun to fight against Sonic/PT/Sheik in a match than Wolf.

Match ups between two characters have been skewed for a very long time by taking more into account 'base traits' (i.e. where people can see Wolf as being good) compared to their ability in options. It is very easy to see WHY character's such as Yoshi or Bowser do NOT go even with MK; as not only does MK have over 9 billion options, they're mostly GOOD as well. With Yoshi and Bowser simply having 'good bases' in the match up whilst not really having a large array of options skews these character's mains to believe they should be higher in the tier list than they should be.

tl;dr
mostly static characters such as Wolf, Zelda, Yoshi will continue to not really have a rise in their tier positions. These boards will continue to evaluate match ups at 'base value' instead of comparison to options, and continue to scream 'WHY IS THIS CHARACTER NOT HIGHER'.
Dynamic characters such as PT, Sonic and Sheik will continue to build up 'match ups' that truly reflect the metagame, as it becomes more obvious these characters have a great array of options and can only be seen as 'subpar' because of those options not being broken.

Dynamic characters will continue to rise in the tier list, and the static ones (who maybe one day can prove to be 'deeper' than what the tier list gives them credit for) will stay where they are or fall. In tournaments the characters who are supposibly listed as 50:50 will always have the higher tier character come out on top due to being more plentiful in options.

Players should give up on their static characters so the tournament scene can be funner and the growth of dynamic characters will continue to show through. This means that eventually we'll see if Brawl is a more balanced competitive fighter than melee; where there are more than just the Top Tier being represented (I haven't been to a melee tournament in a very very very very long time where anyone used anything other than Sheik, Marth, Fox, Falco, Jiggly, ICs, Peach... or Captain Falcon... who weren't 'scrubs').

The tier list is slowly but surely tranversing towards a more true view of character ability by their array of options rather than face value. And it is easy to see the best way for a character's ability to shine through as being more than just being 'static' is through doing well in tournaments.

Hope you enjoyed my read, I'm surely going to make a topic later on "Base Values" vs "Options" -> Which represents tournament viability?

 

[Deleted member]

Just out of curiosity, how is yoshi a static character. Comparing yoshi to someone like zelda in terms of number of options is hardly fair, considering he has some of the best movement/momentum options in the game, and a tons of subtle mixups. It aint shiek, but you know.

I agree with almost all of what you said though

 

[Kholdstare]

Ganondorf
- 1
36. to 37.

This is why we can't have nice things.

 

[Gindler]

So today I learned that yoshi is static.............................for some...reason.

Wario's pretty static, yet he's #3. What's up with that.

 

[Ray_Kalm]

This is why we can't have nice things.

I didn't quite catch what you meant by that.. Care to reelaborate?

 

[Nitrix]

Characters such as Wolf and Zelda were considered good at the start of brawl purely because their base-value options were seen as GOOD; but as brawl has developed it has been obviously shown that they have minimal options in the grand scheme of things. Hence they'll keep dropping.

Characters such as Sonic, Pokemon Trainer and Sheik have a stupidly large array of options, but are held back by those options just not being broken.

The tier list is slowly but surely tranversing towards a more true view of character ability by their array of options rather than face value. And it is easy to see the best way for a character's ability to shine through as being more than just being 'static' is through doing well in tournaments.

Hope you enjoyed my read, I'm surely going to make a topic later on "Base Values" vs "Options" -> Which represents tournament viability?

Great post Shaya! I really agree with everything you've stated. This is the reason why Zelda, Ike and Wolf aren't going to rise, imo.

 

[Shaya]

Yoshi has pretty good base values,
invincibility frames on a kill move
great aerial mobility (THE BEST)
controllable projectile
Super armor on second jump
etc etc

However, there's a lot of impedement due to how much Yoshi is restricted by having his shield (with shield options being unbelievably POTENT in brawl)
Sorry if I came off as saying Yoshi was completely worthless. He definitely has more depth to him than some characters above him; but they're not helping him to the point that a match up is considered
"60:40 against yoshi" BECAUSE
Yoshi's array of options aren't as good as the opponent's character in the match up.
It's more
"Yoshi just doesn't have an array of ability as his options can be grouped together [As in yoshi being able to do 10 things doesn't mean 10 options, when those 10 things only really have '1 result']."

I definitely do not know too much about Yoshi. Sorry for understating his abilities.

 

[Kholdstare]

I didn't quite catch what you meant by that.. Care to reelaborate?

He doesn't deserve a bottom tier spot, he's good in skilled hands. In fact, he's mid-high tier in skilled hands.

 

[Brinzy]

It has been said a million times, but for anyone who just happened to be reading along and still feels Zelda was wronged, remember that when you use your Down B, you help Zelda out as well. Her position is virtually meaningless, except she may be used in some low-tier tournaments.

 

[Ryusuta]

However, there's a lot of impedement due to how much Yoshi is restricted by having his shield (with shield options being unbelievably POTENT in brawl)
Sorry if I came off as saying Yoshi was completely worthless. He definitely has more depth to him than some characters above him; but they're not helping him to the point that a match up is considered
"60:40 against yoshi" BECAUSE
Yoshi's array of options aren't as good as the opponent's character in the match up.
It's more
"Yoshi just doesn't have an array of ability as his options can be grouped together [As in yoshi being able to do 10 things doesn't mean 10 options, when those 10 things only really have '1 result']."

Most Yoshi players rely very little on their shields because of this, making the weakness sort of a moot point. Yoshi has a phenomenal spot dodge, which is very helpful on the defensive, as are is pokes, tilts, and aerials. It's helpful (though not often practical) that his shield can't be poked, too.

The best that can be said for Yoshi is that he is never flat-out dominated across the board in a match-up. Game & Watch is easily his worst match (about the only straight 30:70 against him), and even then he has fighting options against him.

It really is hard to say what will happen with Yoshi in the future, because I think he'll go as far as he is taken. Except for his somewhat lacking OoS options, he genuinely has all the tools he needs to win matches; it's just a matter of reaching his potential right now.

 

[Gindler]

Yoshi has pretty good base values,
invincibility frames on a kill move
great aerial mobility (THE BEST)
controllable projectile
Super armor on second jump
etc etc

However, there's a lot of impedement due to how much Yoshi is restricted by having his shield (with shield options being unbelievably POTENT in brawl)
Sorry if I came off as saying Yoshi was completely worthless. He definitely has more depth to him than some characters above him; but they're not helping him to the point that a match up is considered
"60:40 against yoshi" BECAUSE
Yoshi's array of options aren't as good as the opponent's character in the match up.
It's more
"Yoshi just doesn't have an array of ability as his options can be grouped together [As in yoshi being able to do 10 things doesn't mean 10 options, when those 10 things only really have '1 result']."

I definitely do not know too much about Yoshi. Sorry for understating his abilities.

I wish yoshi had the best mobility, he's got the best top speed but not as mobile as wario and jiggz (their elite though so yeah).

His OoS options are pretty bad, but as orion said. We usually don't shield unless it's some multihit move (tornado for example), since his spotdodge is pretty amazing.

The only thing really wrong is killing, but it's not even that bad. I rarely if ever have snakes living past 130%

 

[Zankoku]

Most Yoshi players rely very little on their shields because of this, making the weakness sort of a moot point.

What? This doesn't make the weakness a moot point because it very clearly points out that you're forcing yourselves to be playing around a known weakness - one that limits your options compared to the rest of the cast.

Yoshi has a phenomenal spot dodge, which is very helpful on the defensive, as are is pokes, tilts, and aerials.

The problem is when high or even mid-level players run anti-spotdodge tech. Then you get punished for spotdodging, but falling back on shield is hardly any better.

It's helpful (though not often practical) that his shield can't be poked, too.

This may be the one good thing about it, though Ryoko has bugged me numerous times to try to break a Yoshi's shield with Sheik's chain since the chain will never shieldpoke Yoshi.