Tier List Speculation

[Boiko]

I'm bored and hate studying for exams, so slightly revised list based on new data and new misconceptions.

Also, I remembered some things about Yoshi.

Lists are ordered, left is best.

Fox Tier:

Not Fox Tier (Top):

Not Fox Tier (Not Top):

Quite Viable Tier:

Probably Quite Viable Tier:

Why Bother Tier:

I have No Idea Where To Put This Thing Tier:

Looks generally fair near the top, a few things I disagree with.
Ness is a tier up AT LEAST. If not two. Character is slept on hardcore.

 

[Frost | Odds]

I think you're right, but it's tough to justify putting him better than a lot of these characters. Ness is a ton of fun to experiment with and there's definitely a lot of room for advancement of his meta, but he still has a pretty bad case of stubby arm syndrome. Hmmm.

Did some edits, I think this is better.

Fox Tier:

Not Fox Tier (Top):

Not Fox Tier (Not Top):

Quite Viable Tier:

Probably Quite Viable Tier:

Why Bother Tier:

I have No Idea Where To Put This Thing Tier:



If Where there are more problems, I'm happy to alter my opinion as much as is justified/necessary. I don't think an accurate tier list is nearly as possible or relevant as previous patches, but still a pretty worthy goal to work towards imo.

Yoshi is still being slept on unbelievably hard. I think he's about as good as Peach in Melee, but his technical requirements are so ridiculously obscene that he's just not worth it. He's been buffed significantly from melee.

I also think Bowser might be a lot better than is reflected in this list, but I can't demonstrate it yet. I'll need to be a lot more consistent with my tech. Same applies to Ganon, but I don't give a good goddamn about Ganon so someone else ( @junebug , @Eikelmann ) will have to do it.

 

[Hinichii.ez.™]

I think you're right, but it's tough to justify putting him better than a lot of these characters. Ness is a ton of fun to experiment with and there's definitely a lot of room for advancement of his meta, but he still has a pretty bad case of stubby arm syndrome. Hmmm.

Did some edits, I think this is better.

Fox Tier:

Not Fox Tier (Top):

Not Fox Tier (Not Top):

Quite Viable Tier:

Probably Quite Viable Tier:

Why Bother Tier:

I have No Idea Where To Put This Thing Tier:



If there are more problems, I'm open to altering my opinion as much as is justified/necessary. I don't think an accurate tier list is nearly as possible or relevant as previous patches, but still a pretty worthy goal to work towards imo.

Yoshi is still being slept on unbelievably hard. I think he's about as good as Peach in Melee, but his technical requirements are so ridiculously obscene that he's just not worth it. He's been buffed significantly from melee.

For your list, I would put ic in that last tier and lucario some where in the quite viable section. I think pika and maybe, maybe jigs could be moved up. The main problems jigs had in 3.2, was the absurd recoveries and broken projectiles. Might be missing out on some of the problems, but those were among the main problems and they have for sure been toned down. Got soulpeach(jig player) beating anther 3:0 and lordy 2:1
Minus the QAC what else has pika lost?

 

[JayTheUnseen]

Lucario is tough as rock to fight.Not that that has anything to do with balance.

 

[Boiko]

I think you're right, but it's tough to justify putting him better than a lot of these characters. Ness is a ton of fun to experiment with and there's definitely a lot of room for advancement of his meta, but he still has a pretty bad case of stubby arm syndrome. Hmmm.

The thing that makes Ness viable, IMO is that he has surprisingly good MUs at the top tier levels. Even against the "best characters" he hardly loses.
His MU against Fox is decent, and he has potential to do well against Wolf, Roy, Yoshi, Mewtwo, Falco, ROB, Lucas, Diddy, and Meta Knight. IMO nothing is beyond 55-45 in either direction.

Then he suffers a bit more against Marth and Mario, being two of his harder MUs, but he definitely has the tools to win. Then Sheik kind of bops him if she plays the MU correctly, and Samus is super bad.

Sure he has "stubby arm syndrome" lol, but his ftilt, magnet, and huge disjoints give him a lot of options, especially combined with his potent edge guarding. You'll notice that a few of the top tiers have either linear or less than average recoveries and Ness can punish these super hard.

Just one man's opinion.

 

[DrinkingFood]

Not Fox Tier (Top):

Please stop having an opinion

 

[Frost | Odds]

Please stop having an opinion

You've completely convinced me of the error of my ways. I fully repent --

wait, no. A character that goes roughly even with the spacies (better or worse, depending on stage and whether you ask ROB or spacie players), crushes Samus, slightly beats most of the rest of the cast to one degree or another, and whose worst matchup is Sheik at 60:40 or something; would need some pretty serious goddamn flaws in order to not be top tier.

You could be right, but being an ass in lieu of providing any sort of justification is not persuasive. I recognize that you probably know your character better than anyone, so your opinion holds much more weight than most - but it doesn't mean you're unbiased.

 

[DrinkingFood]

crushes Samus, slightly beats most of the rest of the cast to one degree or another, and whose worst matchup is Sheik at 60:40 or something.

But this is all wrong. Did you know Samus' missile can sometimes go through ROB's side-b reflector and hit him (yes, during the reflector frames) The sheik matchup is way worse than 60:40 lmao, she counters almost everything ROB is. Yes, he does have some pretty serious goddamn flaws, like his ****ty dash dance/wavedash/awful grounded mobility, still a pretty small shield, some of the worst rolls in the game and short get-up/tech rolls for such a large character, terrible aerial mobility without committing to his boosts, no anti-airs, CC ability that pretends to be reliable but actually is 50/50 reward/return-to-neutral against knowledgeable players (DI up gets you out of dsmash but gets you hit by usmash or dtilt while DI down lets you CC usmash launcher or dtilt but gets you caught in dsmash [strictly worse than Samus or Peach's CCs with are always heavily advantageous on hit]), I could go on because there's a lot more. ROB also has trouble with characters who can quickly outreach him in the air to end his staggered fair chains; characters like DDD, zard, or kirby who have hard hitting aerials that can vary the timing with which they come down (because of multi jumps) so that he can't reliably take them out with upairs but also can't CC their hits; hard hitters that approach from a long distance like falcon; fast small characters that are hard to hit with projectiles (diddy/squirtle/MK/Sheik/sonic/others). The characters ROB had problems with in the previous versions were characters he had problems with for reasons that haven't been addressed, because they can't be addressed because his design, in terms of balance, is difficult to address or work with. The only thing he gained in this version (factoring in changes to other characters) is a slightly improved punish game due to being able to take advantage of worse recoveries. That doesn't move you from bottom 15-20 to top 10. I'm pretty confident you know next to nothing about ROB so there's no way we can have an even discussion about him without me writing a guide and making you read it.

 

[Player -0]

Please write a guide.

...


I'll up vote it too.

 

[Tagxy]

Dont be sad Choice Scarf, if you still have fun with pika then don't let anyone tell you to stop playing him. If you're trying to succeed in tournament I would certainly recommend having at least a strong secondary/co-main, but good effort can still take you a long way. IMO, his movement (one of his other main qualities) is still fun since its basically ported from melee, and his grab game seems to finally be the same as melees too. The greater tragedy is hearing people stubbornly suggest the character is fine.

 

[Frost | Odds]

But this is all wrong. Did you know Samus' missile can sometimes go through ROB's side-b reflector and hit him (yes, during the reflector frames)

That sucks. I hope it's fixed in the next patch. Regardless, that matchup is still not even remotely close.

The sheik matchup is way worse than 60:40 lmao, she counters almost everything ROB is.

How's that?

Yes, he does have some pretty serious goddamn flaws, like his ****ty dash dance/wavedash/ [...] still a pretty small shield, some of the worst rolls in the game and short get-up/tech rolls for such a large character

Yes, those are pretty bad.

awful grounded mobility

That side B, regardless of bugs, is one of the strongest grounded burst movement options in the game, particularly because unlike almost every other such move (which lose badly to projectiles), it hard counters projectiles.

terrible aerial mobility without committing to his boosts

This is like saying Luigi has terrible grounded mobility without committing to his wavedashes. Technically true, but highly misleading.

no anti-airs, CC ability that pretends to be reliable but actually is 50/50 reward/return-to-neutral against knowledgeable players

I looked for a gif of ROB's utilt, but couldn't find one. You'll have to explain the CC thing, because I'm just a poor, dumb Bowser player who wins for free through abuse of broken gimmicks.

I xould go on because there's a lot more.

Of course.

ROB also has trouble with characters who can quickly outreach him in the air to end his staggered fair chains; characters like DDD, zard, or kirby who have hard hitting aerials that can vary the timing with which they come down so that he can't reliably take them out with upairs but also can't CC their hits

I could see this for D3, particularly given his weight; but Zard's only long ranged aerials (bair and nair) either don't hit in front of him, or take an extremely long time to do so. I can't imagine how you could be struggling to hit him, though I'll take your word for it.

If you seriously think Kirby is a matchup that's anything other than overwhelmingly in ROB's favor, then I have a whole bunch of exciting, natural herbal supplements and healing crystals to sell you.

fast small characters that are hard to hit with projectiles (diddy/squirtle/MK/Sheik/sonic/others). The characters ROB had problems with in the previous versions were characters he had problems with for reasons that haven't been addressed, because they can't be addressed because his design, in terms of balance, is difficult to address or work with.

Makes sense. On the other hand, the nerfs to Diddy, MK, and Sonic in particular were pretty severe and varied; I have difficulty believing that they wouldn't have a significant impact in any matchup.

I'm pretty confident you know next to nothing about ROB so there's no way we can have an even discussion about him without me writing a guide and making you read it.

Write it, then. I'm pretty sure you know less than nothing about Bowser, but were you to engage me in conversation about him, I'd happily provide the information you're after rather than continually resorting to childish condescension.

Look, I get that ROB is relatively immobile on the ground, has a bad shield, and can struggle with approaches from the Sakurai angle. While these traits kinda suck, they're hardly unique to him. What is unique to him is his pair of extremely fast, extremely hard hitting projectiles that can reach across the entire stage - one of which is an item that can be AGT'd, glide tossed, and generally abused in similar fashions to any other item (though much better than any other item that exists in 3.5 due to its travel speed and range). Literally no other character has reach on anywhere near the same scale of power and speed.

That reach, combined with ROB's Marth-like spacing in both the ground and the air (if not his grounded mobility), his incredibly strong gimps (due to the aforementioned gyro, laser, physical spacing, and dunk) and recovery, along with a highly versatile suite of horizontal (gyro, laser, fsmash, uair) and vertical (usmash, nair) kill moves --- all means that you're absolutely correct: this character is fiendishly difficult to balance properly. An awful lot of cast members struggle to get in on ROB in much the same way that they struggled to get in on 3.0 Mewtwo: the combination of long range, burst movement, and fast projectiles are inevitably going to generate a lot of frustration regardless of any weaknesses ROB may also have.

I think you're also undervaluing ROB's ridiculous downthrow. I don't know how that thing slipped through the patch, frankly -- it's an incredible chaingrab on a ton of characters, and appears to lead to guaranteed kills against the rest.

Uh, regardless of all that, congrats on beating Lunchables the other day. No small feat.

Jesus Christ. Welcome to the Odds Writes A Goddamned Crappy Book About Tiers Thread, enjoy your stay

 

[Mystic-]

Dont be sad Choice Scarf, if you still have fun with pika then don't let anyone tell you to stop playing him. If you're trying to succeed in tournament I would certainly recommend having at least a strong secondary/co-main, but good effort can still take you a long way. IMO, his movement (one of his other main qualities) is still fun since its basically ported from melee, and his grab game seems to finally be he same as melees too. The greater tragedy is hearing people stubbornly suggest the character is fine.

I'll never understand why, in every competitive game, so many people whine about their favorite character sucking or what have you. Like I joke about it in a lot of games and I understand that Falcon isn't the best character but jesus everytime I come on here you're here whining about how bad Pika is now. Like they fixed Pika's throws and removed his lagless recovery. He lost 2nd zip QAC which made him lose a lot of flavor but is both consistent with their stated design goals and a fairly minor nerf. Pika was decent last patch and almost everyone else got nerfed more than him and recoveries are more gimpable than ever. You can either get better at using Pika or switch characters but whining about him isn't going to fix the real issue here. You.
/rant

 

[Jams.]

I looked for a gif of ROB's utilt, but couldn't find one. You'll have to explain the CC thing, because I'm just a poor, dumb Bowser player who wins for free through abuse of broken gimmicks.

I am not DF and am nowhere near as knowledgeable about ROB as DF, but hopefully I can answer this. ROB's main options out of CC are dsmash, dtilt, and I guess usmash (I personally feel this is really risky). Most characters can hold up to get out of dsmash (barring super fastfallers like Fox) and can CC dtilt and usmash (the 2% hit that sends you into the main hitbox). What this means is that ROB's CC game is actually fairly risky against opponents that know how to react properly. If the opponent guesses the correct option and is not a super fastfaller, he can effectively punish ROB on hit or at the very worst return to neutral, instead of ROB gaining an advantage through proper use of CC.

Edit: I realized I kind of just reworded what DF said. Whatever.

 

[Tagxy]

I'll never understand why, in every competitive game, so many people whine about their favorite character sucking or what have you. Like I joke about it in a lot of games and I understand that Falcon isn't the best character but jesus everytime I come on here you're here whining about how bad Pika is now. Like they fixed Pika's throws and removed his lagless recovery. He lost 2nd zip QAC which made him lose a lot of flavor but is both consistent with their stated design goals and a fairly minor nerf. Pika was decent last patch and almost everyone else got nerfed more than him and recoveries are more gimpable than ever. You can either get better at using Pika or switch characters but whining about him isn't going to fix the real issue here. You.
/rant

Im not sure how you interpreted my post as a complaining about pika sucking. Also I did switch characters, and rarely randomly come in here to talk about pika or segue into him, I just join the conversation. Post said everything else that needs to be said otherwise.

 

[Choice Scarf]

@ Tagxy @ Mystic- I for one will probably always play Pika no matter how good or bad he is. Hell adapting to the new QAC mechanics are an interesting challenge! I just wanted to better understand his flaws so I could figure out ways around them when I play. It would just be nice if other "mains" felt the same way and wouldn't drop him because of the QAC nerf though. But that's getting off topic so let's move on.

 

[Frost | Odds]

I am not DF and am nowhere near as knowledgeable about ROB as DF, but hopefully I can answer this. ROB's main options out of CC are dsmash, dtilt, and I guess usmash (I personally feel this is really risky). Most characters can hold up to get out of dsmash (barring super fastfallers like Fox) and can CC dtilt and usmash (the 2% hit that sends you into the main hitbox). What this means is that ROB's CC game is actually fairly risky against opponents that know how to react properly. If the opponent guesses the correct option and is not a super fastfaller, he can effectively punish ROB on hit or at the very worst return to neutral, instead of ROB gaining an advantage through proper use of CC.

Edit: I realized I kind of just reworded what DF said. Whatever.

Fair enough.

Holding up only seems to get out of ROB's dsmash if you're already in the air -- otherwise, iirc it actually needs quarter circle SDI.

How are CC jab and CC grab?

 

[DrinkingFood]

Finished, **** that's long

That sucks. I hope it's fixed in the next patch. Regardless, that matchup is still not even remotely close.

Are you saying this because of grounded side-b? You are way overrating that move. When caught it in you can easily just DI behind him and down to CC and avoid a follow-up, and the move overall isn't quick so if you bait/outpace it, it can be punished very easily. The hitboxes even end waaaay before the spinning GFX stops, idk why it's even there.

How's that?

Had to run and find these real quick:

I think I found out why Sheik is a bad matchup for ROB. Too hard to hit her when she SHs, all her aerials are really meaty and always beat ROB's, hard to approach if she needles from the air, her hurtboxes change a lot when she jumps and lands so lasering her is easier said than done, basically can't recover from below against needles, dsmash doesn't lead to many good follow-ups since she's not a fast faller, and she combos the **** outta ROB unlike most characters and can even chaingrab him at some points.

Large stages don't actually work against a good sheik, not for ROB anyways. I used to think we could out camp her, but that's not actually the case. She has too much vertical mobility and her hurtboxes change too much to reliably hit her with our projectiles, which have small hitboxes and a lot of cool down (especially gyro on miss). She can charge her needles or throw her needles safely while moving up and down like that, and then once her needles are charged she is a huge threat to approach while she's airborne, can tack on 18 percent if she hits them (which is easier to do if she's grounded tho). The aerial needle throws stuff approaches from afar or anywhere not directly underneath her, and she can come down with one her of her extremely meaty aerials if you get too close for the needles to hit. You won't be crouch canceling that aerial if she's been tacking on damage with her needles. And if you use side-b to reflect them if thrown while grounded you can't do it on reaction because needles are too quick, so you have to read when she will throw them which is asking to be baited. That's why I think small stages are good, it lets you get up in her face quickly so you can still CC her aerials and not have to deal with as many needles early on. Lack of platforms also helps, it stops her from using them to get good needle angles and land safely after throwing them.
I used to think I could also out-survive her, but that's still only partly true- sheik can intercept high recoveries easily (one of ROB's strengths in terms of recovery) and can use needles to easily intercept low recoveries (which forces ROB below side-b sweetspot range and into his very bad/predictable up-b sweetspot range). Here, I've got some handy dandy videos of me vs another top 3 PM player in my state, who appears to have picked up sheik in PM almost exclusively to deal with my ROB.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFEWkEyswak
Ignore the last game of me as Roy, that was an experiment/for practice, trying to bring up my secondaries to my ROB's level.
I also played him earlier in tourney, test running my samus for the first two games then taking a game as ROB and losing the fourth (skip to 9:15): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyg-DVUr0vM
I have improved at the matchup from my first try at it from a week earlier, if you want to see the progression of our matchup, watch this set first (split into 3 vids with no sound and a bit laggy, lame as ****) and then the above two in reverse order. But if you see some questionable choices in the above games, the reasoning is probably answered by the consequences of a better choice that gets stuffed anyways in earlier games because it's ****in' sheik.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mbnu2DRIYF0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbzC1-FGloo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4GlYY8sqNw
Note: i also hopefully have some solutions in the work, imprôving my punish game on sheik and my responses to her being able to go airborne so quickly, i'll be able to test them next time I play him likely about a week from now.

That side B, regardless of bugs, is one of the strongest grounded burst movement options in the game, particularly because unlike almost every other such move (which lose badly to projectiles), it hard counters projectiles.

It's not now and never was. It doesn't even have follow ups if you CC on reaction (last hit is 29- easy to react). It's also unsafe on shield, AND it got nerfed in this version.

This is like saying Luigi has terrible grounded mobility without committing to his wavedashes. Technically true, but highly misleading.

It is misleading, but luigi isn't a valid reductio ad absurdum for that, because being grounded is a much smaller commitment in smash due to CCing and shielding and a lot of other things.

I looked for a gif of ROB's utilt, but couldn't find one. You'll have to explain the CC thing, because I'm just a poor, dumb Bowser player who wins for free through abuse of broken gimmicks.

what is debug mode?
Explained the second part in my next post.

If you seriously think Kirby is a matchup that's anything other than overwhelmingly in ROB's favor, then I have a whole bunch of exciting, natural herbal supplements and healing crystals to sell you.

I had a nice ****ing paragraph typed up on Kirby but I'm on a phone and pressed the wrong button so now it's all gone. Ugh. Whatever I think it's either disadvantageous or slightly disadvantageous. ROB has a really hard time punishing Kirby, and gets straight out prioritized by Kirby's every aerial. He even has a pseudo air dash with a hitbox, and can copy our laser and stay airborne or crouched and avoid gyro pretty easily, and can stop ROB's upair with a stone which is ROBs only real reliable damage racker against floaties.

Once upon a time I had a nice explanation for this typed up, let me see if I can summon that inspiration once again.

-ROB can't punish Kirby. ROB's punishments on floaties rely on abusing upair's range to juggle them, keeping them in a staggered position until he can force them into a situation that leads to a boost nair or upsmash kill at like 80-90 percent. Because of the nature of ROB's linear, slow speed, he can't generally get to kirby for follow-up upairs without kirby being able to armor his way down with stone.
-ROB can't dictate neutral against kirby. His aerials out prioritize ROB's and his crouch is low, making aerial approaches risky at best, and his small size+crouch make him difficult to laser or hit with gyro. Meanwhile Kirby has much better grounded approaches (read: dash attack beating CC and unpunishable when it crosses up ROB's shield), and Kirby can copy ROB's laser which is better against him in this case than for him.
-Kirby can't punish ROB too hard, but grab into dthrow tech chase into either more dthrowing or a dash attack into up-air into staggered position above kirby is really is really all kirby needs when ROB does so badly against kirby specifically in terms of punishing and neutral.

Makes sense. On the other hand, the nerfs to Diddy, MK, and Sonic in particular were pretty severe and varied; I have difficulty believing that they wouldn't have a significant impact in any matchup.

I didn't say their changes wouldn't have an impact on any matchup, only little-to-none on ROB's. His problem with small fast characters is they are hard to hit with projectiles since gyro goes over their head unless really far away, and size+vertical speed makes lasering them a guessing game even IF their reaction is too slow for laser (it hits frame 25 at the earliest btw, easy to shield and possible to reliably powershield), and their speed makes them liable to baiting out approaches from ROB when camping doesn't work. They completely dictate neutral against him.

Write it, then. I'm pretty sure you know less than nothing about Bowser, but were you to engage me in conversation about him, I'd happily provide the information you're after rather than continually resorting to childish condescension.

I would consider writing it if I had more time, but even just this conversation is sapping valuable practice time.
I also feel like it would be fraudulent to try to write a guide so early into the game's meta.

Look, I get that ROB is relatively immobile on the ground, has a bad shield, and can struggle with approaches from the Sakurai angle. While these traits kinda suck, they're hardly unique to him. What is unique to him is his pair of extremely fast, extremely hard hitting projectiles that can reach across the entire stage - one of which is an item that can be AGT'd, glide tossed, and generally abused in similar fashions to any other item (though much better than any other item that exists in 3.5 due to its travel speed and range). Literally no other character has reach on anywhere near the same scale of power and speed.

I've covered this, but you're overrating ROB's projectiles dramatically. Laser hits frame 25 and his very easy to shield on reaction. It can also be powershielded reliably. Gyro is a great projectile once it gets in his hands. Unfortunately, getting gyro in ROB's hands is a huge commitment in the first place. It takes a long time to place, and the only way he can pick it up instantly is through gyro jumping, otherwise you must also add in the time it takes him to get to the gyro in order to grab it- additional commitment. If ROB doesn't give up stage space to the opponent in order to fire gyro far away enough from the opponent, he can get punished for it or have it stolen from him before he can get it.

That reach, combined with ROB's Marth-like spacing in both the ground and the air (if not his grounded mobility), his incredibly strong gimps (due to the aforementioned gyro, laser, physical spacing, and dunk) and recovery, along with a highly versatile suite of horizontal (gyro, laser, fsmash, uair) and vertical (usmash, nair) kill moves --- all means that you're absolutely correct: this character is fiendishly difficult to balance properly. An awful lot of cast members struggle to get in on ROB in much the same way that they struggled to get in on 3.0 Mewtwo: the combination of long range, burst movement, and fast projectiles are inevitably going to generate a lot of frustration regardless of any weaknesses ROB may also have.

ROB does not have marth-esque reach. For one, he is a square- twice marth's width. He is much slower than Marth on the ground with less grounded disjoint, less grab reach, and worse hitbox coverage. Airborne, his burst range is farther, but his disjoint is still less. Additionally, fsmash is not a reliable kill move as it is ridiculously hard to hit. It's slow to start, and the hitbox only lasts for two frames. Uair is no longer a reliable kill move with the update, it takes around 140% on many characters when boosted into. ROB's only reliable kill options are gimps/offstage carries, boosted nairs, or upsmash/DACUS. Bair is okay too, more situational due to hitbox placement and its momentum changing property.

I think you're also undervaluing ROB's ridiculous downthrow. I don't know how that thing slipped through the patch, frankly -- it's an incredible chaingrab on a ton of characters, and appears to lead to guaranteed kills against the rest.

ROB's dthrow is fantastic and I'm not undervaluing it all because it hasn't even been brought up til now. Keep in mind that ROB does not have the grounded speed to reliably punish with grabs of their own merit- rather, they must be set-up for.
Dthrow doesn't chaingrab that many characters very hard. Spacies+falcon are a given, they can be chaingrabbed to around 100%. Platforms can get in the way around 50s-70s for fox and 30s-40s for the others. Characters in the sheik/Tink/Link fall speed category get away after a second or third throw (from 0) if they don't DI or DI in or get away onto a platform on the first throw. Roy/MK/DK/Diddy/maybe Lucas get chaingrabbed for less than 30 damage, from 0, and generally escape onto platforms from the second or third throw. And that's about it for CGs. Follow-ups are usually guaranteed, but just DIing in towards the stage minimizes the length of his follow-up, it's not some huge mystery. DIing the follow-up hit down and/or away generally gets you to a staggered position (this is extremely common, nothing ridiculous about ROB's throw combo set-up here), but at this point it's suuuuuper character dependant.

 

[DrinkingFood]

Fair enough.

Holding up only seems to get out of ROB's dsmash if you're already in the air -- otherwise, iirc it actually needs quarter circle SDI.

How are CC jab and CC grab?

Addressing this before I finish my last post-
Wrong, go to the lab and try it with anyone but fox. Even falco. You don't have to be airborne and the only character that need SDI inputs to escape is fox (everyone else just holds up to ASDI out 9/10 times). So on a successful CC ROB has a kind of 50/50 against a knowledgeable opponent. Dtilt or usmash to punish the opponents attempt to escape a dsmash with incoming preemptive ASDI up, or dsmash if they attempt to CC an incoming usmash launcher hitbox or dtilt. Guess right, ROB gets usmash strong hit, dtilt->grab or dtilt to knockdown depending on percent, or dsmash to *possible* follow-up. Guess wrong, ROB gets 8 percent max(could be less than he took from the hit), and he either gets punished for the failed usmash/dtilt or resets to neutral off the failed dsmash. It's not even a true 50/50 because DIing away avoids usmash entirely, avoids dtilt follow-ups on some characters at low percent, and makes follow-ups from dsmash on average fallers impossible without a read/guess. Most players don't even use these kinds of things yet. But I know this kind of counterplay is fully possible because I see Melee players respond with good SDI/DI to peach's CC dsmash and even falco's CC shine in Melee, because they've learned to look for signs of a bad approach on their part so their reaction time can start early.

Compare to other good CCs:
Peach: dsmash- Best case scenario is low percent knockdown, high percent offstage backwards at a bad angle; worst case huge damage. Never bad or neutral for peach on hit.
Dtilt- i think it hits frame 12 or something so it's slow, but it's a meteor so guaranteed follow-up.

Samus (heavier than ROB): Dsmash- low percent knockdowns or hi percent backwards offstage at a bad angle. Or get cc into both hits into a follow-up.
Dtilt- now above Samus, unless at low percent for a cc into tech/missed tech

Roy: Dsmash- Really only good for killing out of a CC but it hits quickly so it does that well
dtilt- Now above Roy, unless at low percent for a cc into tech/missed tech

Spacies:
Shine

 

[steelguttey]

you know i realized i never believed marth was bad in pm until i stopped playing stupid low tiers and played wolf

marth has a good matchup with every one of my previous mains

fk that character

 

[Frost | Odds]

Are you saying [that ROB crushes Samus] because of grounded side-b? You are way overrating that move. When caught it in you can easily just DI behind him and down to CC and avoid a follow-up, and the move overall isn't quick so if you bait/outpace it, it can be punished very easily. The hitboxes even end waaaay before the spinning GFX stops, idk why it's even there.

The side b is only part of it - though it does constitute a hard counter to everything about Samus's neutral game packaged into a single move. The other part is that Samus, like ROB, struggles against sudden approaches from the Sakurai angle. Usmash is cool, but it's certainly not feasible on reaction to an approach anywhere near as sudden as ROB's aerial ones. She's pretty much forced to hide in shield while ROB is hovering in the air like a vulture, because if she commits to a grounded normal or jumps then she's screwed. ROB also has tilts with comparable range (and, to my understanding, much more disjoint) to Samus's, has a much easier time to keep her in the air/gimp her offstage than the converse, and can stuff pretty much anything she does with the gyro.

Re: Sheik

Seems reasonable.

It's not now and never was. It doesn't even have follow ups if you CC on reaction (last hit is 29- easy to react). It's also unsafe on shield, AND it got nerfed in this version.

If the opponent is in a position to do anything on reaction, you're using the move wrong.

It is misleading, but luigi isn't a valid reducio ad absurdum for that, because being grounded is a much smaller commitment in smash due to CCing and shielding and a lot of other things.

Sure, except that ROB is extremely safe, relative to the cast, while in the air and/or boosting around. He's extremely hard to keep from landing/reaching the edge, and has huge, safe aerials that are extraordinarily difficult for most characters to challenge - and fair is safe on shield, though I'm sure how well it has to be spaced is MU-dependent.

[Dsmash stuff]

Makes sense. I labbed it a bit- holding up does indeed work for what appears to be most characters; though not for bowser

Why not just CC grab instead?

 

[DrinkingFood]

I said i wasn't done I'm still updating lol

I finished that long post, so now I am going to not waste all my practice time for the next hour before I go to bed
Maybe I'll respond more later, maybe not

 

[Strong Badam]

Do ROB players not just CC -> run JC grab? It's kind of amazing with most characters. You don't have to keep holding down after you CC something lol

 

[Hinichii.ez.™]

you know i realized i never believed marth was bad in pm until i stopped playing stupid low tiers and played wolf

marth has a good matchup with every one of my previous mains

fk that character

Has good or even mu with my mains even now
Fk that character

 

[Foo]

Do ROB players not just CC -> run JC grab? It's kind of amazing with most characters. You don't have to keep holding down after you CC something lol

Wow... I... never actually thought of that... It may sound like I am mocking you right now, but.... sadly I'm not. Now, If you'll excuse me I need to go sit in a corner and beat myself senseless with a gamestop controller.

 

[Sinz]

Has good or even mu with my mains even now
Fk that character

I just realized someone made a joke about you changing your avatar to cute girls. But that's a boy.

to be on topic.

Samus really does get crushed by Rob. Its a sad feeling.

How does everyone feel about Snake? I played him last patch but something feels really off to me and I can't quite pin it down. I just keep saying he feels gross. How do you feel he does vs the important characters this patch? (Sheik, Fox, Falco, Wolf, Roy, Marth, Samus, and Rob)(from what I've seen and read on this thread.)

 

[Hinichii.ez.™]

I just realized someone made a joke about you changing your avatar to cute girls. But that's a boy.

to be on topic.

Samus really does get crushed by Rob. Its a sad feeling.

How does everyone feel about Snake? I played him last patch but something feels really off to me and I can't quite pin it down. I just keep saying he feels gross. How do you feel he does vs the important characters this patch? (Sheik, Fox, Falco, Wolf, Roy, Marth, Samus, and Rob)(from what I've seen and read on this thread.)

Nah
This is a avatar, that is drawn out as a girl, but originally, the character is a male who was forced to dress and act more like one.

All I know about snake is, he gets slammed by marth, even when your prof. See prof v m2k I think he only got 1 win on m2k marth.

 

[shairn]

One of our local top players mains Snake and feels 3.5 Snake is trash. I think it has something to do with the startup of upB or something.

 

[Scuba Steve]

His grounded up-b lost the invincibility frames on the start-up, so it's not as safe of an OoS option anymore

 

[Deleted member]

i don't have much rob exp but as a sheik player i definitely have a hard time with that MU, rob is pretty heavy, has a hard combo weight to work with, is pretty trick to edge guard, and edge guards her back quite well. i'm sure sheik has some stuff that i don't know about but my first impression is that its not too bad at all.

 

[Scuba Steve]

Needles can wreck Rob's recovery pretty hard

 

[Sinz]

Nah
This is a avatar, that is drawn out as a girl, but originally, the character is a male who was forced to dress and act more like one.

All I know about snake is, he gets slammed by marth, even when your prof. See prof v m2k I think he only got 1 win on m2k marth.

I thought he got castrated at a young age for that stuff? Either way its one hell of a screwed story.

One of our local top players mains Snake and feels 3.5 Snake is trash. I think it has something to do with the startup of upB or something.

He just has too many bad match ups against important people now. The upb is such a weak option oos now That and losing the cg against spacies at low percents hurts a lot. That match up went from hard to miserable. I dropped him in favor of my secondaries. :x He had so many bad match ups and none of those improved this patch. I think he can still work but the amount of work and perfect spacing you need to have puts Fox to shame.

 

[DrinkingFood]

i don't have much rob exp but as a sheik player i definitely have a hard time with that MU, rob is pretty heavy, has a hard combo weight to work with, is pretty trick to edge guard, and edge guards her back quite well. i'm sure sheik has some stuff that i don't know about but my first impression is that its not too bad at all.

Winner's Finals: (Ignore first two games)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTnq7mzTD9s
GFs:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDCebZo1dAw games 1-4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG_VvvWwexA games 5-9 (played as roy last game iirc)

Kinda fraud streamers. But anyways, I man handled Lee until he started going Sheik against me. ROB is my only well-developed character, the others have been experiments with secondaries. Sheik def doesn't have a hard time comboing or edgeguarding ROB. This is even in 3.02, where ROB's recovery was better. Now, ROB has been nerfed and sheik has not.

 

[Deleted member]

i watched the first set you linked vs lee martin, you definitely made some rudimentary mistakes that would have killed you as any character vs sheik. any time he does anything good vs you, you can see him waiting you out and then reacting you out of the game. you also jump way too much and nullify your own CC game in doing so while strongly enabling sheik's jabs and tilts. the 2nd match where you won, you can see a clear difference in not letting him wait you out. even with all that aside you still almost won game 3 despite two suicides. i think if you stay grounded and simply block ground needles you'll have a much more reasonable time with the matchup.

i will say that watching lee made me realize that sheik can outwait rob really hard on high platforms like DL64 and that may be one of her better CPs against him for it.

 

[DrinkingFood]

Those are older matches, the reason I linked that was actually for the content of the post. The ones I just linked are newer by a month and I take first set of GFs from him, blocking more needles is at least one thing I improved between the two tourneys

 

[Blank Mauser]

Fox Tier:

Not Fox Tier (Top):

Not Fox Tier (Not Top):

Quite Viable Tier:

Probably Quite Viable Tier:

Why Bother Tier:

I have No Idea Where To Put This Thing Tier:

I disagree with Zard being in the same tier as Ivy, Pit and ZSS. G&W, Mario being too high. Pikachu too low etc.

Also I like Olimar this patch. Purple pikmin consistently wreck things now. I think hes under-used personally.

 

[mimgrim]

Olimar may or may not be good in 3.5. But damn is he super not fun to play.

I'm also starting to think Sonic *might* be a top 3 character in 3.5.

 

[trash?]

I made a point in like 2.1 where sonic's design means he's always going to get hit with notable changes every version and right now it looks like 2012-me is still hitting the right ideas, so the solution here is for me to go back to playing DDD and thinking that doing decently against ike will solve all my woes

 

[TreK]

Fox Tier:

Not Fox Tier (Top):

Not Fox Tier (Not Top):

Quite Viable Tier:

Probably Quite Viable Tier:

Why Bother Tier:

I have No Idea Where To Put This Thing Tier:

I have not thought this through nearly enough
But out of personal experience, ZSS kicks way more butts than that

 

[Soft Serve]

I have not thought this through nearly enough
But out of personal experience, ZSS kicks way more butts than that

Noo don't say that, You'll alert the ZSS boards to come and tell you you're wrong

ZSS is pretty good though, although her offstage is depressing and fully charged blasters aren't even an option because of how easy they are to power-shield and how telegraphed they are. Still she's got the fast+good DD+ Uair string thing going on, with great spacing tools in her tilts, and great whiff punishes in her dsmash/grab

 

[Ningildo]

Olimar may or may not be good in 3.5. But damn is he super not fun to play.

I'm also starting to think Sonic *might* be a top 3 character in 3.5.

People keep saying that Oli isn't fun to play, without ever explaining why. So, uh, why do you think so?