Tier List Speculation

[OidBirdie]

the more i play PM the more i think fox is top tier by himself.

I think you're underestimating the beast that is MK.

 

[OidBirdie]

Edit: crap, first double post

 

[Oro?!]

MK vs Fox isn't better than an even matchup for MK. MK does way better vs Wolf and Falco.

 

[DMG]

I think he just meant overall, not MK vs Fox

Which is still silly because it's Fox

 

[FireBall Stars]

I do not think a tier list should require a lesson to know how to interpret.

Unless the person can't interpret what a tier list means. Or interpret the arguments used to construct it.

Semantics is another topic, but, if you don't get the semantics right you risk a higher chance of getting your own post misinterpreted. Which in a discussion, is something important.

 

[Apollo Ali]

^You say 'he' but do you mean 'them' ?
Peach really wasn't 'much' worse that the 'better characters' in Melee, I wouldn't even class her as a Tier below 'Top' in that game. In PM, there are minor things that happened to everything of course. The thing that hurts Peach in this game is her lack of ability to corner characters as well, but fortunately for her, there aren't many more characters she has to work like that against. Otherwise, she's very well rounded and generally won't get clobbered hard by anything. Nothing from big and sluggish heavy-hitters to floaty-fast projectile spammers really threaten her to a point where she's not working at least like 90% as functional as she can be. Other methods of play and character styles, due to the traits others have that are a little more polarizing here or there, she's more universally functional than almost anyone. Top that off with her being probably the best of this style of play, and throw in some little tweaks to get rid of some pin-point weaknesses to keep her better in this niche than most new-comers, and she's set for life.
It's not that she's notably better than Fox/Falco/Marth/Sheik/etc, it's just that she doesn't have anything notably 'abuse-able' about her, like at all, where others at least have hints of things in certain areas.
Pika and Luigi it makes sense to question, as they're considered pretty much trash universally in both Melee and PM, unlike Peach... but if you need more explanation on Peach specifically I can go into actual details.
For Pika, I won't elaborate much, but the Up-B changes alone basically open up a dynamic to his game that wasn't even there before. Pika is a new character in PM, and as of 3.0, he can really hardly be related to his Melee-self. He's further from his Melee-self than PM Mario to Melee Mario is, just from the Up-B working the way it does. From on-stage QA1 and complete freedom with off-stage game, specifically about it. Otherwise, there's nothing like significantly improving things like Grab range, Aerials in various ways, and having bigger Stages overall in the game, when talking about a character who is already Tops in speed in the game even outside the QA1 stupid-speed stuff.
Luigi is basically the same idea. He's not comparable in the slightest to his Melee-self, and is further from it than Mario. Even his basic combos aren't carried over, since he has things like U-Air > Down-B > DJ Misfire/Up-B free-crap on every character at any %. His recovery isn't the worst in the game next to Kirby or something like Melee, and his neutral game (the thing everyone thinks is the worst in the game next to Ganon or something) doesn't even work the same, especially with the incorporation of Brawl mechanics like Turn-Around and Crawling when applied to his friction and distance-speed game. Big stages are great for him more than anyone in the game save maybe Falcon, Sonic, Pika, and a few spammers. Not just for freedom of movement, but the polarizing nature of his ability to kill things off hits.

tl;dr Peach functions similarly, with minor buffs, but the way she functions is good for the overall game so nothing hinders her. Pika and Luigi aren't at all comparable to their Melee counter-parts and aside from the very vague and blunt things like "They like N-Airs in different ways" there's no reason to consider them relating to their Melee-selves. Even Mario has more similar-functioning and appearing things to his game, and everyone knows how much 'better' he got.


Hence top > down + left > right is pretty good.
Nguz did a good job of explaining the nuances and benefits of a Curve list, and the way I had it set up. In which case, it's work explaining so people understand, since it's pretty much the most valuable thing regarding format probably in this thread in terms of directly making what everyone is discussing... into something applicable.

Fair point at Peach, and I think you might be right on that point. Peach is slept-on in Melee because we only have Armada as her champion; that will only be exacerbated in P:M. I actually was mostly surprised at Luigi and then looked at other characters relative to Melee and was concerned overall.

As far as your points on Luigi and Pika go, it's an interesting thought, but I'd have to wait to see evidence. I agree Luigi's neutral has been buffed overall with the addition of Brawl mechanics and Vist obviously makes him look ridiculously incredible but I it's still mostly theory. I know next to nothing about Pika so no comment on that, except that evidence ain't there yet. I feel similarly about Lucas. I'd love for people to blow open those characters tho, that would be p. rad.

 

[Ali Baba 177]

Other than Squirtle sucks apparently...

I can see that a lot of people count squirtle as a low tier character and he does not do well in tournaments, but he doesn't seem that bad to me.,, Can someone explain how he is bad?

 

[Time2Play]

I can see that a lot of people count squirtle as a low tier character and he does not do well in tournaments, but he doesn't seem that bad to me.,, Can someone explain how he is bad?

People will tell you that he looses to priority.
Nevertheless I still think that he will end somewhere in the middle. Hes small, hes fast and he has some nice techs. And his matchups against the spacies are not that bad.

 

[Nausicaa]

He doesn't have anything with certainty to break through neutral, and he kind of needs to be the one to break through neutral given he can't camp and gets out-speed + out-range lame-stuff against him from almost everyone.
He's still solid, not exactly bad, but at plain sight, the depth of him is lackluster. I wouldn't be surprised to see Squirtle being on par with everyone, but given this is 'speculation' only with the young meta-game, the speculation is that if anyone gets the short-stick, it appears there's a better chance it'll be Squirtle than others.
That speed though...

Apollo, Vist is a just a player that happens to be playing the character, nothing spectacular, the established Pikas will be the last people to apply new stuff to Pika without the direction of others, and Lucas is too awkward for people committed to Smash to play him unconditionally given how most people overplay themselves into fluency rather than conscious binges and reflecting for any efficient learning process. Not much has changed in the Lucas meta-game since 2.1 as a good testament to that, and the reasons will linger still.
Game is good, people like it, but learning is hard, people don't like it. :/

Peach isn't slept-on because we only have Armada, the only reason she can be slept-on is because the person sleeping on her simply doesn't know better, and developed a subjection of her at a certain place do develop confidence in as being accurate. Armada/Vist/whoever can be mentioned as a 'beacon' for hope in a given character that's considered garbage is more of an excuse to say it's gimmicks from good players, or a hint that what's subjective within a person could be wrong but usually only to be shrugged off and overlooked.

Can't trust nobody and nothing, not even yourself. So if everything everyone knows is inaccurate, because naturally there's subjectivity without exception, what to do but develop our own ability to figure things out for our selves?
We can use only our subjectivity from others and ourselves to develop 'the ability to figure things out for ourselves' and these discussions make good context for that, but that's literally the only thing of value in forum-discussion, whether we realize, understand it, accept it, or not. XD
Life is funny like that.

 

[Terotrous]

That's like saying Cammy was nerfed in SFxT. Entirely different games with different gameplay mechanics. They are simply different and unrelated representations of a character, neither nerfed nor buffed from each other.

This is silly. First of all, Project M's own character page for Olimar compares him to his Brawl incarnation repeatedly. Secondly, even between games that are pretty different, like Melee and Brawl, no one had trouble understanding statements like "Jigglypuff was heavily nerfed in Brawl".

I could somewhat see the argument for some characters, like Lucario and Wario, who are so drastically different from Brawl that they almost play like new characters, but honestly Olimar's general playstyle has not changed much. The major change is the Pikmin maturity mechanic, other than that he just got a few basic move speed adjustments, a little recovery help, and some nerfs. He's still pretty much the same character.

I think my biggest issue with the 4 Pikmin Nerf is that nuanced Olimar play is supposed to be about making good use of the varying Pikmin types, since each has different strengths and weaknesses. With 6 Pikmin, you're virtually guaranteed to have at least 4 of the 5 types, and you have a decent chance to get all 5. With only 4, having all 5 types is obviously impossible, and you have about a 70% chance of only drawing 3 different types. This adds an annoying luck element to playing Olimar in that you may go a long time without getting a specific type that you want (and tossing your pikmin off the stage to get new ones not only leaves you vulnerable much longer due to slower Pikmin Pluck, but it prevents your pikmin from maturing as well). If anything, I feel this just encourages even more braindead and spammy Olimar play because at least that way bad luck with Pikmin Pluck can't screw you over.

I also feel that the Pikmin maturity mechanic can be used to balance out the number of Pikmin that he has. If we gave him 6 Pikmin, you'd probably immediately raise the (valid) concern that this would make it too easy to get flower pikmin. We could balance this out by reducing the amount of health each Pikmin has, forcing you to be more careful with them to keep them alive. Alternatively, we could reduce the benefit you get from flower pikmin, or make leaf pikmin even weaker. There's loads of possibilities here.



Anyway, to anyone saying "Olimar is good already", please go to a tournament and place well. So far, in most competitive matches I've seen where someone picks Olimar, the opponent just walks all over them and they quickly go back to a good character after getting 3-stocked. Perhaps he has some hidden tech, but I still find the luck element involved in Pikmin pulling to be an unnecessary headache, when you could just pick a better character and have your whole moveset available to you at all times.


EDIT: It just occured to me that another possible fix for Olimar might be to make his Pikmin Pluck non-random, either he always pulls out the Pikmin in a specific sequence, or Pikmin Pluck will always give him a Pikmin he does not currently have (this might be broken though, it'd make it too easy to go nuts tossing whites).

 

[Narsic]

This is silly. First of all, Project M's own character page for Olimar compares him to his Brawl incarnation repeatedly. Secondly, even between games that are pretty different, like Melee and Brawl, no one had trouble understanding statements like "Jigglypuff was heavily nerfed in Brawl".

I could somewhat see the argument for some characters, like Lucario and Wario, who are so drastically different from Brawl that they almost play like new characters, but honestly Olimar's general playstyle has not changed much. The major change is the Pikmin maturity mechanic, other than that he just got a few basic move speed adjustments, a little recovery help, and some nerfs. He's still pretty much the same character.

I think my biggest issue with the 4 Pikmin Nerf is that nuanced Olimar play is supposed to be about making good use of the varying Pikmin types, since each has different strengths and weaknesses. With 6 Pikmin, you're virtually guaranteed to have at least 4 of the 5 types, and you have a decent chance to get all 5. With only 4, having all 5 types is obviously impossible, and you have about a 70% chance of only drawing 3 different types. This adds an annoying luck element to playing Olimar in that you may go a long time without getting a specific type that you want (and tossing your pikmin off the stage to get new ones not only leaves you vulnerable much longer due to slower Pikmin Pluck, but it prevents your pikmin from maturing as well). If anything, I feel this just encourages even more braindead and spammy Olimar play because at least that way bad luck with Pikmin Pluck can't screw you over.

I also feel that the Pikmin maturity mechanic can be used to balance out the number of Pikmin that he has. If we gave him 6 Pikmin, you'd probably immediately raise the (valid) concern that this would make it too easy to get flower pikmin. We could balance this out by reducing the amount of health each Pikmin has, forcing you to be more careful with them to keep them alive. Alternatively, we could reduce the benefit you get from flower pikmin, or make leaf pikmin even weaker. There's loads of possibilities here.



Anyway, to anyone saying "Olimar is good already", please go to a tournament and place well. So far, in most competitive matches I've seen where someone picks Olimar, the opponent just walks all over them and they quickly go back to a good character after getting 3-stocked. Perhaps he has some hidden tech, but I still find the luck element involved in Pikmin pulling to be an unnecessary headache, when you could just pick a better character and have your whole moveset available to you at all times.


EDIT: It just occured to me that another possible fix for Olimar might be to make his Pikmin Pluck non-random, either he always pulls out the Pikmin in a specific sequence, or Pikmin Pluck will always give him a Pikmin he does not currently have (this might be broken though, it'd make it too easy to go nuts tossing whites).

Olimar's playstyle in brawl is disgusting, evil, they in no way want that same playstyle back in this game. He would sit across the stage spamming pikmin at you while sipping tea and writing a novel, during this time you're just trying to get to him. That campy character needs to burn, the 6 pikmin "nerf" was a way to get rid of his old playstyle, so you can definitely classify Olimar in that Lucario and Wario base you described. He isn't (or should not be) the same character, he can't be, PM is so different from Brawl that Olimar can't gain the same momentum from his old sit back and watch you cry tactic. They needed to adapt the character to the new PM environment, that is why he got the changes he did.

Now I don't know enough about Olimar to say if he's bad or good, but I can say he does not have the same playstyle as in Brawl. Just imagining Brawl Olimar makes me curl up in a ball. I hate that character, and I am glad I never have to see him again.

 

[Oracle]

Six pikmin promotes running away and spamming side b, since there is virtually no risk and you don't care about your pikmin because its so easy to have a lot that missing a couple doens't really matter. Four pikmin makes camping much harder because if you do a pikmin toss and get hit offstage then your recovery is significantly worse. I don't see how having fewer pikmin makes it harder to manage colors, especially since you rarely actually want diversity. Most MUs in brawl you will be throwing away all but one or two kinds of pikmin because only a couple are good in that matchup, and its similar here. Pikmin management is also deeper imo because the decision between a flowered pikmin you don't need and a baby pikmin that you do need is very real.

Basically, olimar is pretty much completely fine. If you want evidence, theres a video from this weekend where I went olimar game 3 of doubles winners finals vs sethlon and utdzac. I wish I had more, but the grand finals set where I went all olimar didn't get recorded (but we won)

 

[Plum]

I don't care that Olimar is viable or not (he is, but w/e) I just care that he's booty butt cheeks boring compared to Pikmin series

 

[SpiderMad]

What did u have in mind for his moveset overall

 

[Terotrous]

Olimar's playstyle in brawl is disgusting, evil, they in no way want that same playstyle back in this game.

From the various back roomer posts I've seen about Olimar, I think this was basically the rationale behind his design - we hate Olimar as a character, so he's not high on our list of priorities for balance. I can't claim not to understand this mindset, but I do find it regrettable. Olimar is potentially an interesting character with some unique mechanics, unfortunately the way he was set up in Brawl let to a very campy and lame playstyle. I do think some of this was just Brawl, though, since you don't get much of a reward for landing a hit, safe offense dominates.

Six pikmin promotes running away and spamming side b, since there is virtually no risk and you don't care about your pikmin because its so easy to have a lot that missing a couple doens't really matter. Four pikmin makes camping much harder because if you do a pikmin toss and get hit offstage then your recovery is significantly worse.

If Side B is the problem (and I agree that it is), doesn't it make more sense to just nerf that move rather than Olimar as a whole? You could perhaps increase the recovery of Side B or decrease the damage that the Pikmin deal (particularly if they're leaf). Nerfing the number of Pikmin also impacts Olimar's melee game, so if the objective is to encourage more offensive Olimar play I'm not convinced it's the best approach.

I don't see how having fewer pikmin makes it harder to manage colors, especially since you rarely actually want diversity. Most MUs in brawl you will be throwing away all but one or two kinds of pikmin because only a couple are good in that matchup, and its similar here. Pikmin management is also deeper imo because the decision between a flowered pikmin you don't need and a baby pikmin that you do need is very real.

This is another situation where luck becomes a factor. The only time where you can pull Pikmin for free is while you're invincible, which gives you enough time to get 4 or so. Didn't get the ones you wanted? You're now in a pretty bad spot, the opponent can basically rush you down for free if you try to toss those ones away and get more.

Also, they actually buffed Olimar's recovery when he has few Pikmin (he gets a little hop when using Up B relative to how few pikmin he has), it's not as horrible as it used to be.

Basically, olimar is pretty much completely fine. If you want evidence, theres a video from this weekend where I went olimar game 3 of doubles winners finals vs sethlon and utdzac. I wish I had more, but the grand finals set where I went all olimar didn't get recorded (but we won)

Link to the video / stream?

Doubles is pretty different than singles though, your partner can cover deficiencies in your character.

 

[Fish&Herbs19]

Anyway, to anyone saying "Olimar is good already", please go to a tournament and place well. So far, in most competitive matches I've seen where someone picks Olimar, the opponent just walks all over them and they quickly go back to a good character after getting 3-stocked. Perhaps he has some hidden tech, but I still find the luck element involved in Pikmin pulling to be an unnecessary headache, when you could just pick a better character and have your whole moveset available to you at all times.

Here you go.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TaH5rmmRFI

 

[Infil]

Lucas is crazy good, he deserves whatever tier spot people want to put him.

 

[Terotrous]

Here you go.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TaH5rmmRFI

To be honest this isn't really changing my opinion that Olimar tends to get run over by fast characters. Lucas is just all over him most of the time. Lucas basically only dies when he forgets to respect USmash.

Also I'm not seeing a lot of secret tech, except "Pick Yoshi's / Battlefield". Uthrow into U/Fair and Dash Attack into USmash are as basic as it gets. This Olimar is playing solid but there's really nothing fancy going on.

That being said, I think I might be willing to consider 5 Pikmin instead of 6. This still gives you the chance to get all 5 colours, and it makes getting 4 colours a lot more likely. Also, it gives Up B some of its range back, which is nice, it's pretty valueless as an attack right now and it has the potential to be a great fancy combo finisher.

 

[woundedust]

O think olimar with only 4 pikmin and brawl pikmin pluck would not be overpowered

 

[Oracle]

Olimar can pluck pikmin as fast as in brawl...the technique is just a little more complicated than mashing b

Its a lot easier than you would think to find time to manage your pikmin. Idk from your posts it just seems like you havent actually played much with olimar. Hes not particularly fancy, but pikmin management leads to some cool stuff and honestly its refreshing to play a solid character with good tools who doesnt have a million gimmicks or a busted projectile

 

[Nguz95]

can you still do the really fast running pluck you could do in Brawl?

 

[Terotrous]

Olimar can pluck pikmin as fast as in brawl...the technique is just a little more complicated than mashing b

Its a lot easier than you would think to find time to manage your pikmin. Idk from your posts it just seems like you havent actually played much with olimar. Hes not particularly fancy, but pikmin management leads to some cool stuff and honestly its refreshing to play a solid character with good tools who doesnt have a million gimmicks or a busted projectile

The last sentence nailed it. I just put in about 30 minutes of Olimar matches, and I agree that he feels "solid", but not dominant or powerful in any way (and at least half the cast has some really broken stuff). He also feels a little stiff, likely because he's got a lot more recovery on his moves and fewer pikmin. I must admit I did have some fun using him (Up throw combos are pretty entertaining even if they are super simple), but there were way more situations where I got, like, 3 reds and 1 yellow than I'd like.

 

[Oracle]

Does every character really need something that seems broken to be a good character? Most of the things that seem broken have easy answers that just arent intuitive (what I referred to as gimmicks). Olimar has a decent projectile, powerful moves, a really good recovery,and a great combo game. What more do you need? Just because a character doesnt have a shine or a boomerang doesnt make them unviable or bad

 

[Plum]

(つ ◕_◕ )つ GIVE NON-CHANGING PIKMIN* OR RIOT (つ ◕_◕ )つ

*on non-throwing moves

 

[Terotrous]

Does every character really need something that seems broken to be a good character?

To be honest I think the answer is probably yes. Most of the characters who are awesome are generally solid and have something about them that's amazing. That puts them one step above just "generally solid". Even if Olimar got one more Pikmin I don't think he'd be Lucas tier or anything, he'd just be a bit more well-rounded.

 

[Nguz95]

that text scaling Tho

 

[JOE!]

To be honest I think the answer is probably yes. Most of the characters who are awesome are generally solid and have something about them that's amazing. That puts them one step above just "generally solid". Even if Olimar got one more Pikmin I don't think he'd be Lucas tier or anything, he'd just be a bit more well-rounded.

This so much. A character can be solid, sure. But it will ALWAYS be worse than a character who is solid with an amazing trait or two.

 

[Thane of Blue Flames]

This so much. A character can be solid, sure. But it will ALWAYS be worse than a character who is solid with an amazing trait or two.

Like ...

Yeah, that is a tautological statement that is completely true, because it's tautological. I still fail to see how this applies to most of the P:M cast. Like, what to most characters have that's amazing? Lucario's OHC and Ike's QD come with significant deficiencies elsewhere because they were designed and balanced around those traits. A lot of characters are solid but with a central aspect to their gameplay.

@ Oracle : Is that doubles vid on azprojectmelee?

 

[Ogopogo]

Lucas is crazy good, he deserves whatever tier spot people want to put him.

Agreed. He has so many good tools... he's a Marth spacie with DJC , good combo ability, and a super-fast tether.

 

[Empyrean]

Lucas just seems to have so many great options, in the air and on the ground. I'm not even good with him but I can still feel his potential when using him. Does he even have particularly bad matchups?

 

[JOE!]

Like ...

Yeah, that is a tautological statement that is completely true, because it's tautological. I still fail to see how this applies to most of the P:M cast. Like, what to most characters have that's amazing? Lucario's OHC and Ike's QD come with significant deficiencies elsewhere because they were designed and balanced around those traits. A lot of characters are solid but with a central aspect to their gameplay.

Usually it's not one aspect that is amazing, but a handful that work together on top of a generally solid design. Perfect example would be Falco:

Alone, he would be "solid". Add in just his Dair, he's Solid+. Just his shine, Solid+, etc. But, his Shine combined with Dair combined with Lasers that allow him to control neutral in order to space those other moves make him "Amazing".

Or even Link: he has a sword already, and is relatively fast enough to be "Solid". Add dynamic projectiles, a Scorpion-like GET OVER HERE grab, and an Up B that can ruin certain recoveries by itself on top of all that? Amazing.

Characters like Olimar while still viable / good, are merely solid as they have yet to either have something / find something that makes them stand out like a good chunk of the cast has so far, like Lucas with his versatile combo game -> super finishers, or Mario with his wall of fire + amazing grab<->combo game + gimping power.

Guess where I'm going with this is that the characters you generally see as the high/top tier in many of these lists are there because they are both solid + have stand out features to back that up, as opposed to the others who are either more polarizing in their features (meaning their features have huge drawbacks against other characters, and with such a balanced cast having bad MUs has got to make you worse) or just simply have nothing "outstanding" going for them that other characters don't do better.

 

[Cassio]

Did they change the trait about olimars pikmin where they lose to every attack under the sun? Olimar was weak against a smart rush down strategy for this reason in Brawl, so I imagine hed be trash in P:M if its still the same and the opponent is smart enough to abuse it.

 

[Nguz95]

Lucas just seems to have so many great options, in the air and on the ground. I'm not even good with him but I can still feel his potential when using him. Does he even have particularly bad matchups?

calling all @Hylian
This man is not on the Lucas hype train, and he might be right. I personally think he's super good, but his learning curve is crazy steep. I don't think he beats fox or falco (maybe even mk) just because PK Freeze is not flexible enough to handle a lot of people's movement.

 

[NonSequtur]

As new as the metagame is, does anyone think that a character will break out the way Jigglypuff did in melee? (Or Yoshi, if I were to ride the aMSa hype train) Because people thought they had a solid grasp on what made a good character and then someone shows up and changes the game. I'm mainly afraid that a character like Lucas, who's already considered amazing, will have that kind of thing and ruin what seems to be considered a good balance, where all characters have the ability to hypothetically win a national. What would be the response from the PMBR? Chainthrows can have their release points changed (looking at you Sheik), moves can have small knockback angle and hitstun adjustments, but what if it's the central design of the character that ends up being flawed? (Que joke about spacies)

 

[JOE!]

Learning curve being steep should not have an impact on how good a character is, as there -will- be people who get past that.

 

[Nguz95]

Learning curve being steep should not have an impact on how good a character is, as there -will- be people who get past that.

I never said it was. I mentioned his learning curve because it deters a lot of people from playing him. It's a reason we haven't seen someone take Lucas super deep yet.

 

[Thane of Blue Flames]

I feel like HF Neon's getting there. Pink Fresh, too, maybe.

 

[Nguz95]

Definitely. Both of those guys are getting there. Pink Fresh is way more patient than Neon's Lucas. They are both so different.

 

[Thane of Blue Flames]

I believe I heard on S@x commentary that Pink Fresh comes from a Brawl background. I know I heard that he can't even Wavedash, so coupled with his presumed native game he probably reacts to his opponents with a more patient bait-and-punish style.

Neon I've heard grows a phantom hand to push more buttons for him. He said he mains Lucas in P:M because Fox "wasn't hard enough".

So yeah, two pretty different approaches to the same character there.

 

[JOE!]

I never said it was. I mentioned his learning curve because it deters a lot of people from playing him. It's a reason we haven't seen someone take Lucas super deep yet.

Right, it's just it seems to always be the case that people say "oh, its ok for this character to be really good because it's hard to play" as if the hard to play / learn part is an actual drawback to how good it is.