In the Smash community, it is generally considered that Hero isn't a viable character, and most would place him somewhere in the mid tiers. (Personally I believe Hero to be lower mid tier, but I can definitely see him climb to upper mid tier as the meta progresses.) Having played the character since its release, I can definitely say that there are 3 glaring flaws Hero has that must be fixed in order for him to become viable. (That is, being lower high tier at worst.) NOTE: I'm not advocating straight up removing weaknesses, as every character should have them, but what I'm suggesting is to fix three apparent flaws that the character has while still keeping the core weaknesses of said changes. Let's get right into them.
#1) Give invincibility frames to his Up-B. As it is right now, he doesn't have any invincibility frames on is Up-B, severily hindering his recovery, especially against reflector characters. Of course, how many frames are we talking about? Just a few frames are needed, from the point the torndado is created to the point where Hero's hurtbox is outside the tornado's hitboxes. This let's him still have a punishable recovery (think Villager's Bowling Ball or the myriads of spikes or lingering hitboxes) but removes the critical issue that is someone reflecting back the tornado to him while he recovers. For example: Hero wants to recover with Kaswoosh. The opponent Fox can just activate his reflector and hold it while dropping down to the tornado. This will outright KO/gimp Hero, even at low percents. The counterplay to this for Hero is to either have his Bounce activated, recover with Acceleratle instead, or use Zoom.
And as of right now, Hero can trade with his Up-B, where the tornado is created but Hero won't lift off, leaving him on the ground. This change also removes that.
#2) Slightly extend his grab range. Raise your hand if this has ever happened to you: You want to grab the opponent but failed, and instead their grab outranged your (missed) grab, which you should have had from the beginning anyway. Having the second-shortest grab range in the whole game (after Simon and Richter I believe, correct me if I'm wrong), Hero can have a rather tough time grabbing the opponent. There are many situations where it looks like Hero's grab reached the opponent, only for it to miss. This makes his grab rather risky, leaving you open to the opponent's potential punishment, which can be detrimental. But just how much bigger (longer) should his grab be? Just slightly extend the hitbox to cover his whole hand. Of course, he should still have a short grab range, but as of right now it is a tad too short. Increasing the grab range would make his grab more consistent, as some characters (like Yoshi and Bowser, for example) can be hard to grab in certain situations/animations/stances. (Thankfully, it comes out on frame 6!)
#3) Improve some moves's frame data. I won't go into micro details here (read: every change that I think should happen), but I think all of his aerials (aside from dair) are a tad slow, and that many of his "normal" (ground) moves have too much endlag. While slowness and bad frame data should be a part of Hero's weaknesses, some moves are just too slow. For example, his Bair is slower than his F-smash, and his F-tilt has ending lag compared to many other characters's smash attacks. Here is a list of the moves that needs frame data improvements the most in my opinion:
- Bair: f18 > f16 (-2 frames in every area, such as landing lag, auto cancel window and ending lag)
- Fair: f14 > f12 (-2 frames in every area)
- Nair: f8 > f6 (-2 frames in every area)
- Uair: f6 > f5, -3 frames of ending lag
- F-tilt: f9 > f8, between 5-8 frames of lag reduction
- Up-tilt: -2/-3 frames of endlag
- D-tilt: -3 frames of endlag
- Jab: f6 > f4
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There are more things that should happen to Hero, like making his jab connect better and his Zapple linger just a little bit longer (to prevent opponents to land on it while the thunderbolt is still out), but this isn't the thread for that. And not to talk about the rebalancing some of his areas need (like the crits), but again, this isn't the thread for that.
To conclude: if Hero gains some invincibility frames on his Up-B (all three variants of them), gets a slightly extended grab hitbox and also gets overall framedata improvements, he will more than likely become a viable character. (He would still lose hard to the top tiers though as most of them can easily rushdown and overwhelm Hero, but the ones with reflectors can't get an super easy kill anymore when Hero recovers - though they can still punish his Up-B descend like every other character can do.) This all is just speculation and theorycrafting of course, but he would be viable in my eyes, or at the very least, end up becoming a solid middle tier.
What are your thoughts about all of this? Do you agree or disagree with me? Are there other things that need to happen to Hero in order for him to become viable? Let me know below!
(Current Smash Ultimate version: 11.0.0.)
Unrelevant random fun fact: Bang is 1 frame faster than Kaboom, but Sizz is as fast as Sizzle. Buff Sizz Sakurai.
#1) Give invincibility frames to his Up-B. As it is right now, he doesn't have any invincibility frames on is Up-B, severily hindering his recovery, especially against reflector characters. Of course, how many frames are we talking about? Just a few frames are needed, from the point the torndado is created to the point where Hero's hurtbox is outside the tornado's hitboxes. This let's him still have a punishable recovery (think Villager's Bowling Ball or the myriads of spikes or lingering hitboxes) but removes the critical issue that is someone reflecting back the tornado to him while he recovers. For example: Hero wants to recover with Kaswoosh. The opponent Fox can just activate his reflector and hold it while dropping down to the tornado. This will outright KO/gimp Hero, even at low percents. The counterplay to this for Hero is to either have his Bounce activated, recover with Acceleratle instead, or use Zoom.
And as of right now, Hero can trade with his Up-B, where the tornado is created but Hero won't lift off, leaving him on the ground. This change also removes that.
#2) Slightly extend his grab range. Raise your hand if this has ever happened to you: You want to grab the opponent but failed, and instead their grab outranged your (missed) grab, which you should have had from the beginning anyway. Having the second-shortest grab range in the whole game (after Simon and Richter I believe, correct me if I'm wrong), Hero can have a rather tough time grabbing the opponent. There are many situations where it looks like Hero's grab reached the opponent, only for it to miss. This makes his grab rather risky, leaving you open to the opponent's potential punishment, which can be detrimental. But just how much bigger (longer) should his grab be? Just slightly extend the hitbox to cover his whole hand. Of course, he should still have a short grab range, but as of right now it is a tad too short. Increasing the grab range would make his grab more consistent, as some characters (like Yoshi and Bowser, for example) can be hard to grab in certain situations/animations/stances. (Thankfully, it comes out on frame 6!)
#3) Improve some moves's frame data. I won't go into micro details here (read: every change that I think should happen), but I think all of his aerials (aside from dair) are a tad slow, and that many of his "normal" (ground) moves have too much endlag. While slowness and bad frame data should be a part of Hero's weaknesses, some moves are just too slow. For example, his Bair is slower than his F-smash, and his F-tilt has ending lag compared to many other characters's smash attacks. Here is a list of the moves that needs frame data improvements the most in my opinion:
- Bair: f18 > f16 (-2 frames in every area, such as landing lag, auto cancel window and ending lag)
- Fair: f14 > f12 (-2 frames in every area)
- Nair: f8 > f6 (-2 frames in every area)
- Uair: f6 > f5, -3 frames of ending lag
- F-tilt: f9 > f8, between 5-8 frames of lag reduction
- Up-tilt: -2/-3 frames of endlag
- D-tilt: -3 frames of endlag
- Jab: f6 > f4
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There are more things that should happen to Hero, like making his jab connect better and his Zapple linger just a little bit longer (to prevent opponents to land on it while the thunderbolt is still out), but this isn't the thread for that. And not to talk about the rebalancing some of his areas need (like the crits), but again, this isn't the thread for that.
To conclude: if Hero gains some invincibility frames on his Up-B (all three variants of them), gets a slightly extended grab hitbox and also gets overall framedata improvements, he will more than likely become a viable character. (He would still lose hard to the top tiers though as most of them can easily rushdown and overwhelm Hero, but the ones with reflectors can't get an super easy kill anymore when Hero recovers - though they can still punish his Up-B descend like every other character can do.) This all is just speculation and theorycrafting of course, but he would be viable in my eyes, or at the very least, end up becoming a solid middle tier.
What are your thoughts about all of this? Do you agree or disagree with me? Are there other things that need to happen to Hero in order for him to become viable? Let me know below!
(Current Smash Ultimate version: 11.0.0.)
