Pre-Release The Transition: New Mechanics, Re-works, Balance Changes Thread

[Thinkaman]

I mean, ledge attack was the worst option on average, and the direct counter to it has been improved. (You can now perfect shield it out-of-shield)

Curious if dodge decay affects ledge rolls our tech rolls.

 

[Awesomeperson159]

Just did ICs. Wish they got buffed more, because I think they're going to be bottom 5 (they removed almost everything janky they could do in Brawl and Melee).

 

[Thinkaman]

Characters I have the biggest questions about the viability of are ICs, Palutena, and Bowser Jr.

ICs just have a lot of complicated unknowns. Their damage looked great, but there are many links in the chain that could break for them.

Palutena as she exists in Smash 4 benefits very little from the systematic changes, probably the least of all characters. Doing stuff out of a run doesn't help her much, despite her run speed. 3f jumpsquat isn't a huge change from what she had. Landing lag wasn't her limiting factor. Air dodge works against her uair. Her specials still seems poor. We'll just have to see what improvements her core moves got to keep up.

Bowser Jr. also doesn't care about doing stuff out of a dash, though like Charizard he probably loves the new jumpsquat more than anyone, even his dad. He was just such a rigid character before, with what I felt was maybe the lowest ceiling in Smash 4. But Zelda suffered the same problem, and got a revolution. So we'll see!

 

[Untouch]

Bowser Jr. just felt unfinished to me, a lot of very absurd choices that just never got patched. Just fixing the weird decisions like only getting recovery back if you go into tumble will make him more viable.

 

[LancerStaff]

This is a bit of a stretch but I feel like many of Pit’s buffs will also apply to Palutena. Pit’s had gobs of endlag shaved from many moves, not just aerials, and he has significantly higher damage and kill power as well. Pit’s a character people feel kinda ho-hum about, and Palutena doubly so. Now Pit’s going to be able to chain tilts into aerials which themselves had damage buffs, for example. Palutena will likely get frame data buffs to N/S/Dspecial at least, like Pit did, and be a more competent zoner. I’m also predicting some Utilt > Usmash shenanigans.

Bowser Jr I feel similarly about but he doesn’t have any particular reason to receive some of Daddy Soccer Guy’s bias, so... But Sakurai did say he was rushed in 4 too.

 

[Awesomeperson159]

At the request of Thinkaman , Palutena and Bowser Jr.'s info has been done, and they've both been buffed as far as the community can tell. ICs were already done, but I think they kinda sorta suck. They can do damage, but what's ICs without their grab game?

Anyways, it seems LancerStaff was right - Palutena's buffs besides her better side and down specials are to the speed of her moves.

As for Jr., all anyone can tell from his trailer is that his cannonball sucks less.

 

[Thinkaman]

Right, we have vague hints that Palutena has better numbers, and we could get her in front of us and find that her numbers are bonkers good. It's totally possible; there was nothing really wrong with the character outside of generally poor numbers on the majority of her moveset.

This was also true for WFT, but I feel WFT's kit is far more likely to directly benefit from the systematic changes.

Oh yeah, and Samus is a pessimistic wild card as well.

 

[Awesomeperson159]

Got info on the top 5 characters in 4 (Bayo -> Rosa), and watched a Sol vid about EVEN MORE LITTLE MAC BUFFS

At least they nerfed Mac's DTilt a tiny bit...

In case you're wondering, Bayo, so far, has nothing but nerfs, Cloud has less aerial lag but worse limit, Diddy has tweaked frame data (go through his trailer frame by frame, DSmash has like half the ending lag), Sheik has better aerials but a worse combo game, and it's anyone's guess what Rosa has.

 

[Untouch]

https://twitter.com/Meshima_/status/1021603244529737729
Back roll has more endlag now, spotdodging has less endlag.

 

[Awesomeperson159]

Just went down the tier list and did all the way down to R.O.B. Once I'm done every character, I'll start analyzing frame data, because you can go frame-by-frame on the trailers and get the current frame data.

 

[Awesomeperson159]

OK, all the characters' changes are finished! Let me know if I missed something, and feel free to discuss.

 

[Erimir]

Pretty sure Jigglypuff's Final Smash has an additional disjointed hitbox at the end.

If you watch her profile video, Tink and Mario get hit by contact with Jigglypuff at about 15 seconds (but doesn't appear to be high knockback), but a second later, there's a sort of shockwave effect and they are KO'd despite being some distance from Jiggs. You can tell it's a separate hit because you see the red lightning "Deadly Blow" effects on both characters right before they die.

This would appear to make Jigglypuff's FS a lot better.

 

[J0eyboi]

The shield drop animation looks longer than Sm4sh. I think it's 15 frames like Melee, but I could be super wrong about that.

Edit: I was wrong about that. It's either 10 frames or 11.

Edit 2: Further research suggests 11, but more importantly that you can jump cancel the shield drop animation (in this video at 3:58, ZeRo as Ike enters jumpsquat after being in shield drop for only 3 frames) which is nice I guess

 

[Zerp]

Awesomeperson159

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Bayonetta's Witch Time seems to transfers ownership of enemy projectiles to Bayonetta on hit now. I guess we can now say Bayonetta buffs exist.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Just going to throw out there that that's the sort of thing that could easily be a pre-release bug. Witch Time is trying to slow the projectile down and inadvertently claims ownership. I'd be sure to test that one again when the game officially releases.

 

[Zerp]

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Turns out there's another small Bayonetta buff. Watch, in the final version of the game, all the nerfs will be removed and she'll just be buffed everywhere./s

Both of these are minor buffs but I have to question the logic behind implementing these.

 

[Enderwoman]

I'm getting pretty worried about the general disadvantage state of this game. Aside from edgeguarding looking a lot more viable it still doesn't really seem like you can get much off your opponent being in the disadvantage, it's almost like Smash 4.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Interesting take, I actually have frequently thought that pressing advantages looks even stronger than in 4 where it was already really pretty good when good characters were involved. We just today watched an ICs player hit a DK once and put him into a nasty juggle trap that looked ridiculously hard to escape and did 70%. Then we saw Ridley put DK on a ledge later and keep him there for over half a stock. In general the directional air dodge looks like a relatively weak mechanic thanks to the 1 million years of lag after you use it so it really seems like characters with good juggles might have an even bigger party than in 4 which was already a pretty big party for them. Then I look at how much easier it is to stay mobile with good, safe attacks in this game and I see, frequently, that even if you get your feet on the ground and get your shield up that often you're just trading being smacked around for being shield pressured so you usually need multiple sequential correct defensive decisions to re-establish true neutral.

If anything, my biggest worry would be that it might be too hard to re-establish neutral which, as the most strategically interesting and complex part of smash, is the part you'd want to be the biggest portion of any match. Overall I'm very optimistic about Ultimate, but if I had a worry, it would be the exact opposite.

 

[MrGameguycolor]

Interesting take, I actually have frequently thought that pressing advantages looks even stronger than in 4 where it was already really pretty good when good characters were involved. We just today watched an ICs player hit a DK once and put him into a nasty juggle trap that looked ridiculously hard to escape and did 70%. Then we saw Ridley put DK on a ledge later and keep him there for over half a stock. In general the directional air dodge looks like a relatively weak mechanic thanks to the 1 million years of lag after you use it so it really seems like characters with good juggles might have an even bigger party than in 4 which was already a pretty big party for them. Then I look at how much easier it is to stay mobile with good, safe attacks in this game and I see, frequently, that even if you get your feet on the ground and get your shield up that often you're just trading being smacked around for being shield pressured so you usually need multiple sequential correct defensive decisions to re-establish true neutral.

If anything, my biggest worry would be that it might be too hard to re-establish neutral which, as the most strategically interesting and complex part of smash, is the part you'd want to be the biggest portion of any match. Overall I'm very optimistic about Ultimate, but if I had a worry, it would be the exact opposite.

It's gonna take a lot to relearn for sure.

One good thing about Directional Air-dodging (DAD) is you can at least ledge snap fairly easily.

 

[J0eyboi]

I'm getting pretty worried about the general disadvantage state of this game. Aside from edgeguarding looking a lot more viable it still doesn't really seem like you can get much off your opponent being in the disadvantage, it's almost like Smash 4.

Really?
No, really?

For starters, stage control will be harder to lose, as rolling is the only way to cross up a grounded shielding opponent without committing to a jump, which is going to be a much worse idea because with 3 frame universal jumpsquat, very few characters will lack good antiairs OoS or anti-crossup OoS options. Covering landings will be harder due to the lower landing lag on airdodges (though overall better mobility will render this a nonissue), but juggling will otherwise be easier due to the amount of endlag airdodges have. Ledgetrapping would be very hard to make weaker, with parrying being jump cancellable (though I really hope that isn't in the final game) and aerials having way lower landing lag overall. And finally, pressure is likely going to be harder to deal with (depending on shieldstun) due to the longer shield drop animation. I don't see why you would think that advantage will be weak in this game.

If anything, my biggest worry would be that it might be too hard to re-establish neutral which, as the most strategically interesting and complex part of smash, is the part you'd want to be the biggest portion of any match. Overall I'm very optimistic about Ultimate, but if I had a worry, it would be the exact opposite.

I wouldn't worry too much about that. If it's too hard to get back to neutral, we'll just play with more stocks. The game being faster paced means we probably won't have to worry about games taking too long even if we end up in a 4-stock meta.

 

[**Gilgamesh**]

Interesting take, I actually have frequently thought that pressing advantages looks even stronger than in 4 where it was already really pretty good when good characters were involved. We just today watched an ICs player hit a DK once and put him into a nasty juggle trap that looked ridiculously hard to escape and did 70%. Then we saw Ridley put DK on a ledge later and keep him there for over half a stock. In general the directional air dodge looks like a relatively weak mechanic thanks to the 1 million years of lag after you use it so it really seems like characters with good juggles might have an even bigger party than in 4 which was already a pretty big party for them. Then I look at how much easier it is to stay mobile with good, safe attacks in this game and I see, frequently, that even if you get your feet on the ground and get your shield up that often you're just trading being smacked around for being shield pressured so you usually need multiple sequential correct defensive decisions to re-establish true neutral.

If anything, my biggest worry would be that it might be too hard to re-establish neutral which, as the most strategically interesting and complex part of smash, is the part you'd want to be the biggest portion of any match. Overall I'm very optimistic about Ultimate, but if I had a worry, it would be the exact opposite.

Where are these new videos

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Where are these new videos

It's a UK invitational Nintendo just did. You can probably find it pretty fast by searching on youtube for that.

 

[Untouch]

On the EVO smash ultimate stream we've just been given OFFICIAL confirmation that rage is still in the game but now starts at 90% instead of 35%.

 

[**Gilgamesh**]

https://clips.twitch.tv/ExquisitePowerfulBadgerFloof

Not being able to run past opponents is confirmed to be intentional and for a reason.

 

[Nobie]

Soooo...

Super meters in competitive play. Might be a real thing, especially if they're only half as strong.

Is it possible to combo into supers? How might this affect balance? None of them are crazy transformations anymore, so the worry about them completely altering game mechanics isn't really there.

One thing I wonder is if you can knock a super out of someone like you can a Smash Ball.

THE SKY'S THE LIMIT.

 

[LancerStaff]

Not seeing it... Final Smashes still don’t look balanced or even particularly fun for 1v1 fights. We’re going to have things ranging from Ness and Lucas’s which are borderline worthless in a 1v1 to Pit and (especially) Dark Pit’s which is probably going to confirm from a ton of things for early kills. The balance is looking quite strained and all over the place already...

 

[Thinkaman]

Final Smash meters is just the new Stamina mode, for when you want to play dress-up and pretend to be a traditional fighting game.

 

[Untouch]

Could see some meme side tournaments with stamina and meter final smashes.

 

[Vulgun]

I'm probably the only one here who sees these as a competitively viable option. The Final Smash meters are the answer to the previous problems of Final Smashes as a whole back in Brawl and 4, wherein it won't disrupt gameplay at all and it requires you to work for that ultimate move instead of having to strain yourself and hope you get lucky.

The one implication that would come out of this is that the game would be faster solely due to the power of some Final Smashes, thus requiring us to increase the amount of stocks to adjust for this. And this isn't necessarily a bad thing, either, as the game would feel much more fast-paced and fun alongside being competitive. The meters add a whole new layer to the competitive nature of Smash, and I would be disappointed if they weren't even tested out in tournaments.

And currently, I don't see any downsides that would prevent the Final Smash meter from being legal. Sure, it's possible you could link an attack into it, but they're not going to be the be-all-end-all of a match until last stock (look at Little Mac's KO Punch).

I just think that proper testing and evaluation in the competitive scene should determine their fate. Anything less is downright ridiculous in nature.

 

[Thinkaman]

I'm all for not rushing to ban things; by all means, consider and evaluate to your heart's content.

But Final Smash meter, aka "everyone has KO Punch (of wildly varying quality)" has the same issues as walk-offs, vaguely similar to reasons why people hate Bayonetta: they can reduce the outcome of the game to a very narrow set of interactions.

It's one thing to pick Little Mac and know what you're getting into at character select with this one specific character--sort of like picking Luigi or G&W and knowing they have luck-based side-specials. But we don't want to give everyone in the game KO Punch any more than we want to give everyone Judgement.

It makes for a fun diversion, like giving everyone raccoon tails so everyone can have Peach's float. But it's highly unlikely to be the heart of the game that it was balanced around, nor what new or returning players expect to play with.

 

[Untouch]

My opinions:

Stage Morph should be legal based on how easy it is to set up. Would potentially fix a lot of problems with a lot of stages, and potentially allow greater stage variety.
Squad Mode if it works how people think it works (they really didn't show it in action) this SHOULD be at least doubles tier main event, maybe a bit lower. I feel like this'd bring the variety that top level play needs.
Final Smash Meter I don't think should be legal. Interesting, yes, but final smashes are not balanced and I fear it may lead to projectile camping to build meter.
Stamina Stocks won't be legal, I can say that. Maybe combined with above for a side event?

 

[Vulgun]

I'm all for not rushing to ban things; by all means, consider and evaluate to your heart's content.

But Final Smash meter, aka "everyone has KO Punch (of wildly varying quality)" has the same issues as walk-offs, vaguely similar to reasons why people hate Bayonetta: they can reduce the outcome of the game to a very narrow set of interactions.

It's one thing to pick Little Mac and know what you're getting into at character select with this one specific character--sort of like picking Luigi or G&W and knowing they have luck-based side-specials. But we don't want to give everyone in the game KO Punch any more than we want to give everyone Judgement.

It makes for a fun diversion, like giving everyone raccoon tails so everyone can have Peach's float. But it's highly unlikely to be the heart of the game that it was balanced around, nor what new or returning players expect to play with.

While true that this could potentially reduce the outcome to a narrow set of interactions, I don't believe that this will always end up being the case for the Final Smash meter as a whole. There's too little we know about it currently, though this won't be a problem once the game releases.

The deciding factor of the integration of Final Smashes hinges upon how fast or slow they build up. And I'm hoping that they build up much more slowly than Cloud's Limit and Little Mac's KO Punch. This would compensate for the power of the Final Smashes and wouldn't disrupt gameplay all that much.

And I do agree about your worries about Final Smashes. I'm worried about their implications in game, but I'm only hoping that they're offset by the aforementioned speed at which they charge. If worst comes to worst, however, then I could see Final Smashes going another way, competitively.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

I want to see final smashes become legal now but. Marth's Critical Hit still OHKO'd despite Meter ones being weaker than average.
Now Squad Strike and Stage Morphing however, should absolutely be legal imo for more complexity

 

[Iron Maw]

I don't see how this comparable to KO Punch at all beyond having a meter. That implies that FSMs will all general kill you at 30% like it does as opposed to more reasonable 70-80% for kind of moves their are. Plenty Fighters already have Super Meters as a standard mechanic many more extreme than we see in Smash. Of course the use of each character FS will varitey since they fall into different categories, bit they should all have baseline of balance. FSM is something clearly aimed Competitive Community and it's something a lot people have wanted in Smash since Brawl. It's definitely work taking a look at especially since many of cast more options and even potential bump the viability of certain low tiers. A long with them being toned down, hopefully they will be blockable so they can't be something you can throw out and win. Landing them like any other move should important even more so on resource dependent system. so it carries a risk in it's use.

Besides we already pretend to play Smash like a traditional fighters as much as possible anyway.

 

[LancerStaff]

Stage morphing is cool. I don’t see it allowing otherwise banned stages but it would be neat for using it as the starting stage or something.

Not worth discussing if they don’t fix the horrendous amount of lag and dropped frames though. Good gravy it’s bad, and that was the trailer.

 

[Vulgun]

I want to see final smashes become legal now but. Marth's Critical Hit still OHKO'd despite Meter ones being weaker than average.
Now Squad Strike and Stage Morphing however, should absolutely be legal imo for more complexity

Granted, it can't be used while another Final Smash is active, and its power is compensated by the fact it is really, really slow in start-up. There's only so many interactions you could do that would confirm into Critical Hit in this game. Now if Final Smash meters had differing values on a character-to-character basis, and Marth/Lucina's charges the longest, that'd be nice.

Speaking of Stage Morphing, this just absolutely rocked my world when I first saw it. I believe this alone could take the meta in a different direction and make it much deeper than it normally is. It would be an interesting thing to test out once the game releases and I'm hoping it's good.

 

[Thinkaman]

There's a mystery "Custom Balance" menu option:

It's not Handicap; that is elsewhere in the menu. The best anyone can guess is that this is rage, or the 1.2x solo multiplier?

 

[LancerStaff]

Oh, oh! It’s probably got something to do with custom equipment. It might be that it averages it out across the sets on the characters playing, or it enforces stricter rules or caps.

The symbol is from a Power from Smash Run, and Powers were associated with custom sets as well. Powers may just be equippable outright instead of being Smash Run exclusive.

 

[Untouch]

It has the same icon as rage did in smash 4, so it may be rage related.

 

[LancerStaff]

It has the same icon as rage did in smash 4, so it may be rage related.

That “Rage” icon is for the rage Power, for use in Smash Run. The icon has no apparent connections to the mechanic otherwise.

Is rage even referred to as such in 4?