Tier List Speculation

[Life]

I can't help but wonder if obvious disparities in strength like between Sheik and obviously far weaker but not straight up godawful members of the cast like Charizard, will ever be addressed. Everybody acknowledges it, but there's such a pounded-in bias for the status quo that addressing problems that exist, but aren't overwhelming, may well be impossible.

List of reasons why Squirtle is not allowed to ever be good:

 

[DrinkingFood]

woah hold up, how do you claim to know enough about zard to give him a placement relative to sheik as "far weaker but not straight up god awful"

EDIT: I know you were being intentionally vague, but I don't see why there's any reason to think zard is "figured out" enough that even an approximation of his potential is known. Even by zard mains. The fact that he's fairly standard in terms of how he operates (lots of DDing, and spacing heavy) doesn't really mean that's he's necessarily easier to approximate how good he is. Characters that reward fundamentals heavily, if anything, are harder to judge because you don't really know how good people can get at using those certain tools. You can see almost infinite improvement in consistency and effectiveness of use of tools like DDing and safe spacing, but with diminishing returns for any amount of experience/practice, so you can't tell just yet where zard mains are going to end up taking him.

 

[didds]

Squirtle is bad?
Got to knock down the top before we can adjust the rest, how can sheik be balanced in a way that allows a chance against fox without bodying someone like zard?

Answer? We must kill the fox..

 

[AuraMaudeGone]

I can't help but wonder if obvious disparities in strength like between Sheik and obviously far weaker but not straight up godawful members of the cast like Charizard, will ever be addressed. Everybody acknowledges it, but there's such a pounded-in bias for the status quo that addressing problems that exist, but aren't overwhelming, may well be impossible.

I find it funny as Sheik/Fox/Top Tier you just wait for someone to use something slower than you/laggy or just out speed them...

Sup, Bowser?

 

[Akhenderson]

Squirtle is bad?
Got to knock down the top before we can adjust the rest, how can sheik be balanced in a way that allows a chance against fox without bodying someone like zard?

Answer? We must kill the fox..

Make her have less kill options off of 50/50 mix up throws on the entire cast but retain her ability to edgeguard. If there's one thing smash 4 did right with sheik is that she is a combo machine but has difficulty securing kills. In Project M, she's also a combo machine, but retains all the kill options that she had in melee, and more because of her newly usable bthrow/dthrow difficult to react to mix up that guarantees a kill at kill percentage on the entire cast if DI'd wrong.

 

[941]

I feel like there are characters in the game that would need a complete redesign in order to be both balanced and intuitive. The reason big characters like Bowser and Zard are low-tier in every smash game is because they can't be strong without being dumb to play against. Not trying to say these characters should be left completely useless in a competitive sense, but the only way to make them even with the top tiers is to bring everyone else way down. It may be an unpopular opinion, but I don't really like the idea of bringing down the Melee top-tiers when so much of the player base comes from Melee. I actually like most of those characters, and I think it's silly to ruin them for Melee players for the sake of helping the characters that don't fit into the game as well. I know a lot of people are tired of Fox and Sheik, but I don't really want to see them get the same treatment as the Ice Climbers.

 

[PlateProp]

I feel like there are characters in the game that would need a complete redesign in order to be both balanced and intuitive. The reason big characters like Bowser and Zard are low-tier in every smash game is because they can't be strong without being dumb to play against. Not trying to say these characters should be left completely useless in a competitive sense, but the only way to make them even with the top tiers is to bring everyone else way down. It may be an unpopular opinion, but I don't really like the idea of bringing down the Melee top-tiers when so much of the player base comes from Melee. I actually like most of those characters, and I think it's silly to ruin them for Melee players for the sake of helping the characters that don't fit into the game as well. I know a lot of people are tired of Fox and Sheik, but I don't really want to see them get the same treatment as the Ice Climbers.

ICs are still good, they're just glitched. Removing infinites/wobbiling is a good thing, they're degenerate

 

[Boiko]

Make her have less kill options off of 50/50 mix up throws on the entire cast but retain her ability to edgeguard. If there's one thing smash 4 did right with sheik is that she is a combo machine but has difficulty securing kills. In Project M, she's also a combo machine, but retains all the kill options that she had in melee, and more because of her newly usable bthrow/dthrow difficult to react to mix up that guarantees a kill at kill percentage on the entire cast if DI'd wrong.

14 frames of reaction time. Not even possible. Such a lazy kill setup.

 

[941]

ICs are still good, they're just glitched. Removing infinites/wobbiling is a good thing, they're degenerate

It's not just the glitches, it's the character as a whole. They've been bottom-tier in pretty much every version of PM, and all the changes to the character kind of ruins them for Melee ICs players. The only ICs player that every really played PM was ChuDat and he almost always played Kirby. Meanwhile Melee Fox/Falco/Marth/Sheik etc. mains can pick them up in PM and do just fine.

 

[AceGamer]

It's not just the glitches, it's the character as a whole. They've been bottom-tier in pretty much every version of PM, and all the changes to the character kind of ruins them for Melee ICs players. The only ICs player that every really played PM was ChuDat and he almost always played Kirby. Meanwhile Melee Fox/Falco/Marth/Sheik etc. mains can pick them up in PM and do just fine.

You mean he abused Kirby lol

 

[D e l t a]

im bad and junk (see me vs rip for a real laugher), but i'd also like to play against your [states'] yoshi's again but with marth. I think Sheik atm firmly beats Yoshi, but I have some things I'd definitely like to try with Marth in this MU.

Yeah Sheik definitely does well against Yoshi, but nowhere near as devastating as in Melee.

As for Marth v Yoshi, it's a lot of spacing and patience. CC dsmash & dtilt destroy bad Fair/Dair approaches and can stuff out his grab range. Luckily Marth can rack on decent damage with grabs & spaced out Fsmash is pretty hard to punish as Yoshi. The MU is still stupid and pretty in favor of Yoshi.
Our #3 PR Lain plays Fox in that MU now after losing to Tap's Yoshi. Not to mention Railz's Yoshi took out Gohan's Marth

 

[Agi]

Yeah.

Jesus I didn't realize it was actually a no-impact landing. That makes a lot of its uses even dumber than I'd thought. Lots of tech skill required, but that doesn't really have any bearing on balance (as we observe with Fox).

Stuff nobody does yet:

- Use DJL to change pivot point of DD, instead of WDing
- Use DJL to dB or dash grab or dsmash or utilt or jab out of shield
- Instant DJC advancing/retreating nair oos
- b reverse nB
- lots of others

How about multi-parrying with buffering a jump with C-stick out of shield and buffering the DJL with tap jump?
This character looks so fun.

 

[Nausicaa]

woah hold up, how do you claim to know enough about zard to give him a placement relative to sheik as "far weaker but not straight up god awful"

I can't help but wonder if obvious disparities in strength like between Sheik and obviously far weaker but not straight up godawful members of the cast like Charizard, will ever be addressed. Everybody acknowledges it, but there's such a pounded-in bias for the status quo that addressing problems that exist, but aren't overwhelming, may well be impossible.

I get what you're trying to say, but tournament placings are often a lagging indicator of meta development (especially in an environment like PM's). Also a very inconsistent indicator since the meta often seems to evolve (at least within mass-viewed top level play) in spurts rather than in a smooth progression. Somebody's rocking the new meta at their local smashfest and we don't even know it yet.

A lot of this is the reason I avoid putting out my own tier list, I think that's it's obvious that certain characters definitely aren't bad, but we're at such an underdeveloped stage in the game, it's really hard to tell where improved fundamentals for lots of players make the difference between a character with bad or good gimmicks that you just have to learn vs a character with strong tools that just needs also good fundies; it also makes the difference between a character that rewards fundamental play way more heavily for any given "amount" of fundamental skill, like say marth, who gets way better more quickly the more precise your play becomes, so really it's hard to estimate even his potential when it's based entirely on a level of play that, like melee, will take PM players many more years to develop.

hey remember when I said DK WASN'T a finished character and strong bad hadn't peaked his metagame and people were giving me crap about that? youre not the only one

Anyway, I'm already picking up enough characters to prove enough points right now; it seems kinda odd that I'm the only top player on SmashBoards who can't simply state anything about a character I don't already play - for some reason I alone am challenged to go prove it. I'm still grinding out Yoshi and Ganon in addition to my actual secondary as well as my video and modding work. There are only so many hours in the day.

An unfortunate consequence is that this creates a cycle of meta fragmentation. People reduce or stop contributing to widely viewed discussions, so we're back to limited communication via word of mouth, PMs, Skype, small YT/Twitch channels, etc and whatever happens to find its way to a widely viewed stream (where the masses form their tier lists, hello 3.0 S@X). 2005 communication in 2015. Word gets out or gets proven wrong eventually, but it's taking longer than it really should given the tools at our disposal and the strength/size of the community.

You know, just reading convos backwards pretending their new convos altogether.

Fun stuff.

 

[TheGravyTrain]

List of reasons why Squirtle is not allowed to ever be good:

Seriously this. Went to my first tourney. Played pretty good against a Zelda. Then went against Apples (Wario). Got grabbed, down throw, regrab, down throw, regrab, all because stupid tech roles...

 

[DrinkingFood]

have you tried not rolling every time

 

[PlateProp]

have you tried not rolling every time

tfw your non tech roll is better than your actual tech roll though

You dont understand the pain, and how little it makes sense

 

[jtm94]

ROB's tech roll isn't amazing either btw.
You could be Olimar and not function while still not having a good tech roll.

 

[steelguttey]

but the funny thing is oli has a **** tech roll

 

[didds]

Seriously this. Went to my first tourney. Played pretty good against a Zelda. Then went against Apples (Wario). Got grabbed, down throw, regrab, down throw, regrab, all because stupid tech roles...

Gotta avoid getting grabbed better, pretend like every mu is melee icies. When you do get grabbed, you have to be smart with your tech options, tech in place to any offensive option is very quick.

Sometimes the best option is the mad man option.

Just get up and grab that fat fool back!

 

[Soupchicken]

I'd like to see another round of nerfs as drastic as 3.5s except this time melee characters aren't exempt from changes.

Right now characters with extreme properties can only be balanced by making some aspect of their game stupid to play against (looking at you Bowser). If the average strength of characters was toned down a bit you would have more flexibility to create interesting characters that aren't as polarizing.

 

[PootisKonga]

I'd like to see another round of nerfs as drastic as 3.5s except this time melee characters aren't exempt from changes.

Wouldn't we all (except Melee Fox players)?
Edit: Oops, I didn't fully read that. I don't think the entire cast needs more drastic nerfing, just the obviously busted few

Right now characters with extreme properties can only be balanced by making some aspect of their game stupid to play against (looking at you Bowser).

That's true, and I really don't like how that is the solution.
PMDT, when are we getting TinyBowser?

 

[Scuba Steve]

Squirtle is already super ****ing tiny, he doesn't need a good tech roll. Even then, he's fairly floaty so he shouldn't be forced to tech super often like a character like Fox or Falco might. The distance a tech roll goes isn't the only thing that determines how easy it is to hit a character out of it. A big part of why DK is so easy to tech chase is not because his tech roll doesn't go very far, but it's because he's ****ing huge and fat and even when he moves himself away, his fatass hurtbox is still relatively close to you. Here's an extremely professional and detailed visual aid of this phenomenon

 

[Ripple]

fatter character should get tech rolls that match the distance of mewtwo's normal rolls. or you know...ike's tech rolls since they are amazing

 

[TheGravyTrain]

I understand there are things to do about it, but it was my first tournament and it was a complete struggle. Tried conditioning with tech rolls then random tech in places, but he was very good. Didn't try miss techs on purpose, I need to use that more.

It was disappointing because first round I played what felt like a decent Zelda and was able to put in work, but then proceed to get double four stocked because of waft and dthrow next set again Apples.

 

[Frost | Odds]

A big part of why DK is so easy to tech chase is not because his tech roll doesn't go very far, but it's because he's ****ing huge and fat and even when he moves himself away, his fatass hurtbox is still relatively close to you. Here's an extremely professional and detailed visual aid of this phenomenon: [best pic]

Bowser's got the same problem, plus the frame data on his tech roll is just godawful.

I'd like to see another round of nerfs as drastic as 3.5s except this time melee characters aren't exempt from changes.

Right now characters with extreme properties can only be balanced by making some aspect of their game stupid to play against (looking at you Bowser). If the average strength of characters was toned down a bit you would have more flexibility to create interesting characters that aren't as polarizing.

Couldn't agree more.



EDIT:

turns out DJL is also great for microspacing - similar stuff to pivots, but much easier to do consistently, and can also be done out of shield. IE. Peach can run forward just a smidge and then quickly dsmash, in situations where otherwise her only option may have been to dash attack. I'd make a video but my capture card is basically broken atm.

 

[CORY]

fatter character should get tech rolls that match the distance of mewtwo's normal rolls. or you know...ike's tech rolls since they are amazing

for real, though. **** mewtwo's normal rolls >: C

Squirtle is already super ****ing tiny, he doesn't need a good tech roll. Even then, he's fairly floaty so he shouldn't be forced to tech super often like a character like Fox or Falco might. The distance a tech roll goes isn't the only thing that determines how easy it is to hit a character out of it. A big part of why DK is so easy to tech chase is not because his tech roll doesn't go very far, but it's because he's ****ing huge and fat and even when he moves himself away, his fatass hurtbox is still relatively close to you. Here's an extremely professional and detailed visual aid of this phenomenon

beautiful.

 

[Life]

I suppose this isn't on-topic but I feel compelled to respond.

Squirtle is already super ****ing tiny, he doesn't need a good tech roll. Even then, he's fairly floaty so he shouldn't be forced to tech super often like a character like Fox or Falco might. The distance a tech roll goes isn't the only thing that determines how easy it is to hit a character out of it. A big part of why DK is so easy to tech chase is not because his tech roll doesn't go very far, but it's because he's ****ing huge and fat and even when he moves himself away, his fatass hurtbox is still relatively close to you. Here's an extremely professional and detailed visual aid of this phenomenon *snop*

I'm not asking for Sheik-level BS tech rolls here. The fact that characters have tech rolls of different lengths can be used as a large-scale balance lever; if auto-techchase throws such as GnW and Charizard ever prove to be universally strong, for instance, buffing some or even most characters' techrolls to combat it could be a great solution. Not every character needs a gigantic techroll, not even the ones I play!

I just think it is gimmicky jank "poorly designed" (I know that's kind of a buzz-phrase but I can't think of anything better) that in nearly every tech situation Squirtle is in, techrolling is either dramatically weak or just outright wrong. In some cases teching at all is a bad choice! (Looking at you, Flame Choke.) Since when does that make any sense? That would be like if l-canceling doubled your end lag instead of halving it. Why punish someone for doing an important advanced technique?

Additionally, Squirtle's techroll is the same as it was in Brawl. That isn't an inherently bad thing, but it does sort of suggest that it simply never occurred to the PMDT to change it.

Now granted, Squirtle's techroll isn't the only weakness in the character, and he has ways to counteract it (not getting grabbed or spiked or whatever situation puts him in a techchase in a given matchup, or just taking advantage of his low friction to slide offstage and put himself in a different but less broken bind).

You are right in saying that Squirtle doesn't need a good techroll to be balanced. He needs a techroll at all to be well-designed, however.

 

[didds]

Some may argue that a poor techroll on someone as elusive as squirtle is actually good design and makes tech chases and squirtle's tech option mixup all the more important

Sort of a, "finally caught him, can't **** up now" thing

 

[Life]

Some may argue that a poor techroll on someone as elusive as squirtle is actually good design and makes tech chases and squirtle's tech option mixup all the more important

Sort of a, "finally caught him, can't **** up now" thing

You're not wrong, but...



Have the techroll lengths of every character been thought out that way? Is there a reason any given character has any given techroll animation?

 

[Magus420]

's tech rolls themselves are around bottom 1/3 of the cast in distance.

 

[4tlas]

's tech rolls themselves are around bottom 1/3 of the cast in distance.

But they are very quick.

 

[Magus420]

All tech rolls are 40 frames.

 

[CORY]

i'm pretty sure everyone's frame data is the same, or very similar? i didn't check everything, but the handfull i did were almost all identical, just a few frames off on a couple of characters.

edit: magus ninja-ing the **** out of me.

 

[Frost | Odds]

's tech rolls themselves are around bottom 1/3 of the cast in distance.

He's very hard to tech chase, though, relatively speaking - in large part due to his small size, and the speed and ridiculous size of his shine, which can pretty easily lead to a killing combo for Fox, like a grounded Sakurai combo.

Not cool on a character who's supposed to be a 'glass cannon', imo.

 

[Magus420]

It isn't due to how far his rolls go though. Shine on getup is pretty good regardless.

 

[4tlas]

All tech rolls are 40 frames.

Huh. Maybe something about the animation makes it feel quicker then. Like I find it super easy to techchase Falcon or Squirtle, but Fox is very difficult. Maybe its because of that bounce in the Falcon and Squirtle animations, I have time to recognize they are teching before they've actually moved, and I can catch up?

 

[Life]

Huh, I could have sworn Fox was one of the longer ones. There isn't a list I can find anywhere, though. (Question mark?) Could also be a character size thing like with Bowser's techrolls.

For what it's worth, techchasing GnW is relatively hard because his techrolls are identical for the first few frames so you can't differentiate as quickly and therefore react as quickly, even though AFAIK they aren't super long or anything.

 

[D e l t a]

If we're talking about rolls, let's just point out how Lucas among a few other characters have terrible times for their tech rolls. Not to mention rolling off ledge as Lucas takes a year to complete and is vulnerable for almost half the animation.

Mewtwo's rolls are terrible on a platform tho. Not to mention the fact that his roll being such a great distance forfeits stage control & positioning while throwing their back to a corner. Sure, you might not be able to get an immediate punish, but momentum swings heavily in your favor. To elaborate further, they won't be able to cross-up roll -> counter attack like other characters can (Marth, Fox, MK, etc). Plus, Mewtwo's roll has enough end lag that you can punish them if you're spaced well and anticipate the roll.

tl;dr Get better and convert weaknesses into strengths.
Unless your character sucks. In that case, I'm sorry you haven't accepted Fox as your main.

 

[Player -0]

Well invincibility frames only last about half the animation. If some characters move farther and faster than other characters then you can't cover most of the options by standing in one spot. I kind of explained it badly but it makes sense.

Playing vs. Falco and then vs. other character's is hard. Falco's tech roll goes so far.

 

[Frost | Odds]

It isn't due to how far his rolls go though. Shine on getup is pretty good regardless.

Not directly, but because his rolls still go pretty far relative to his character size, it's tough to account for them and stationary getup->shine (especially because shine is also an option after the tech rolls).

A strong option means opponents have to spend more positional/timing 'resources' on covering that option, thereby also strengthening other options that mixup. If Fox's opponents didn't have to worry as much about dealing with his tech rolls, covering the in-place tech option would be less prohibitively difficult; and vice versa.