• Welcome to Smashboards, the world's largest Super Smash Brothers community! Over 250,000 Smash Bros. fans from around the world have come to discuss these great games in over 19 million posts!

    You are currently viewing our boards as a visitor. Click here to sign up right now and start on your path in the Smash community!

Time for the King to get Buffed

caslinm

Smash Rookie
Joined
Oct 19, 2019
Messages
1
I am finding it harder and harder to play as the great king online as I always end up combo food against certain characters. Does anyone think the king will get buffed on the next patch?
 

SecretAsianMan

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Nov 26, 2018
Messages
136
honestly, probably not.
He has issues, we all know that. Its just there isn't a thing on King K. Rool that is literally disfunctional. His moves do work: its just they suck by design.
Obviously if King K. Rool gets a buff then Ill be happy, its just
im skeptical if nintendo would buff king k. rool in the first place.
 

Damned1

Smash Cadet
Joined
Jul 25, 2019
Messages
34
honestly, probably not.
He has issues, we all know that. Its just there isn't a thing on King K. Rool that is literally disfunctional. His moves do work: its just they suck by design.
.
Wrong.

"Bad by design" would imply that those moves are horrible even on paper. And let me remind you that K. Rool was getting a lot of hype. Yes, that was partially due to the pre-release "hurr durr optimism"... but it wasn't completely based on that. Nair seemed like an awesome landing tool, grab range seemed massive, FSmash seemed kind of bad, but insanely strong etc. etc.

Only shortly before and after release we realized those moves had some small or big problems that... well, made them much worse. NAir's landing lag lasts too long, and its hitbox doesn't even cover his whole body, FSmash is not only laggy (we expected that), but also very small and active for a short time. And one thing that i still don't understand - Kannonball, which i expected to be a projectile to beat smaller projectiles. So why on earth it loses to faster and spammable projectiles like Razor Leaf with this end lag and 1-in-game restriction? I noticed that the very first day and instantly thought that interaction is so bad it's almost funny.

If there is any "bad by design" thing with :ultkrool:, it's the Krown. It's good, but the fact it's BETTER AS AN ITEM THAN A MOVE is kind of dumb. No other character that can have its move used against him suffers as much from that (see :ultwario: :ultrob: or even :ultmegaman: and :ultpeach:).

So if :ultkrool: should get anything in the next patch, i would prefer not "buffs" but "fixes" - changes to things that clearly aren't working as intended (read: they prevent the move from getting anything). I touched upon that in my previous post, but basically, some hitboxes on :ultkrool: moves are just too frigin small (im looking at you, Jab 1 and FSmash), and his grab is... kind of meh (even dash grab). Belly armor should also scale with 1v1, or just get more hp. Only after that i would look for other buffs (end lag reduction etc.).
 
Last edited:

Call_Me_Red

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Nov 29, 2018
Messages
420
Location
Yeehaw, Texas
Wrong.

"Bad by design" would imply that those moves are horrible even on paper. And let me remind you that K. Rool was getting a lot of hype. Yes, that was partially due to the pre-release "hurr durr optimism"... but it wasn't completely based on that. Nair seemed like an awesome landing tool, grab range seemed massive, FSmash seemed kind of bad, but insanely strong etc. etc.

Only shortly before and after release we realized those moves had some small or big problems that... well, made them much worse. NAir's landing lag lasts too long, and its hitbox doesn't even cover his whole body, FSmash is not only laggy (we expected that), but also very small and active for a short time. And one thing that i still don't understand - Kannonball, which i expected to be a projectile to beat smaller projectiles. So why on earth it loses to faster and spammable projectiles like Razor Leaf with this end lag and 1-in-game restriction? I noticed that the very first day and instantly thought that interaction is so bad it's almost funny.

If there is any "bad by design" thing with :ultkrool", it's the Krown. It's good, but the fact it's BETTER AS AN ITEM THAN A MOVE is kind of dumb. No other character that can have its move used against him suffers as much from that (see :ultwario: :ultrob: or even :ultmegaman: and :ultpeach:).

So if :ultkrool: should get anything in the next patch, i would prefer not "buffs" but "fixes" - changes to things that clearly aren't working as intended (read: they prevent the move from getting anything). I touched upon that in my previous post, but basically, some hitboxes on :ultkrool: moves are just too frigin small (im looking at you, Jab 1 and FSmash), and his grab is... kind of meh (even dash grab). Belly armor should also scale with 1v1, or just get more hp. Only after that i would look for other buffs (end lag reduction etc.).
Kannonball should definitely be buffed. I would love to see either less lag, or higher priority. I think what would cement King K as a viable character is making Kannonball able to go through most projectiles, making it like a shield.

Also, only slightly related, I've started seeing a lot of K Rools opting for pivot grab, because that thing is massive. Dash grab is...fine, but pivot grab honestly seems pretty good.

And I've mentioned this before, but FIX CROWN. Crown should only be able to hit K Rool once. Or at the very least should spawn on our head if it falls off stage. Imagine if someone could steal Joker's Arsene and use it against him for an entire stock. That's what it feels like. It feels like we got a really strong tool, but if you mess up, well...have fun.

I miss that pre-release optimism
 
Last edited:

Damned1

Smash Cadet
Joined
Jul 25, 2019
Messages
34
About the dash grab: It would be good if it wasn't for other characters. See this:


Is completely fine out of context. But then you see this:


Look where is :ultjoker:'s hand compared to his grab range and then look back at :ultkrool:'s. Again, not sure how accurate this is (source: Smash wiki), but... yeeaaaa. (In case anyone wonders: his normal grab range doesn't even cover his claws completely).

And i already wrote a lot about the Krown, so to put it short: 100% agree. Would like this gone completely, but that ain't happening in this game most likely.
 
D

Deleted member

Guest
He's a great character. But yeah a few buffs could definetly help.

For sure.
 

S_B

Too Drunk to Smash
Joined
Aug 11, 2006
Messages
3,977
Location
NH, Discord: SB#6077
Switch FC
SW 5369-1969-6280
My (probably vain) hope is that KKR hasn't seen any buffs as of late because the devs realize that he's nigh-impossible to buff in higher tiers of play without making him stupidly overpowered in lower tiers, and they're planning a "rework" that will change how some of his moves function to the extent that they'll serve a different purpose in his gameplan from then on.

Because his real problem is that he's a "counterpick -> GG" character right now in how bad some of his matchups are (Falcon has a guaranteed combo into knee on him and most fast characters overwhelm him with ease), but if you were to buff him to where he could manage those matchups, the matchups where he does decently would become unbearable for those characters.

The only option is the closest we've seen to a rework of a character in SSB. These days, it's not uncommon for games to rework their characters as they fall out of the meta (especially MOBAs like League and team shooters like Overwatch). If KKR wasn't thriving prior to Joker's release, he sure as hell isn't after it.

I have faith that the dev team will do something for him. This is the first SSB where heavies are truly viable (Leon's Bowser is a terror and Ganondorf has won major tournaments). KKR is currently the outlier in how he's not viable, not just one more heavy in a sea of F-tier heavies.
 

Kold Pizza

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Oct 2, 2019
Messages
195
Location
Gang-Plank Galleon
The development team has shown more effort in Smash Ultimate than they did in Smash 4.

Kudos to them.

Since the game released, the developers deserve a break and cool off for their hard work.

Then they can get back refreshed and take notice on the few characters that do need some fixes; most of the roster competitive wise is really balanced so it’s only a portion of characters that need buffs.

When every single character is viable, it will be a fair game for everyone, no uphill battles.
 

Handy Man

Smash Ace
Joined
Jan 1, 2013
Messages
916
Location
SoCal
It looks like we're getting Terry Bogard and a character balance patch this Wednesday! Could this be our finest hour?

 

Damned1

Smash Cadet
Joined
Jul 25, 2019
Messages
34
Let's hope. I KIND OF dream that the reason stream is that long with just Terry is because this will be huge balance patch and some stuff will be touched upon on the stream. Yes, this is almost for sure not the case, but hey, no harm in dreaming if you know it's just dreaming right?

I just hope that the same won't be the case for K. Rool's buffs...
 

whitesnake

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Aug 18, 2019
Messages
124
My (probably vain) hope is that KKR hasn't seen any buffs as of late because the devs realize that he's nigh-impossible to buff in higher tiers of play without making him stupidly overpowered in lower tiers, and they're planning a "rework" that will change how some of his moves function to the extent that they'll serve a different purpose in his gameplan from then on.

Because his real problem is that he's a "counterpick -> GG" character right now in how bad some of his matchups are (Falcon has a guaranteed combo into knee on him and most fast characters overwhelm him with ease), but if you were to buff him to where he could manage those matchups, the matchups where he does decently would become unbearable for those characters.

The only option is the closest we've seen to a rework of a character in SSB. These days, it's not uncommon for games to rework their characters as they fall out of the meta (especially MOBAs like League and team shooters like Overwatch). If KKR wasn't thriving prior to Joker's release, he sure as hell isn't after it.

I have faith that the dev team will do something for him. This is the first SSB where heavies are truly viable (Leon's Bowser is a terror and Ganondorf has won major tournaments). KKR is currently the outlier in how he's not viable, not just one more heavy in a sea of F-tier heavies.
I appreciate the thoughts but disagree with this. We are very far from having an overpowered heavy at any level of play. Through 5 games in this series we have NEVER had an S-tier super heavy

I think the danger of buffing one of the worst characters in the game is overstated in your post. Buff the king!
 

Damned1

Smash Cadet
Joined
Jul 25, 2019
Messages
34
Quick, not thought-through thoughts:

- Nair's ending lag reduced could be HUGE, finally a great landing tool?
- Fair getting buffs wasn't what i expected, but what i wanted, YES.
- Blunderbuss got a lot of buffs, and while i don't see the one i wanted the most (priority of Kannonnball), faster attack is definetely cool. And i will take better knockback on this any day, thank you very much.
- Kounter got buffed! Nice, less end lag if failed it connect (i can't read). Also, do i read it right that they made Kounter's hitbox larger or sth?
- Upair is now even better kill option and the hitbox is both larger AND lasts longer?

Now, i doubt it makes :ultkrool: much better, but those are definetely changes in good direction. So - thx, Sakurai.

ps. i see also other low tiers getting buffs, so i think we can expect more changes in the future. Noice.
 
Last edited:

Scase

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jul 5, 2019
Messages
22
Has any of this been labbed yet, gd nintendo and their cryptic notes lol.

Any idea if cannon buff was startup, or movement speed of the ball?
 

S_B

Too Drunk to Smash
Joined
Aug 11, 2006
Messages
3,977
Location
NH, Discord: SB#6077
Switch FC
SW 5369-1969-6280
Nair is easily the biggest upgrade in there because you can act out of it VERY quickly now.

The blunderbuss changes are nice, but any half decent, say, Falcon would still hop over it immediately and knee you in the face when you begin firing it. Making the inhale hitbox taller would be amazing...

All in all, not bad buffs, but aside from Nair these aren't really the buffs he needs to keep small, fast characters from overwhelming him.

I look at Leon's Bowser and the one tool in Bowser's arsenal that makes him super dangerous is up+b out of shield. An OOS option like that for KKR would raise his competitive viability substantially.
 

whitesnake

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Aug 18, 2019
Messages
124
Nair is such a well-designed buff too...

Gives KKR a great tool but if spammed the armor will break.

Yet another reason SSBU is a great game
 
Last edited:

whitesnake

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Aug 18, 2019
Messages
124
I will say though, the main two buffs I wanted were not really included..

1) better out of shield option

2) better combo breaker
 

Kold Pizza

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Oct 2, 2019
Messages
195
Location
Gang-Plank Galleon
K. Rool moves up at least one tier with his recent buffs, that I am certain about.

Here’s what I think he needs right now:

- It’s already been brought up before, but it cannot be stressed enough; K. Rool really needs a good out of shield option (one that is a true game changer like Bowser’s whirling fortress).
- He needs something that will ensure him better from being combo food, a true “get off me” kind of move; it’s good to see his gut check got buffed, it’s a neat option but you have to time it right and it can sometimes be risky. I would say increase the disjoints of some of his tilts, at least one of them (I’m thinking about forward tilt).
- On a personal note, K. Rool’s boxing glove attack is one of my most favorite moves of any character ever (besides his blunderbuss, crown, and propeller of course) and I would love to see that buffed by having its hitbox range and sweet spot increased. It would be nice if the same were to happen to his up smash.
- K. Rool also needs an increase of his movement speed and mobility.

These fixes would not only make him move up at least another tier; it would also greatly increase his viability.
 
Last edited:

Damned1

Smash Cadet
Joined
Jul 25, 2019
Messages
34
Still kind of too early for final verdict, but i want to share my thoughts. In spoiler, because i want to talk about other things as well.


Patch 6.0 isn't as big as some people wanted, but it giving us buffs for :ultkrool: is great in itself , considering most of us feared more or less he might not get anything again. What's more, while previous patches offered minor buffs mixed with equally or even more minor nerfs (even if they were actually meaningful, like stronger bury at higher % oraz Upair being slightly better for mixing recovery), 6.0 gave us the most changes so far, they are far more game changing than anything so far.

First and foremost, they actually fix'd three of his "broken" features - things that did not work as intended (?) due to big or small problems. I mentioned them before: not having a landing option due to the Nair's landing lag, lack of any sort of shield pressure and Kounter not covering even his whole belly. All three were solved in the latest patch (well, shield pressure not rly, but that's a progress), and Nair's landing lag might lead us to discover reliable combos - something K. Rool isn't known for.

Secondly, he got some seemingly small buffs. "Seemingly", because i think that they are still very, very important. Fair's and Upair's killing power or hitboxes weren't at the top of anyone's priority lists, but i have already seen it make a lot of difference in actual matches, easily sending offstage or KO'ing earlier than before. Blunderbuss' changes are probably the least important, but the move being overall faster AND also able to KO by itself without reshooting - sth previously unseen, or at least very rare from my experience - means that :ultkrool: finally starts to live up to superheavy standards of kill power.

Now, im usually against instantly going "what else can be changed", since it's difficult to judge the true impact of even seemingly small or useless changes. Seriously, just look at people raging over :ultjigglypuff: after all the pros talking day 1 that "it did not change anything", and don't be surprised if they suddenly go back to "yeah, she's still low tier". With that out of the way, it doesn't hurt to go into more possible buffs for the Kroc, since there is no denying that not all crucial issues were solved, as some things still need more "fixes" rather than "buffs". Kold Pizza Kold Pizza , W whitesnake and S_B S_B already touched upon some, and i will be repeating both them and my previous posts. So... yea, spoilers again.

1. Out of shield option for :ultkrool: sound good, but im still kind of noob when it comes to Smash, so i don't what would be required for that (frame 6-8 with good hitbox?). Besides, which move could fill that role? Nair anf Fair already got buffed, and other than that, there is pretty much.... nothing? I think that's the last cause, unless im missing something.
2. All the old generic stuff: slightly better mobility, because :ultkrool: remains the "bait and punish" character in my eyes; Scalable 1v1 or generally higher HP of Belly Armor; some more shield pressure tools (higher shield dmg on UpSmash and FSmash).

3. Fixes and buffs for some of his moves, mainly Jab1 (again: claw swipe with no hitbox on claws...) and FSmash (it DEFINETELY needs to last longer . End lag reduction would be welcome as well, but might be too much). Dash Attack having a splash hitbox when K. Rool lands would be nice too.
4. Krown... yea, that's a tough one, and i wrote about it a lot. In short, make it worse as an item: let it hit :ultkrool: only once, make it weight more so that it limits movement like :ultwario:'s bike and/or decrease it's knockback and DMG versus K. Rool. Or... assuming it's possible... why not remove the reset on despawn timer if it's picked up, so it could despawn even from characters' hands? ... yeah, most likely impossible. Oh, and assuming we fix that problem, faster speed with range to go along with it might be cool.
5. Kannonball priority - again, make it so it doesn't get countered by faster (?) and spammable projectiles, so MUs like :ultivysaur: don't make Blunderbuss far worse than it is.
6. A "get off me!" move... Up Tilt seems like the move for it IMO, but do we really want to buff it? It's already pretty damn fast with decent power to go with it. Or maybe make Nair even better, so it is both OOS option, combo opener AND combo breaker so that everyone can finally complain :ultkrool: got a broken move? No idea.

Oh yeah, and the general chant of every main who wants his big character buffed: "REDUCE END LAG". That's all from me (looks at the wall of text), sorry. ^^'
 
Last edited:

G-Guy

Smash Ace
Joined
Oct 9, 2014
Messages
807
NNID
G-Guy1990
New Fair's range is awesome, now imagine it being a SH-Autocancel move...that would be amazing.

People are already labbing new Nair->DSmash on shields and apparently that set up punishes enemies who like to shieldgrab you after the Nair.

The biggest thing that needs a fix now is Krown in my opinion. It feels slow and sluggish compared to the rest of his kit and I keep repeating it:
having his arm extended his hurtbox is super unneccesary...

Stuff I also would like:

- a bigger hitbox on FSmash. That move feels kind of unfinished, tbh.
- less endlag on DSmash. The fact that you can hit people with the shock wave and NOT follow up with anything really annoys me.
- as unlikely as it may be, intangibility on his arm during back air would make him SCARY.


Overall, I am really pleased so far. Yeah, is OoS is non existent and many characters edgeguard him almost for free. However, I feel like his keep-away game got stronger with the Fair and Blunderbuss changes.
Playing like K Rool is sort of like being the boss in a platformer: If the enemy gets to you, you get AHNK'd.
get AHNK'd too much and you loose. Keep the enemies away or armour their attacks and you won't get AHNK'd.

Enjoy the patch, let's hope this wasn't the last for our king!
 

Scase

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jul 5, 2019
Messages
22
The biggest thing that needs a fix now is Krown in my opinion. It feels slow and sluggish compared to the rest of his kit and I keep repeating it:
having his arm extended his hurtbox is super unneccesary...
At this point, I feel like removing the armor on it would almost be a buff.
 
Last edited:

Kold Pizza

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Oct 2, 2019
Messages
195
Location
Gang-Plank Galleon
While I do love the crown move, it does need some kind of buff.

When you compare it to the blunderbuss now after this patch, it isn’t as reliable right now. I don’t want it to become obsolete down the road from now. I want the crown’s movement to feel more fluid and those hurt boxes involving K. Rool’s arm turned into disjoints.

I certainly hope that move gets fixed because I love that move (it’s a magnificent reference to the original DKC game).
 
Last edited:

Damned1

Smash Cadet
Joined
Jul 25, 2019
Messages
34
Posting this because i for once have a time to show example of sth i've said before. Now, there are a lot of matches in which you can see FSmash's damage to shield, but usually im not at home when i notice them and later i don't have time to search through my history. So, here you go, same video, but two examples (change 128 to 148 in the link and you get it).

https://youtu.be/ULU8RfuhONg?t=126

Again: this is extremely slow attack, both with a rather long startup and VERY long end lag, very short as far as active frames go and with hitbox that even by look is modest at best. Basically, high risk, high reward. And THIS is the shield damage it does?

Yea, this isn't the top priority when it comes to helping :ultkrool:, but every time i see FSmash startup, i hold my breath. And then it gets shielded and im like "oh, right, it's THAT bad". Kind of depressing, really.
 

Kold Pizza

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Oct 2, 2019
Messages
195
Location
Gang-Plank Galleon
There will be several more patches in the future.

I prefer K. Rool gets buffed little by little every patch instead of a big amount in one patch; just so the pleb casual complainers don’t take notice.

Anyways, I’ve been paying attention to the Events Hub site tier list since the famous Smash experts’ tier lists haven’t come up on YouTube yet.

In the Events Hub site, K. Rool is on the upside this month, he could move up but that would take a while. As a dedicated K. Rool main, I take everything experts and websites say with a grain of salt and simply look for ways to improve how I play K. Rool.

Though some gamers think K. Rool didn’t really move up in the tiers a lot, that could be potentially beneficial to us because we have the element of surprise with us when we play competitive Smash. That’s the key silver lining here.

Online battling certainly has gotten more interesting now. K. Rool truly feels smoothly playable more than ever. Competitors will plan for certain strategies to counter us and we’ll do the same. After the recent patch, it feels so good have more options now; though K. Rool’s viability needs improvement (especially up Smash and forward smash), it feels good to have a decent number of options now for certain strategies.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom