Unpopular opinion: Yoshi is not high tier. Evidence inside.

[Shady Shaymin]

If the grab had Lucas levels of end lag, or if it was converted into a melee grab with follow ups then yes, Yoshi would be insanely broken.

1.1.5 goals ^-^

 

[The Other Yoshi]

Hey people. dont' you worry about at think. I will make Yoshi top tier.

 

[TheQTpie]

I for one agree with this opinion highly. I've mained Yoshi for over a year now and all of the things that were brought up are things that are very true. None of his aerials are safe on shield even if spaced properly. Shields absolutely destroy his entire game plan. And quite frankly nobody has been able to do well with him. Even in my scene there have been quite a bit of Yoshi players almost all of which end up dropping him later on down the road. And the few who haven't dropped him believe him not to be too good as well. Great article very informative.

 

[100AngryTurtles]

I for one agree with this opinion highly. I've mained Yoshi for over a year now and all of the things that were brought up are things that are very true. None of his aerials are safe on shield even if spaced properly. Shields absolutely destroy his entire game plan. And quite frankly nobody has been able to do well with him. Even in my scene there have been quite a bit of Yoshi players almost all of which end up dropping him later on down the road. And the few who haven't dropped him believe him not to be too good as well. Great article very informative.

Yoshi's Fair is safe on shield if spaced properly. Yoshi has so many mixups that conditioning opponents into shielding isn't that big of a deal. Also The Wall has done exceedingly well with Yoshi alone.

 

[Delta-cod]

Yoshi's Fair is safe on shield if spaced properly. Yoshi has so many mixups that conditioning opponents into shielding isn't that big of a deal. Also The Wall has done exceedingly well with Yoshi alone.

Yoshis do well on the local level. But they very rarely (never, at this point?) take great placements at national events. This is either indicative of a lack of player skill among his players, or that Yoshi just isn't that good in the current meta.

 

[100AngryTurtles]

Yoshis do well on the local level. But they very rarely (never, at this point?) take great placements at national events. This is either indicative of a lack of player skill among his players, or that Yoshi just isn't that good in the current meta.

I completely agree with that, but saying things like "Yoshi doesn't have any aerials safe on shield" is just plain wrong. I still agree with The Wall in that Yoshi is still solo main viable and can be pushed further. I also agree with Yoshi's current placing on the official tierlist as a Mid tier. I believe that he has the potential to be a high tier, but in the current meta and how he is being played places him at a Mid tier. I just don't want misinformation to be spread around about the character.

 

[Shady Shaymin]

I feel all of this paper talk of Yoshi struggling against shields is a nice slew of theory craft, but let's be real here. What Yoshi player is stupid enough to just run at the opponent with a punishable aerial and let themselves get hit by something OOS? I like to think that, despite what people infer from results, the average Yoshi player has just enough brain cells to play a patient game and mix up their options between their B grab, shield destroying Dair, and well spaced aerials to pressure shields. If you look at tournament play Yoshi, he doesn't even usually lose by getting camped in shied and n'aired all the way to loser's bracket. Most Yoshis lose either a) getting bodied by one of his tough matchps (lol sheik) b) losing to an aggressive opponent who adapted to their approaches or c) misinputted tech (particlarly on his b-reverse).

 

[100AngryTurtles]

Exactly. I feel like people overstate his weaknesses as the reason for him being mid tier, when in reality I believe it is because we need to learn how to adapt better. I will admit that his grab game is weak, but I do not believe that to be the reason he cannot reach top 8. There are tons of good players out there with various characters. Heck look at iStudying with Greninja. We just need to stick with Yoshi long enough to get there ourselves.

 

[The Other Yoshi]

Here's what needs to happen: Some Yoshi player needs to travel to a isolated location with a wii u, a tv, enough food and supplies, and just really go crazy playing as Yoshi. Similar to what amsa did for Yoshi in melee. I don't understand the attitude of saying the character just isn't good enough. There's simply no creative spirit in that kind of thinking. It's much funner to imagine and pursue whats possible in terms of technique and play style, even if it might contradict the current meta. For example, in smash 64 I kicked ass as yoshi. Why? because I never used the shield button. I just relied on getting the first hit and combo-ing until they died. Granted, I was like 10 and my opponents were children or cpus, but the principle still stands. Don't you wanna push the envelope?
In conclusion:
Yoshi is the Rock Lee of super smash brothers. It doesn't matter that he doesn't have the conventional tools that make other ninjas great, because he's a ****ing dinosaur and I'll never give up.

 

[C0rvus]

To the point of killing taking longer, Yoshi has kill setups, yes? After you get your opponent to a certain percent, maybe don't keep tacking on every hit when the opportunity presents itself. You need the kill, not another dair onstage, you get what I mean? Plus, with rage, your opponent may just have an easier and easier time killing you. Just a thought.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Heck look at iStudying with Greninja. We just need to stick with Yoshi long enough to get there ourselves.

Man I hate fotm ****
"X player did Y thing with Z character, mention them a million times literally everywhere till it gets obnoxious"

Anyways we all have stuck with Yoshi longer than most of the communities age lol

Greninja is prolly a better character than Yoshi ever since his buffs to Ftilt and Shuriken, the random kb buffs to like 5+ moves is just silly but I guess helps him some more. It didn't need istudying to do well for Greninja to instantly be a good character, he's always been a good character just like Tink ROB Villager etc.

Just sadly not until some random person does well on an NA stream that people realize it finally. Similar to other esports if it's not NA, the recognition will never happen for the players/characters.

I don't understand the attitude of saying the character just isn't good enough.

Prolly cause the character isn't exactly a secret beast? That's like some of the delusional Link or Zelda mains back in brawl thinking there's some magical untapped power in them that has yet to be found, and I'm not exaggerating either.
http://smashboards.com/threads/vide...ead-october-20th.369394/page-18#post-20000041
(man most of the comments of this argument was deleted last time I found this, oh well)

The rest of this post is silly shizz not really worth talkin' about like comparing anime to smash or smash 64 determination when all 12 whole characters in that game is good just some more stupid than others (pikachu kirby)
It's not like we never play the game, Smash 4 has been out for almost 2 years so we're definitely trying our best and been playing Yoshi the entire time.
Yoshi is just limited in what he can do cause he isn't like Cloud where he's blessed with everything except super good recovery outside of limit upb. Especially since he has a super special trait called "really ****ing stupid Uair and dair"

To the point of killing taking longer, Yoshi has kill setups, yes? After you get your opponent to a certain percent,

Our kill setups is split in like 5 or 6 situations.

Their %
Our %
Staleness of Jab or smashes
Where did we hit with the shoe
Fallspeed/weight

Maybe missing a thing or two, sometimes even if we hit with the Jab1 with all the cards on the table, Usmash is prolly not the best decision to do. Dsmash is prolly more likely to hit most of the time, it's more consistent but not much as a kill move unless you're like at the ledge

Meanwhile top tiers have more simple less tight windows for their kill setups like sheik and her 50/50, or more recently cloud with Uair limit etc. bayonetta and all her death combos if you can pull it off at 0% or corrin with counter/side-b being frame 5 and stupid strong. Plus corns tippers being long range outside Usmash.
Sum examples.

tl;dr for post
Yoshi is ok, but saying we're not trying our best when we even have other Yoshi's at nationals trying and failing, while also playing their Main the entire smash 4 lifespan so far :^)
Yoshi Kill setups is ok too, but wish our throw game could've been touched up to make it less frustrating at times.
ayy lmao

Spoiler

With how well 6+ characters have been doing recently under C.falcon and Yoshi in terms of the tier list since the start of this year, Yoshi is actually looking to drop to top 25 instead now. Of course along with Falcon maybe but the players for that character has been getting better results

 

[Lukingordex]

Yep, yoshi is one of the best mid tiers, but definitely not a high tier. And I came to that conclusion by looking at his MUs against the top/high tiers:

disadvantages:
40:60
45:55 (most say even but I don't personally agree)
40:60
35:65 (this MU is terrible urgh)
45:55
45:55
45:55 (could be 40:60)
45:55
45:55 (not sure on this one, could be even)
45:55 (maybe even? Most people have different opinions on this MU)

Even
50:50 (this MU is one of the most controversial ones because a lot of people have different opinions, but imo it's even)
50:50 (mayyybe we have the advantage here but if we do it's really not that significant)
50:50 (same situation as Ness)

So as we can see we lose to the big majority of the viable characters, and on top of that we also have some MUs with mid tier characters that are even which is a thing the high tier characters rarely have. Imo A character like that can't be considered a high tier.

 

[The Other Yoshi]

I didn't mean to come off like that much of a tool, and I am sorry. I was being facetious. I do not discredit all the yoshi players who have invested time playing/developing him. Its just I have been under a rock in terms of the game meta and greater discussion for a long time so half of what I say is ignorant. I didn't even know people thought link and zelda had untapped potential.

Zero and others have described yoshi as undeveloped. Is they mistaken? Again, maybe zero has no idea what he's talking about and I'm only referring to his opinion because I don't know any better, I'm just here to learn.

I am maybe confusing the development of a character with individual player skill.

Can someone give me an example of a smash 4 character's meta and play style that changed as people developed it (without necessarily being the direct result of nerfs/buffs)?

 

[LeifEriksson]

45:55 (not sure on this one, could be even)

Personally I'd say it leans towards Ryu, because he has some stupidly safe kill setups Yoshi doesn't have.

 

[Delta-cod]

Lukingordex There are a lot of varying opinions about how Yoshi does against that list of characters. I'd also say listing things as 45:55 is a bit misleading in terms of disadvantaged match ups counts -- 45:55 is basically a 50:50. I'm a big fan of the 0-4 rating system for this reason.

Either way, most of those matchups aren't POSITIVE, which means we're either fighting uphill or even battles all the way. Which is tough, as you progress through a tournament. Fatigue is a real factor, especially when we can't just rely on something like Dthrow > Uair for easy damage/kills. These little givens really take the edge off a match, they let you autopilot. The downtime can be crucial.

I didn't mean to come off like that much of a tool, and I am sorry. I was being facetious. I do not discredit all the yoshi players who have invested time playing/developing him. Its just I have been under a rock in terms of the game meta and greater discussion for a long time so half of what I say is ignorant. I didn't even know people thought link and zelda had untapped potential.

Zero and others have described yoshi as undeveloped. Is they mistaken? Again, maybe zero has no idea what he's talking about and I'm only referring to his opinion because I don't know any better, I'm just here to learn.

I am maybe confusing the development of a character with individual player skill.

Can someone give me an example of a smash 4 character's meta and play style that changed as people developed it (without necessarily being the direct result of nerfs/buffs)?

I'm gonna be a bit emphatic here, please note that none of this emotion is directed at you in any way.

I would say that the people who's opinions you're referencing are just mistaken. I never see ANYONE outside of dedicated Yoshi mains actually pick up the character and try to put work in with him. Despite this, PLENTY of people say things like "Oh, Yoshi is just undeveloped/misunderstood/has hidden potential", but they don't even understand the character. People always say things like he has good damage output, good frame data (really?), strong attacks, he can faceroll his controller and still win, etc. But I don't see them taking Yoshi to tournaments. If he were that easy and that good and HAD that potential, surely SOME current top player would have picked him up to capitalize on everyone's lack of experience against this hidden tech Yoshi has and made some easy money.

But nobody has yet. Is Yoshi that strange to play? He's just got a funny jump, really. His shield's been normalized in this game! His grab is kinda bad, but so is ZSS's! That can't be the reason, right? No matter what I consider, it all comes down to Yoshi just not being good enough to invest time into from their perspective. And when you think about THAT, it really makes you wonder why people say "Yoshi is a hidden beast with plenty of untapped potential".

Does this mean we, the currently existing Yoshis, have finished exploring the character and pushing him to his limits? No way. There's so much we can improve on and optimize. But mechanically speaking, I don't think there's enough room in the game engine and Yoshi's current design to push him up multiple tiers' worth of rankings. But we CAN do better.

Regarding your request for an example, I really have nothing to contribute there. I will say that sometimes meta developments are closely linked to an individual's skill. Maybe I'm really good, and I find out a way to trash Rosalina and I'm just going around smashing them everywhere. If I share the secret, that's meta development. Now all Yoshis can go out and trash Rosalinas. That'd be amazing! If I keep it to myself, it just looks like I'm a super good player who is an anomaly with Yoshi.

I think what qualifies as a character's metagame is what all the high level mains are capable of doing. It's important to share information with each other so we all can improve and put out a strong showing for Yoshi. A lot of developments do start as an individual player's skill though. But when that playstyle or technique is dissected and the rest of the playerbase can consume it, then we get an improved metagame. It does take someone to take the lead, though. More communal metagame shifts usually involve collective datamining, for things like combos and kill setups, etc.

 

[C0rvus]

FWIW I don't think most people still think Yoshi is that good anymore. The consensus seems to place him at the top of mid tier, or just outside high tier. I think it's appropriate, given that Yoshi has nothing super abusive or broken. He's too honest to be top tier. His specs are very good, and is his frame data not good? It certainly feels good enough, though coming from a Toon Link player, that means little I suppose.

 

[Sinister Slush]

For the character that's easy to pick up and win, it's no longer mario it's now 5.99.
Specifically Cloud.

 

[Delta-cod]

FWIW I don't think most people still think Yoshi is that good anymore. The consensus seems to place him at the top of mid tier, or just outside high tier. I think it's appropriate, given that Yoshi has nothing super abusive or broken. He's too honest to be top tier. His specs are very good, and is his frame data not good? It certainly feels good enough, though coming from a Toon Link player, that means little I suppose.

He has good frame data, but not enough good frame data on moves that matter (i.e. kill moves). This REALLY hurts. The fact that Nair comes out so quickly and interrupts combos is great and all, but a lot of our good frame data is used up on things like jab and nair coming out really fast, while our kill moves are just a little bit too slow to be get combo'd into by the fast ones (in general).

This isn't a major fault in general, except that it makes Yoshi too honest in a world where we have characters, again, with fast grabs that lead to kills, ridiculous moves like bouncing fish, etc.

Yoshi's frame data is good. His moves are appreciably fast, especially for how hard some of them hit. But it's not THAT good, and it definitely isn't great in some places where, if it were better there, Yoshi would be a much better character. That can be said about plenty of characters, but imagine a world where Yoshi could act faster out of, say, Dthrow. This is a world now where our grab, while kinda slow and risky, has significant reward and leads into kills. Just one little change there drastically alters the dynamic of Yoshi's game. We'd have grabs into combos, grabs into kills, etc. And I'd say that's still fair, given that Yoshi's grab is still AWFUL. The risk suits the reward, like ZSS's (although I doubt Yoshi would get anything as good as her off a grab anyways).

 

[Enoki]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDibFkwqo_o

This is a rather late contribution to the discussion, but it's applicable. ZeRo just ranked Yoshi as 28th, the bottom of high tier.
I kind of liken Yoshi's problem to what ZeRo said is a huge issue for Ike: "Where can the character be developed to?... He doesn't have amazing tech that can push the character to a superior level." Interestingly, Zero only cited Yoshi's lack of results as the reason for low placement and didn't mention any of Yoshi's weaknesses.

Many of Yoshi's options, once adapted to, become significantly less useful. In particular, egg lay, up b, and down b all becomes significantly less successful as soon as your opponent figures out the weaknesses of those moves. Contrastingly, specials like Ryu's or Bayo's or Diddy's have definite room for development and, even when adapted to, have the strength and variability to remain useful.

I still find Yoshi's crippling weakness to be his lack of safe kill options to throw out. No grab mixups. No spaced bair with crazy range. No lagless or invincible smashes. No killing tilts. His kill options like usmash and down b are laggy enough that if you miss one time, you lose. There's not even any element of surprise to take advantage of, short of offstage egg lay or something. Yoshi just doesn't have the tools to be consistent in this metagame, especially with 2 stock. I can see Yoshi meta developing much further in edge guarding, but even then Yoshi is taking a risk going offstage.

So Yoshi is definitely a good character! But he's very honest in comparison to the top tiers, and thus takes way more effort to be successful with.
(Also, interestingly we're kind of seeing the same thing with ESAM and pikachu. Pikachu has a harder time getting kills than most other top tiers and, thus, consistency issues. And as the meta has developed, Pikachu has become less and less relevant. It's just like what happened with Yoshi early on: people thought he was OP, until they actually figured out what they were doing.)

 

[White_Pointer]

I was gonna come in and mention ZeRo's placement of him. Based on his ranking criteria, I don't disagree with where he's placed Yoshi. Maybe he can get better but there are no results to show that he potentially can rise up the tier list after 18+ months of meta development. Yoshi has also barely been touched in patches so hasn't required any real change in playstyle over that time, and I think that says a lot.

 

[Poltergust]

I think the main reason why Yoshi is not placing well is because of his mostly even match-up spread among the high tiers (barring Sheik and Diddy). It means that you have to constantly be outplaying your opponent to proceed through the bracket at a high level. It's not a bad thing on a match-by-match basis, but the fact that Yoshi really doesn't have any match-ups where he can take a breather (outside of Rosalina; I'm positive that's a solid win, but there are not even that many Rosalina players so whatever) can actually really wear people out over the course of a long tournament.

Also, there really aren't enough stand-out Yoshi mains in general, even at the local level. Numbers is definitely a factor as well.

People saying that Yoshi doesn't have kill set-ups are just plain wrong, though. Jab -> d-smash, jab -> down-B, u-tilt -> u-air (character specific), f-air ground-spike -> anything, and (most importantly, in my opinion) Egg Throw -> anything are all tried-and-true combos that everyone needs to know and connect consistently. Jab -> up-smash is also good even if it's not technically guaranteed. Shockingly, Yoshi only has a hard time killing once the opponent is near 200%, since these combos stop working then and you pretty much have to kill with n-air or with an edgeguard.

Speaking of which, his edge-guarding game is also brutal since all of his aerials serve a purpose off-stage, eggs lead to guaranteed follow-ups if you can get the read on the recovery, and his amazing aerial mobility allows him to follow people who are recovering super-low or high. If you are playing passively against an off-stage opponent whose name is not Sheik you are not utilizing Yoshi's moveset to its fullest potential. Go deep, keep racking on that percentage with eggs, n-airs, and d-airs. You don't necessarily have to kill if you can at least give your opponent a hard time when recovering. A significant portion of damage you will deal to your opponent in many match-ups will be when you and your opponent are both off-stage, and you need to take advantage of that.

I like what Enoki said toward the end of their last post: Yoshi is an honest character. He has the tools to compete, and while they are not as versatile or as easy to use as the tools that characters like Ryu and Sheik have, they are reliable and give him enough flexibility to deal with pretty much any match-up that comes his way.

...Except Diddy. Screw Diddy. =P

 

[ReturningFall]

I would say that the people who's opinions you're referencing are just mistaken. I never see ANYONE outside of dedicated Yoshi mains actually pick up the character and try to put work in with him. Despite this, PLENTY of people say things like "Oh, Yoshi is just undeveloped/misunderstood/has hidden potential", but they don't even understand the character. People always say things like he has good damage output, good frame data (really?), strong attacks, he can faceroll his controller and still win, etc. But I don't see them taking Yoshi to tournaments. If he were that easy and that good and HAD that potential, surely SOME current top player would have picked him up to capitalize on everyone's lack of experience against this hidden tech Yoshi has and made some easy money.

But nobody has yet. Is Yoshi that strange to play? He's just got a funny jump, really. His shield's been normalized in this game! His grab is kinda bad, but so is ZSS's! That can't be the reason, right? No matter what I consider, it all comes down to Yoshi just not being good enough to invest time into from their perspective. And when you think about THAT, it really makes you wonder why people say "Yoshi is a hidden beast with plenty of untapped potential".

I'd wager it's worse than that. Back in the early days when everyone thought Yoshi was "SS tier" we had alot of players playing Yoshi and more recently we've seen Esam (as a secondary) and others try and pick him up.

It's not just that good players did some collective mistaken analysis and quit, it's that we've seen people try and just not take him anywhere.

 

[Gros Michel]

Could it be that 1.1.5 will help Yoshi out a bit? He may not have been directly buffed but some of his worst matchups (like Shiek and MK) got taken down a peg.

 

[TheQTpie]

Could it be that 1.1.5 will help Yoshi out a bit? He may not have been directly buffed but some of his worst matchups (like Shiek and MK) got taken down a peg.

I think that the nerfs to some of his bad match ups will help but it doesn't change the fact that Yoshi has a hard time killing consistently and has a terrible grab, which I think will always be his downfall unless he gets buffed which is most likely not happening. Another thing to keep in mind is that not everybody was playing these characters in the first place and Yoshi mains still weren't able to get good results on a national level. If anything the nerf to sheik, mk, etc, will probably only help him locally.

 

[Enjeru Karasu]

Could it be that 1.1.5 will help Yoshi out a bit? He may not have been directly buffed but some of his worst matchups (like Shiek and MK) got taken down a peg.

Yeah, pretty much every one of our match-up got hit to some degree (Cloud wasn't hurt as bad in singles compaired to the others though and Diddy wasn't touched, but that's always going to be the case). But in the long run it doesn't change much unless we step up our game and take advantage of it. The really good players will be strong regardless of nerfs, since they have Smash fundamentals down really well. We can't rely on a miracle patch or constant nerfing of better characters: in the end it comes down to how well we play.

 

[Regralht]

I don't quite get where this lack of kill options thing is coming from. Outside of having an advantageous position (relying on yoshis good edge guarding or anti-air tools), we still have stuff like jab 1 -> w/e, usmash, utilt -> uair, etc.

The major thing holding yoshi back at the moment is his lackluster neutral game against the high / top tiers. He has good movement and has a lot of unique strengths, but they don't intuitively work well together and are pretty risky. Yoshi players typically get carried by their ability to hard read the timing of when the opponent wants to do something. (I'm basically saying that yoshi players are flat out outplaying their opponent in neutral)

For example:

Yoshi vs mario on FD, and they're just outside of each other's smash & tilt ranges. Let's say that mario decides to dash at yoshi. What can yoshi do to stop this? A lot of things, actually. But if you consider all of the options that both characters have, yoshi loses this 'RPS' situation in a sense that his options cover less options than Mario's does, and your options are typically less rewarding. If mario shields, all of your attacks are unsafe (outside of a low reward dtilt that was done with godlike timing. But ofc if the mario player looks for this he can just focus on powershielding at the tipper range of dtilt). Well, we could just grab him, right? Going for a grab as yoshi is risky as hell, for a medium reward (yoshi is godlike at juggling, I feel like his advantage state is underrated). Grab will lose to variations on the timings of the opponent's approach, and typically it even gets stuffed by quick attacks (mario could also dash -> spot dodge to cover many options). Yoshis jab will also do poorly due to being unsafe on shield (mario will be sliding towards you), being low reward (unlikely to land a solid jab 1 -> follow up), and the attack has poor range. If mario also mixes in JC reverse usmash, we can get killed from having our pokes beaten out, or we'll lose stage position due to yoshis poor OoS game (can't punish mario usmash on shield, and screw using our terrible rolls). If yoshi tries to reposition himself, his options lose quite hard to whatever mario feels like doing in reaction to yoshi moving (our dash attack is unsafe on shield and whiff. Same with usmash. Dash / pivot grab is horribly unsafe. Ftilt is unsafe. Jumping puts us in bad spot. Egg toss is risky and isn't rewarding (tldr for most options lol). Etc)

(Basically, yoshi encounters these types of situations very frequently against good characters. Situations where his pool of options are arguably worse than the opponent's pool of options, even though they have a 'equal' position relative to each other and the stage. Yoshi also has surprisingly lackluster CQC options. He isn't dangerous at multiple spacings)

-On a side note, I feel like a lot of yoshis usually resort to short hopping away when in a bad position like this. Most of the time, we can get away with it because most people are bad at abusing yoshis somewhat mediocre landing options. Against someone that uses shield and anti-air well, we get kinda bodied.

With that said, how do we fix this? Probably through the use of yoshis movement. We need to be able to threaten the opponent proactively (ex. Running at you = I might dash attack. The opponent will pick an option to avoid that, so we have to use something that will cover their counter), and safely. This movement must also allow yoshi the ability to whiff punish pokes. What tools does yoshi have to do this with? Well, we've got a godlike run turnaround (sliding + access to our standing options + perfect pivot in place stops momentum + can crawl slide to retreat!), our dash attack goes a ****ing mile (dash grab is kind of long too), our perfect pivot is solid, we have an overall quick dash (solid extended dash dance / foxtrot), and our jump options are scary if the opponent decides to hard commit to something.

I've been thinking about this for weeks, but I'm frustrated and stuck tbh. I'd love to hear the thoughts of others on this topic, I'm stuck cycling over the same information and tactics over and over again with little to no progress...

When and where to use each tool and how they work together is so complicated (heavily changes depending on the MU...), and I feel like yoshi doesn't even have a proper poke (and although our movement options sound good on paper, outside of using foxtrot we can't change our positioning quickly enough to capitalize on the opportunities that we've created (perfect pivots have their momentum ruined when done after other movement options ).

The potential is there imo, it'll just take time to work this out. But I don't feel like there's anyone that wants to actively discuss this kind of stuff (and tbh most people don't understand fighting games well enough, too)

 

[Enjeru Karasu]

I don't quite get where this lack of kill options thing is coming from. Outside of having an advantageous position (relying on yoshis good edge guarding or anti-air tools), we still have stuff like jab 1 -> w/e, usmash, utilt -> uair, etc.

The major thing holding yoshi back at the moment is his lackluster neutral game against the high / top tiers. He has good movement and has a lot of unique strengths, but they don't intuitively work well together and are pretty risky. Yoshi players typically get carried by their ability to hard read the timing of when the opponent wants to do something. (I'm basically saying that yoshi players are flat out outplaying their opponent in neutral)

For example:

Yoshi vs mario on FD, and they're just outside of each other's smash & tilt ranges. Let's say that mario decides to dash at yoshi. What can yoshi do to stop this? A lot of things, actually. But if you consider all of the options that both characters have, yoshi loses this 'RPS' situation in a sense that his options cover less options than Mario's does, and your options are typically less rewarding. If mario shields, all of your attacks are unsafe (outside of a low reward dtilt that was done with godlike timing. But ofc if the mario player looks for this he can just focus on powershielding at the tipper range of dtilt). Well, we could just grab him, right? Going for a grab as yoshi is risky as hell, for a medium reward (yoshi is godlike at juggling, I feel like his advantage state is underrated). Grab will lose to variations on the timings of the opponent's approach, and typically it even gets stuffed by quick attacks (mario could also dash -> spot dodge to cover many options). Yoshis jab will also do poorly due to being unsafe on shield (mario will be sliding towards you), being low reward (unlikely to land a solid jab 1 -> follow up), and the attack has poor range. If mario also mixes in JC reverse usmash, we can get killed from having our pokes beaten out, or we'll lose stage position due to yoshis poor OoS game (can't punish mario usmash on shield, and screw using our terrible rolls). If yoshi tries to reposition himself, his options lose quite hard to whatever mario feels like doing in reaction to yoshi moving (our dash attack is unsafe on shield and whiff. Same with usmash. Dash / pivot grab is horribly unsafe. Ftilt is unsafe. Jumping puts us in bad spot. Egg toss is risky and isn't rewarding (tldr for most options lol). Etc)

(Basically, yoshi encounters these types of situations very frequently against good characters. Situations where his pool of options are arguably worse than the opponent's pool of options, even though they have a 'equal' position relative to each other and the stage. Yoshi also has surprisingly lackluster CQC options. He isn't dangerous at multiple spacings)

-On a side note, I feel like a lot of yoshis usually resort to short hopping away when in a bad position like this. Most of the time, we can get away with it because most people are bad at abusing yoshis somewhat mediocre landing options. Against someone that uses shield and anti-air well, we get kinda bodied.

With that said, how do we fix this? Probably through the use of yoshis movement. We need to be able to threaten the opponent proactively (ex. Running at you = I might dash attack. The opponent will pick an option to avoid that, so we have to use something that will cover their counter), and safely. This movement must also allow yoshi the ability to whiff punish pokes. What tools does yoshi have to do this with? Well, we've got a godlike run turnaround (sliding + access to our standing options + perfect pivot in place stops momentum + can crawl slide to retreat!), our dash attack goes a ****ing mile (dash grab is kind of long too), our perfect pivot is solid, we have an overall quick dash (solid extended dash dance / foxtrot), and our jump options are scary if the opponent decides to hard commit to something.

I've been thinking about this for weeks, but I'm frustrated and stuck tbh. I'd love to hear the thoughts of others on this topic, I'm stuck cycling over the same information and tactics over and over again with little to no progress...

When and where to use each tool and how they work together is so complicated (heavily changes depending on the MU...), and I feel like yoshi doesn't even have a proper poke (and although our movement options sound good on paper, outside of using foxtrot we can't change our positioning quickly enough to capitalize on the opportunities that we've created (perfect pivots have their momentum ruined when done after other movement options ).

The potential is there imo, it'll just take time to work this out. But I don't feel like there's anyone that wants to actively discuss this kind of stuff (and tbh most people don't understand fighting games well enough, too)

All of this was very well said.
Yoshi is a character who is a jack of all trades: he's very versatile and can do a lot in the neutral. This also makes him more complicated though, and he doesn't really have anything that's really convenient and easy to use when compared to the highest tier characters. Diddy for instance is small and fast, has a projectile that leads to kill and combo set ups, has a combo throw, and his fair can wall us out. And going back to Mario, his combos are a lot easier to go into, plus his up smash is probably the best one in the game.

I find that it's hard to gain an advantage against certain characters without knowing your opponent: It's easier to do damage on them if you're know how they're going to come at you. That's basically how a lot of my victories go: it's mostly based on a punish game. I can't say that it's like that for every person who mains Yoshi, but there are just some match ups where you have to respect your opponent a lot. That's our main problem: we don't have super convenient set ups in the neutral. Sheik and ZSS have their throws (despite getting nerfed, they can still do a lot at early percents), Cloud is a disjoint character with good range and absurd frame data, and I really don't need to go over what Diddy has over us. We have really good tools, but we have to know when and to use them in each match-up, particular style of play, etc. and like ai said before, we don't really have easy guaranteed set ups like a lot of other high tier characters do. Things are not impossible by all means, but this does make it more challenging in the neutral.

 

[kj22]

I feel like these boards compare yoshi to other characters too much instead of focusing on the unique tools your character has which is alot more than the vast majority of the cast. No yoshi doesn't have exactly what the top tiers has, but that doesn't make him bad by any means. Yoshi doesn't have to flail around in neutral, well spaced eggs guide and condition your opponent to go where they want to, and yoshi's air speed means he's fast enough to punish whiffs from a good distance away. Yoshi actually has safe pressure on shield AND an command grab AND two shield break moves, way more than most the cast can say. Yoshi's main problem is getting opponents off the ground, but when he does it can lead to very damaging strings and even death. He has jab to mixups (grab/dj nair/upsmash/dsmash/another jab,downb) and kill confirms off jab, fair, and eggs. SH airdodge upair into people kills Tink around 110 with no rage on smashville, upsmash beats anything trying to land in front of, on top of, or a little bit in the air behind yoshi and is invincible at his feet and is still strong af in the back hitbox.
On top of this he's heavy and so floaty he gets back for free many times, and rage yoshi can kill around 70, which is just a 2/3 strings with him.

Yoshi's a damn good character

 

[Cat8752]

I feel like these boards compare yoshi to other characters too much instead of focusing on the unique tools your character has which is alot more than the vast majority of the cast. No yoshi doesn't have exactly what the top tiers has, but that doesn't make him bad by any means. Yoshi doesn't have to flail around in neutral, well spaced eggs guide and condition your opponent to go where they want to, and yoshi's air speed means he's fast enough to punish whiffs from a good distance away. Yoshi actually has safe pressure on shield AND an command grab AND two shield break moves, way more than most the cast can say. Yoshi's main problem is getting opponents off the ground, but when he does it can lead to very damaging strings and even death. He has jab to mixups (grab/dj nair/upsmash/dsmash/another jab,downb) and kill confirms off jab, fair, and eggs. SH airdodge upair into people kills Tink around 110 with no rage on smashville, upsmash beats anything trying to land in front of, on top of, or a little bit in the air behind yoshi and is invincible at his feet and is still strong af in the back hitbox.
On top of this he's heavy and so floaty he gets back for free many times, and rage yoshi can kill around 70, which is just a 2/3 strings with him.

Yoshi's a damn good character

I agree that we can tend to exaggerate Yoshi's flaws but you seem to be doing the opposite now. Yoshi's shield breaks can be avoided and aren't very reliable aside from when they are used in specific situations. His command grab is slow (same problem as normal grab) and grants his opponents invincibility once they emerge, meaning he can't get any guaranteed followups (would you look at that, almost exactly the same problem as regular grab. Yoshi's main kill moves are powerful but they aren't safe or nearly as good as something like a kill setup off of grab or even a thrown item. 110 seems a little early to be killing a grounded midweight with a no rage up air, especially when factoring in DI. A tier list is meant to compare characters, one of the main things that makes a character considered good is a high position on a tier list. Therefore it is impossible to say Yoshi is good without first comparing him to other characters, who then may be seen as better.

 

[kj22]

I agree that we can tend to exaggerate Yoshi's flaws but you seem to be doing the opposite now. Yoshi's shield breaks can be avoided and aren't very reliable aside from when they are used in specific situations. His command grab is slow (same problem as normal grab) and grants his opponents invincibility once they emerge, meaning he can't get any guaranteed followups (would you look at that, almost exactly the same problem as regular grab. Yoshi's main kill moves are powerful but they aren't safe or nearly as good as something like a kill setup off of grab or even a thrown item. 110 seems a little early to be killing a grounded midweight with a no rage up air, especially when factoring in DI. A tier list is meant to compare characters, one of the main things that makes a character considered good is a high position on a tier list. Therefore it is impossible to say Yoshi is good without first comparing him to other characters, who then may be seen as better.

There's nothing wrong with comparing him to other characters, it's only comparing him to top tiers and not the whole cast. If he had the same tools as what the top tiers have he'd probably be a top tier, but he doesn't, he actually has tools the top tiers don't have (command grab, great air mobility, heavy weight, usable shieldbreaking moves). I'm arguing to look at him from the tools he does have and not the ones he doesn't have.
His command grab shines greatly from his air mobility and it being b-reversable in the air. You can still throw eggs where they'll appear from the egg, and generally are in a good position since they're were you want them-- the air, or if done by the ledge, offstage and now in an edgeguard scenario.

Yoshi has kill confirms off his jab and thrown eggs, grounded fair, uptilt, and rising up air. While they're not as "safe" as kill setups from a grab, yoshis plan isn't to get a grab. Yoshi has a way different game plan than the other top tiers, and while it may not be as "safe" or "good" compared to theirs, its still pretty good.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Command grab still not that great. It has good range but long startup and gives the opponent invincibility/half damage so not enough to write home about.
Air mobility is ok, but when the top tiers can abuse his floatiness especially since most of them have insane Uairs or other aerials to keep us in the air as an example (since Yoshi has a hard time landing most of the time), heavy weight doesn't matter against top tiers when you think of bayo witch time setups Rosa Luma shenanigans with rage, ZSS downb/upb ladder, Cloud bull****.
The only one that's decent now to deal with in terms of top tier is Sheik and even then that's still a questionable MU but now leaning heavily on even more than ever since all the patches has finally toned down Sheik enough where she's doable, then Bayo/Cloud enters the fray tho.
Diddy is a fair top tier too but Yoshi still suffers from him since fair and banana just shuts down a lot of Yoshi's options.

Even then, sure we have a couple okayish things the top tiers don't have, but they have a lot more than what Yoshi doesn't have as well, need to look at it from both viewpoints. Since Wario has a command grab heavy weight usable shieldbreak moves and good air mobility does that make him really good?
No.


When you reread those options you typed up, almost all of em are basically hard commitments that needs to happen in neutral (where he doesn't have the greatest one again) and requires the opponent to **** up heavily for most of these outside of Jab into X to happen/be converted into a kill.

That's the problem with Yoshi, if his neutral can be shutdown and read easily he's not going to have a fun time. I had a feeling you'd bring up the whole "RunCT combo" (for people that don't know, egglay into Egg toss fair Uair, when you read it in text you most likely can tell that's a gigantic **** up) cause I never understand why people aren't aware of how egglay works. 10 frames invincibility and can throw out something under those 10 frames to counteract or even just Airdodge/float away.
That combo is basically one huge whoops from RunCT.


All that aside, Yoshi is a fair character, he needs to work extra hard for his wins and hope his opponent doesn't know how to deal with Yoshi in order to just outplay them in the neutral and nab some wins. For some people though, why put in all that effort for your favorite character when you hate losing and just finally decided to pick up Cloud or Bayo instead.

 

[Cat8752]

There's nothing wrong with comparing him to other characters, it's only comparing him to top tiers and not the whole cast. If he had the same tools as what the top tiers have he'd probably be a top tier, but he doesn't, he actually has tools the top tiers don't have (command grab, great air mobility, heavy weight, usable shieldbreaking moves). I'm arguing to look at him from the tools he does have and not the ones he doesn't have.
His command grab shines greatly from his air mobility and it being b-reversable in the air. You can still throw eggs where they'll appear from the egg, and generally are in a good position since they're were you want them-- the air, or if done by the ledge, offstage and now in an edgeguard scenario.

Yoshi has kill confirms off his jab and thrown eggs, grounded fair, uptilt, and rising up air. While they're not as "safe" as kill setups from a grab, yoshis plan isn't to get a grab. Yoshi has a way different game plan than the other top tiers, and while it may not be as "safe" or "good" compared to theirs, its still pretty good.

Honestly, there's no point in comparing him to characters who are much lower tier/worse. We could spend all day marveling at having better mobility than Zelda, but it doesn't make Yoshi any better. His command grab as me and slush have stated, is once again, very slow, making it relatively predictable, and early nerfs on its range don't help either. Practically every top tier has good mobility, it is one of the main characteristics of being considered a good character. There only a few special exceptions who are outstanding enough in a different area to have poor mobility and still be considered top tier. Yoshi's weight is nice, but it gets rounded out by the floatyness, which ends up being a crippling weakness. Yoshi's kill confirms become worse and worse as you become aware of them and actively avoid them as a result. Many are not guaranteed or only guaranteed at specific percents, and all of them lose to that lovely R button. It's not just like we're complaining that Yoshi doesn't have the tools of top tiers, there are plenty of things high and mid tiers have Yoshi lacks, and would benefit from greatly.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Like being able to grab for one.

 

[YoshiMaStar]

I would say that his slow grab shouldn't be a problem because Zero Suit Samus has a slower grab, but ZSS has grab set ups and if she does get the grab, she will get a lot more off of it than Yoshi would, so that wouldn't be a valid argument/point.

 

[100AngryTurtles]

She has a slower grab, but it also goes twice as far and has much superior hitboxes (see the ball at the end with an always active hitbox).

 

[YoshiMaStar]

If one Yoshi's grab could work as a Z-Air

 

[TheQTpie]

I think it would be cool if his grab did work as a z-air, however I don't think that would help that anything that he struggles with. He already has the spacing property that a z-air grants with his eggs and his recovery isn't a big enough issue to justify needing a z-air.

 

[Cat8752]

He has no recovery moves that sweetspot ledge, dj can be footstooled/broken and Yoshi is vulnerable for a good deal while using an egg. Zair would also be a disjoint and ideally have range. I think a zair would be very useful for Yoshi (and practically any other character.)

 

[TheQTpie]

I can see that. I do however think that it's not something that he needs like better kill confirms, grab combos, kill throw, etc.

 

[White_Pointer]

I can see that. I do however think that it's not something that he needs like better kill confirms, grab combos, kill throw, etc.

I don't think he necessarily needs grab combos, putting damage on isn't his primary problem. His primary problem is actually getting the KO, but giving him a kill throw or a kill confirm off a throw might break him. He does need better kill confirms, but I'm not sure whether getting them off grabs would be good for the game overall. His grab itself is pretty terribad though with little reward for it, so it might be feasible.