Tier List Speculation

[BTmoney]

I think Mow has the best Sheik I've seen.

I didn't know he played in a serious capacity! Do you dissect your own gameplay so painfully tediously umbreon lol? I feel like since you have access to yourself, your coach, winning everything shouldn't be a problem. But I also reason that you probably put more effort into helping others judging by your posts.

 

[Deleted member]

I didn't know he played in a serious capacity! Do you dissect your own gameplay so painfully tediously umbreon lol? I feel like since you have access to yourself, your coach, winning everything shouldn't be a problem. But I also reason that you probably put more effort into helping others judging by your posts.

wow that was deep.

i do dissect my own play to the slightest minutia, although with the restriction that i have a hard time accepting my own advice sometimes. i feel that the inability to accept one's own advice and better judgment is fairly common though, both in and out of smash.

i mostly play PM to see how the game is developing. sheik has phenomenal stage control, and unlike melee she doesn't particularly lose to any characters that i've seen. i get to use these attributes to test my opponents and their decision-making processes.

on the way to apex, dr pp told me that he thinks of smash play as its own language of sorts, and what you see on the screen communicates the medium of smash much better than the english language does. if this is true, i suppose my best rationale of play would be that i push and pull people to see how articulate their prose can be.

when i played nintendude at apex, he sincerely beat me. i did not counterpick him and i probably could have, but i don't think it would have changed the result. i think this is mostly due to my inexperience against ike, and mike was smart to pick a character that would limit my experience. despite the relative goodness of my character, and that i think she should win the match, there are many other variables that determine the final outcome of a match and i am relearning those lessons from 10 years ago for this new game. i don't expect to win any events, nor do i expect to be the best sheik player.

but for now, i'm a little proud of myself for being the best at the character that i've seen in a small sample size.

 

[BTmoney]

wow that was deep.

I can be a deep person, at times.
But don't give me that lol. Game 1 you SD'd three times. You actually played very well and I thought you were going to beat him handily until halfway through game 3 where MU inexperience I think took over or a dry spell occurred which caused a little bit of bad decision making.

Your marth also looks extremely distinguished. It's interesting, hopefully I can play you in the future (in either game) when I'm not so terrible.

 

[Cia]

wow that was deep.

i do dissect my own play to the slightest minutia, although with the restriction that i have a hard time accepting my own advice sometimes. i feel that the inability to accept one's own advice and better judgment is fairly common though, both in and out of smash.

i mostly play PM to see how the game is developing. sheik has phenomenal stage control, and unlike melee she doesn't particularly lose to any characters that i've seen. i get to use these attributes to test my opponents and their decision-making processes.

on the way to apex, dr pp told me that he thinks of smash play as its own language of sorts, and what you see on the screen communicates the medium of smash much better than the english language does. if this is true, i suppose my best rationale of play would be that i push and pull people to see how articulate their prose can be.

when i played nintendude at apex, he sincerely beat me. i did not counterpick him and i probably could have, but i don't think it would have changed the result. i think this is mostly due to my inexperience against ike, and mike was smart to pick a character that would limit my experience. despite the relative goodness of my character, and that i think she should win the match, there are many other variables that determine the final outcome of a match and i am relearning those lessons from 10 years ago for this new game. i don't expect to win any events, nor do i expect to be the best sheik player.

but for now, i'm a little proud of myself for being the best at the character that i've seen in a small sample size.

Have you played against a good ZSS? Can't say I'm certain, but it feels like ZSS trashes Sheik

 

[Shimesaba]

i mostly play PM to see how the game is developing. sheik has phenomenal stage control, and unlike melee she doesn't particularly lose to any characters that i've seen.

Okay, I'm curious about that. I'd say melee Sheik loses to maybe... Puff, Ice Climbers, and Falco? What do see as different in PM (other than no IC's) that brings Sheik up to the point of no losing matchups?

 

[Deleted member]

all imo:

jpuff has worse stage control, ICs don't exist, fox/falco just seem much more manageable in this game and i've never felt outclassed by a player for either character. for similar reasons, i think marth is much worse than he is in melee and i think peach has solidly winning MUs on both fox and falco. it's all subject to change but that's how i see them now.

the only ZSS i've played was ryoko. i would be surprised about it being a losing MU though, as ZSS feels like she has some real holes to her neutral game when i've played her and sheik's poking game is excellent, but i'm entirely open to being flat wrong here.

my marth is actually much better than the apex 2013 videos lol, i was just having a lot of fun. for my sheik matches with nintendude games 2 and 3, i was definitely trying to win and still lost.

 

[CyberZixx]

I'm fairly new to Project M and play Marth myself. I want to know why you feel he is so much worse in this? I can see it that being the case but have little experience with most of the new matchups. His recover feels bad compared to many of the newly buffed cast.

 

[Deleted member]

I'm fairly new to Project M and play Marth myself. I want to know why you feel he is so much worse in this? I can see it that being the case but have little experience with most of the new matchups. His recover feels bad compared to many of the newly buffed cast.

marth is effectively the same character as he is in melee. the only problem with that is that every other character has changed to some extent. since character goodness is dependent upon a comparison to other characters, marth has become relatively worse. i do not think this alone has caused marth to become a mediocre character. however, the valuable attributes for what make a character "good" have also changed for this game, and i think this is where the character loses points.

melee is traditionally a game based around stage positioning, control, and clever methods of movement to makes those ideas stronger. in melee, marth has one of the best dashdances in the game in a game where dahsdancing is a broken tactic and a moveset that is conducive to always winning air-to-air types of exchanges in a game where forced exchanges are one of the best routes to victory. predictably, the character becomes based around these linear aspects and is very strong for it. in PM, dashdancing is a weaker option because crouching is weaker, there is less discrepancy between character speeds, there are more irregular forms of movement to overcome the dashdancing like crawling, and there are other things to consider in the neutral game like character armor, etc. Dashdancing is still a great tactic, but it's far from blatantly abusable like it was in melee.

likewise, because marth's dashdancing game is weaker, his ground control game is much weaker because grabbing is a less vaulable conversion out of the neutral game than it was before. this means that a lot of marths will do sword swings instead. for marth, his swings in neutral are actually pretty slow as far as attacks go and are quite abusable, particularly when the marth player is doing something that is not immediately threatening. you can pretty much just wait for him to swing and then beat on him for it without much difficulty. this idea of a much worse neutral game is mostly why marth is a mediocre character. for an example of this, watch this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvLT_BE0MBQ

in this first match, i was playing for real up until i taunted. after this point, you can watch me change styles intentionally. notice how often i do laggy swings in the neutral game when i have no idea whether they'll hit or not both before and after the taunt. yes i still do them prior to the taunt, but it's much less and dtilt basically doesn't count sometimes with IASA and stage control, just ignore that. notice after the taunt how often i throw out fsmash or dash attack or fairs that really have no business hitting, or **** like downthrow > turn around > fsmash that doesn't even work. this was all intentional, and it's bad play so you should be able to see why. you can also see how much more effective it is a little later into the match. i was still doing good for a little bit after i taunted with bad play between my 2nd and 3rd kill but that's coincidental and you should treat it like an exception, i kept telling chu i was going to break his shield lmao.

let's keep going. in melee, once you get the conversion into a juggle, you can pretty much have your way with your opponent. in PM, this is no different. however, marth is no longer guaranteed to always win air-to-air exchanges because he doesn't have the same monopoly on air range that he did in the prior game. this leads to all sorts of fun situations where the opponent can simply get out of your juggles for once reason or another. that said, marth's actual combos have improved somewhat so this almost cancels out. however, that increased combo potential will invariably encourage more people to go for them from neutral with swings of the sword rather than grabs, so it exacerbates my prior point about him getting abused in the neutral game and should lower the character's win rate overall.

to be 100% clear, i'm not complaining about marth. i think that marth was done exactly perfectly and i would be upset to see him changed in any way. i'm glad that the PM developers decided to nerf marth by correcting what were obviously flawed mechanics in the prior game. but i also understand that he rode on the back of those mechanics to be a good character.

edit: lol ok i guess those first 2 stock were pretty good on my part. whatever lmao.

 

[BTmoney]

since character goodness is dependent upon a comparison to other characters

I'm glad someone else gets that.
But you need to explain how grabbing for Marth became worse (or at least his upthrow) and what characters' crouch game/armor actually inhibits his ground control, and your point on juggling. Who challenges marth while above him falling down?

And you get an unusual amount of SH double aerials, like that stood out a lot.
You should also expand on your side B usage, what exactly are you looking for with them and if one does hit, what do you do with it?

 

[DMG]

The main thing that sticks out as Marth for me is the different offstage game that has developed for PM. Edgeguarding overall is harder to accomplish because character recoveries are, on average, much better than Melee. At the same time, nothing notable changed for Marth recovering and characters DO have better/easier tools to punish the linearity that people like Marth have. Not a lot has drastically changed for Marth onstage: if your character struggles vs swords or DD/Bait grabs, you're gonna have a rough time against Marth. If you are unsure about a MU, you generally will still have a "cookie cutter" idea. Only a few Brawl characters seem to challenge what or how Marth is supposed to play, IE Sonic.


I dunno what changed for Marth throw/grab wise, I'm not sure what you mean by saying he can't convert from them as well (overall cast is heavier maybe? Little awkward trying to follow up on Lucario Rob Wario etc), but I do agree that people go for Fair/sword in neutral too often and those options have gotten easier to punish (best example: Bowser overriding sword and SH approaches, but losing to grab). If someone properly understands when to be grounded for DD/WD/Grabs, and when to be airborne, those concerns are a bit limited I think (easier said than done obviously). Same issue with Sheik: not enough people understand the power or importance of staying grounded a bit more.


Sheik is super 'taters good. Only thing I'm waiting on is for someone to optimally abuse/use her crawling. I find it hard to conceive bad MU's for her: I can't point the finger at anyone in the Brawl cast at all.

 

[CyberZixx]

That is my exact problem with using Marth in project M. In melee his recovery was not amazing but did the job well enough. Here I am a much harder time getting back to the stage and characters are better at stoping how linear Dolphin Slash is. Getting back on the edge versus Squirtle can be a hassle.

I am having issue edgeguarding the new buffed cast but I feel that will improve with time.

 

[Inty17]

ZSS is way better than people think she is. It's like they combined Sheik, Marth, and Falcon with more aerial mobility and gimmicks. I haven't come across anything in any matchup that Z can't handle with her mobility. She can get in and run away like no other.

 

[Scythe]

her oos options are bad and her kill moves aren't fantastic

 

[Juushichi]

Is using hooligan kick (Down B Kick) worth anything as a consistent finisher?

 

[Cia]

Is using hooligan kick (Down B Kick) worth anything as a consistent finisher?

haha. I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees her similarities to Cammy. I've been experimenting with it as a way to edgeguard ppl who like to recover from below the ledge. so far, it's been very effective against spacies, bowser, and other tether recoveries.

 

[Plum]

Sheik is super 'taters good. Only thing I'm waiting on is for someone to optimally abuse/use her crawling. I find it hard to conceive bad MU's for her: I can't point the finger at anyone in the Brawl cast at all.

I think her crawl is fantastic. Especially on stages like Metal Cavern or Castle Siege; on the lower parts of the stage your crawl dodges a LONG list of moves from characters attacking from the higher ground. Sheik has great stage control so it becomes a realistic option to just hold those areas, and really abuse her crawl. You basically enhance your presence on stage for free.

 

[Giygacoal]

haha. I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees her similarities to Cammy.

You're far from the only one; I think the PMBR said on a stream that the down-special is actually inspired by that move in Street Fighter.

 

[#HBC | Joker]

except it's basically the same as in brawl, so it's not from street fighter at all. unless you're saying brawl based it on street fighter..

 

[CyberZixx]

It's not that similar as before. Before she would jump backward in a good single flip. Now she curls in a ball and twirls forwards. Similar to the Holligan combo Cammy has in the SF games. Also similar to Power Rangers so that is cool.

 

[#HBC | Joker]

but curling into a ball is clearly something samus does all the time.

 

[Jandlebars]

but curling into a ball is clearly something samus does all the time.

Well, not outside of her suit she doesn't really, but there's reasons in the Metroid games as to why that's the case (even if they are somewhat vague on the details).
Comparing Sammy to Cammy kind of makes me cry a little inside, though, because I hated both playing as and against Cammy in any SF game I've played.

More on-topic, though: The Down-B has so many uses it's not even funny. You can ledge-cancel it if you space it properly, mid-air jump out of it (assuming you haven't used one already), wall-jump out of it, travel with pretty amazing momentum across the stage...it's a wonderful move.
The only issues I have with it is that it takes so long to be able to use other methods of recovery (since it lasts for so long), and that I haven't found a way to use the Foot-stool maneuver to much effective degree on-stage. That being said, the former is more due to my lack of using it smartly off-stage, and the latter is possibly just me not testing it out to any extensive degree.

 

[DMG]

For all of this ZSS talk: how does she reliably approach people? When I play her, I tend to do better if the opponent is approaching me and doesn't understand or fully respect her defensive spacing. I already know about Dash cancelling Neutral B, but I can't find ways to approach reliably. A lot of it leans on gimmicky or situational imo, partly because grabbing isn't that strong of a mixup for her to just throw out frame wise.

 

[leelue]

Well I'd expect the PMBR to be really good players, no surprise there. And anyone else that becomes super good eventually ends up in the PMBR anyway.

Necroquote lies

ZSS is way better than people think she is. It's like they combined Sheik, Marth, and Falcon with more aerial mobility and gimmicks. I haven't come across anything in any matchup that Z can't handle with her mobility. She can get in and run away like no other.

Zonic

 

[TheReflexWonder]

How does D-Smash out of a run fare for ZSS?

 

[Overswarm]

How does D-Smash out of a run fare for ZSS?

I fiddled with ZSS for a little while and it worked well when they were on or near the ledge (to push them), and occasionally they'd spot dodge and I'd hit them with the d-smash but other than that it wasn't really a reliable approach unless I could call said spot dodge.

I feel the same way as DMG about her approach options, but I didn't play ZSS much. Just spammed u-air and over-b in their zone.

 

[Professor Pro]

So I made the thread for Great Character Representatives which hopefully will assist in improving the PM Scene and assist this thread in the long run for making more evidence based tier lists, but it's lacking content atm, really gonna need the communities help

http://smashboards.com/threads/great-character-representatives-video-thread.334954/

 

[Jandlebars]

For all of this ZSS talk: how does she reliably approach people? When I play her, I tend to do better if the opponent is approaching me and doesn't understand or fully respect her defensive spacing. I already know about Dash cancelling Neutral B, but I can't find ways to approach reliably. A lot of it leans on gimmicky or situational imo, partly because grabbing isn't that strong of a mixup for her to just throw out frame wise.

My words are hardly anything to judge by in a competitive sense, but in any case...
I'll often throw out a half or barely charge shot to interfere with my opponent. If I think I can effectively close the gap without much risk, I'll dash-cancel it, but often times a stand-alone shot, whether it's shot mid-air or one the ground can at least be useful information to gauge how your opponent might reliably react to the shot.

It's just as easy to stop as Wolf's Blaster, unfortunately, and hardly as spammable or effective at properly controlling space when you take into account his ability to wave-land his shots, so it's not really easy to just *use*, I guess. It's still a useful tool, though, and if you do manage to hit with it (and even more the case if you're consistent with it), then you've got yourself a free opportunity to approach or set up any of her notable combo strings.

 

[Deleted member]

played some more experimental sheik vs zss, zss gets camped out kinda hard as long as sheik doesn't run into anything tricky. MU doesn't feel bad either way as far as i can tell.

 

[Overswarm]

How have you interpreted Sheik vs. Wolf or Diddy? I could see the former going either way but I could see Diddy causing serious issues for Sheik.

 

[Deleted member]

the only good wolf i've played was stric9, who was admittedly pretty tricky but i won every match out of about 30 on various stages.

 

[BTmoney]

worthless opinion:

Wolf feels like a worse version of sheik all things considered .

 

[DMG]

Everyone is a worse Sheik

 

[Kink-Link5]

******* don't even know about Melee Falcon already being a worse Sheik.

 

[Overswarm]

That's funny, just today we talked about Charizard being fat sheik.

 

[Deleted member]

worthless opinion:

Wolf feels like a worse version of sheik all things considered .

i don't think they're similar. wolf plays out like a real space animal with the main difference being a unique neutral game. i think wolf was done really well and offers exactly what a 3rd spacie should really. i could see a similarity drawn between wolf's lunging attack style and sheik's dash attack, not much else though.

edit: charizard definitely plays more like sheik, except charizard seems to hit his opponents more vertical and sheik more horizontal? maybe it's just me.

 

[Kink-Link5]

I think Sheik just makes a really good benchmark comparison since she's so well designed overall lol

Pokes and quick decisions and tools and utility

 

[Overswarm]

It's about right. Honestly if you flipped a video sideways, they'd be very similar trajectories.

I feel that Charizard gets hurt a bit more when combo'd though and unfortunately all his good gimp moves require pristine setup or him being grounded, so he is still a worse fat sheik :B

 

[Overswarm]

I think Sheik just makes a really good benchmark comparison since she's so well designed overall lol

Pokes and quick decisions and tools and utility

I wouldn't say so much "well" designed. Her down+b doesn't fit with her character and her over-b is pretty useless, her other moves are just all pretty godlike XD

 

[BTmoney]

*****es don't even know about Melee Falcon already being a worse Sheik.

True.


And idk I'm not a Wolf fan as far as viability goes.
To me he is just a fox/falco combination man child but notably worse than both.
I wish he had their bair or a sex kick instead of his fair (Sheik gets her ridiculous slap along with a sex kick and Wolf gets something that is weaker [I imagine it's weaker, I labbed it a few months ago], no sex kick, harder to combo into, less safe, and needs to be sweet spotted?)
PM Staff, give Wolf the normal spacey bair please.
That would make me happy. I'm not sure why he has a worse bair other than because its like that in Brawl. (convincing argument I know)
He doesn't have the aerial prowess that Fox and Falco have and he misses it imo.
I honestly think if you're going to put effort into wolf it's wasted time you should have spent playing Fox.


I have deep rooted wolf disapproval.

 

[Overswarm]

Wolf is probably the best juggler in the game. Fox and Falco have a better neutral game; they can get in and out much easier. Wolf has to play more like a "normal character" a lot of the times, but he does that well and once he gets he can combo in virtually any situation.

Still worse than Fox/Falco, but he's not bad.