Official Viability Ratings v2 | Competitive Impressions

[Nobie]

I was thinking about Mewtwo's weaknesses, and I think there's one crucial weakness that hampers him more than anything else. It's not the size, nor the floatiness, nor the light weight, though those all contribute.

It's that Mewtwo literally has fewer invincibility frames on evasive moves compared to most if not all characters. Every time you roll, what would have whiffed if you used a different character hits Mewtwo. When you do a regular get-up from the ledge, Mewtwo somehow gets hit when others would be able to shield in time. It makes it so that his rolls are literally only really good for getting distance and not actually being used for reads.

The only saving grace is that his air dodge has fewer invincibility frames but also allows him to act earlier than any other character out of an air dodge. It's great for avoiding attacks that require precise timing.

Basically, lingering hitboxes are hell for Mewtwo, and if Mewtwo could only get some invincibility frames closer to the standard, then it would help a lot.

 

[Thinkaman]

I actually think Duck Hunt wins all camping wars with customs legal

I agree with all these DH points; however, it's important to note that DHD doesn't really work optimally at full range, even if only a few characters (like WFT or ROB or Robin) really "beat" him in that scenario. He wants to be in that Villager-style sweetspot, where he can followup inbound ZZS hits with aerials and apply the threat of that potent grab.

(His grab isn't game-breaking, but the fact that it works as good as it does is the piece of the puzzle that keeps the character from being single-handedly beaten by the shield button.)

Edit: We had a few other people try to mess around with DH, and everyone played a much farther, much campier game than I did. This performed non-trivially worse, and the lack of kill options were a much bigger problem in this playstyle.

Edit 2: In most of the DH matches we (me and various people, no one in particular) played, the average damage dealt was roughly 360 vs 120.

Edit 3: The toughest DH matchup that we explored was Mario.

 

[oldkingcroz]

The ROB boards, and myself, don't think he has a tough time against Ness. ROB can just crush a recovering Ness, with Gyro, laser, fair, dair, falling nair, etc. Pretty much everything works and is a free kill. Just don't get grabbed or Ness faired, honestly. If anything Ness is among the few top/high tier that ROB is actually good against.

Sonic is theorized to be only so-so against ROB, and I'm not convinced Zero Suit, Pit(s), Yoshi, or Diddy beat him. These are definitely the closer matchups (ROB probably doesn't win any, just he is OK against this lot). Everyone else (in the theorized top tier), does pretty good against him, though.

Villager, Pikachu, Mario, Luigi, Sheik, Falcon, Meta Knight, Rosalina, Mega Man, Fox, Brawler, Roy, etc. Anyone with high speeds or throw combos beats him, essentially.

Dunno about Wario and Olimar. ROB probably isn't the worst to fight them.

ROBs not the best... He crushed low tiers/ heavies, and is one of the best anti-camp charcters, but still, I'm surprised people picked him for top tier materiel.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

The ROB boards, and myself, don't think he has a tough time against Ness. ROB can just crush a recovering Ness, with Gyro, laser, fair, dair, falling nair, etc. Pretty much everything works and is a free kill. Just don't get grabbed or Ness faired, honestly. If anything Ness is among the few top/high tier that ROB is actually good against.

Sonic is theorized to be only so-so against ROB, and I'm not convinced Zero Suit, Pit(s), Yoshi, or Diddy beat him. These are definitely the closer matchups (ROB probably doesn't win any, just he is OK against this lot). Everyone else (in the theorized top tier) though, does pretty good against him, though.

Villager, Pikachu, Mario, Luigi, Sheik, Falcon, Meta Knight, Rosalina, Mega Man, Fox, Brawler, Roy, etc. Anyone with high speeds or throw combos beats him, essentially.

Dunno about Wario and Olimar. ROB probably isn't the worst to fight them.

ROBs not the best... He crushed low tiers/ heavies, and is one of the best anti-camp charcters, but still, I'm surprised people picked him for top tier materiel.

The thing I like about ROB's matchups is that many of them are ROB both destroying the opponent in advantage and ROB getting wrecked in disadvantage. Which is why ZSS and Ness are interesting, because it goes both ways (especially with Ness).
The winner of the matchup is extremely dependent on how well the neutral is played.

 

[Ikes]

quick slightly off topic question, but i was thinking about the pre-evo crew battle, and i was wondering

If someone lost their first stock but got a JV3, would they still have that stock lost? or would it be given back to them?

 

[C0rvus]

Well, my local took a vote on whether or not customs should stay. The decision hasn't been finalized yet, but the vast majority were in favor of getting rid of them. RIP. Though I imagine if another major makes them legal then TOs will run customs-on again to practice. I don't really understand all the disdain towards custom moves, but I can live without them I suppose.

In other news, I've been playing lately. He was my demo main, and I'm a big fan of his neutral game, but I have yet to figure out how to use lemons properly. After taking him to a local, I found I struggle a lot in the and MUs (though the latter could mostly just be my opponent being a good deal better than me.) Probably need another character to deal with Sheik as well. Metal Blade setups and projectile footsies are fun.

 

[meleebrawler]

I was thinking about Mewtwo's weaknesses, and I think there's one crucial weakness that hampers him more than anything else. It's not the size, nor the floatiness, nor the light weight, though those all contribute.

It's that Mewtwo literally has fewer invincibility frames on evasive moves compared to most if not all characters. Every time you roll, what would have whiffed if you used a different character hits Mewtwo. When you do a regular get-up from the ledge, Mewtwo somehow gets hit when others would be able to shield in time. It makes it so that his rolls are literally only really good for getting distance and not actually being used for reads.

The only saving grace is that his air dodge has fewer invincibility frames but also allows him to act earlier than any other character out of an air dodge. It's great for avoiding attacks that require precise timing.

Basically, lingering hitboxes are hell for Mewtwo, and if Mewtwo could only get some invincibility frames closer to the standard, then it would help a lot.

Short-hop air dodges are practically better than rolling anyway. And that goes for the ledge too, ledge-drop -> jump -> airdodge is safer than most of Mewtwo's ledge options.

 

[NairWizard]

The hype about Heavy Skull Bash especially fell completely flat. Pikachu seems good but not special. No character is good enough to be special in this game other than Sheik.

While ESAM is a talented player, he did not fully demonstrate how overwhelming HSB can be at EVO. He missed many 50:50 setups that could have netted him early stocks, and instead went for hard reads that frequently went poorly for him.

I don't think that Pikachu is amazing in a default metagame, but Heavy Skull Bash has not been overhyped. This does not mean that it's easy to use or learn, but let me just say it again: this is a move that is the equivalent of a faster, aerial Bowser f-smash, on a character with autocanceling, frame-trapping aerials, one of which starts on frame 4.

This is the kind of setup that I expect to see used with HSB:

 

[Jams.]

The ROB boards, and myself, don't think he has a tough time against Ness. ROB can just crush a recovering Ness, with Gyro, laser, fair, dair, falling nair, etc. Pretty much everything works and is a free kill. Just don't get grabbed or Ness faired, honestly. If anything Ness is among the few top/high tier that ROB is actually good against.

Sonic is theorized to be only so-so against ROB, and I'm not convinced Zero Suit, Pit(s), Yoshi, or Diddy beat him. These are definitely the closer matchups (ROB probably doesn't win any, just he is OK against this lot). Everyone else (in the theorized top tier), does pretty good against him, though.

Villager, Pikachu, Mario, Luigi, Sheik, Falcon, Meta Knight, Rosalina, Mega Man, Fox, Brawler, Roy, etc. Anyone with high speeds or throw combos beats him, essentially.

Dunno about Wario and Olimar. ROB probably isn't the worst to fight them.

ROBs not the best... He crushed low tiers/ heavies, and is one of the best anti-camp charcters, but still, I'm surprised people picked him for top tier materiel.

I have to say I strongly disagree on the ROB:ZSS matchup. This matchup is played very frequently at a top level by 8bitman and NickRiddle, and it has looked absolutely awful for ROB. ROB may win slightly in neutral, but ZSS gets out of juggles for free with downb and recovers pretty much for free. On the other hand, uair->uair->upb wrecks ROB. Good luck DIing that...

 

[outfoxd]

I agree with all these DH points; however, it's important to note that DHD doesn't really work optimally at full range, even if only a few characters (like WFT or ROB or Robin) really "beat" him in that scenario. He wants to be in that Villager-style sweetspot, where he can followup inbound ZZS hits with aerials and apply the threat of that potent grab.

(His grab isn't game-breaking, but the fact that it works as good as it does is the piece of the puzzle that keeps the character from being single-handedly beaten by the shield button.)

Edit: We had a few other people try to mess around with DH, and everyone played a much farther, much campier game than I did. This performed non-trivially worse, and the lack of kill options were a much bigger problem in this playstyle.

Edit 2: In most of the DH matches we (me and various people, no one in particular) played, the average damage dealt was roughly 360 vs 120.

Edit 3: The toughest DH matchup that we explored was Mario.

I'm one of those fools that won't drop DH in a customs unfriendly state. My playstyle varies wildly dependent on MU, stage, and situation. I timed out a pac one match and went ham on a megaman the same day. I don't win much, but ive played enough to know DH was supposed to run half aggression and half campy, adjusting for situation. His kills are just way too undertuned for it to completely come together.

I think of him as a mid tier mma fighter who is ok at everything. , but deals with top level strikers by taking them down or forcing grapplers to box with him. Just good enough to deal with people out of their comfort zone, but not enough to destroy anyone.

Edit: finally started landing reverse can stage spikes today. That is the kind of stuff DH needs more of.

 

[Man Li Gi]

I have to ask, cuz I can't tell.......what's the verdict on customs?

I want them to be legal and standard (seriously if you complain that it's jank, I think you just haven't prepared as each custom does some for of trade off), but they aren't no sweat.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

While ESAM is a talented player, he did not fully demonstrate how overwhelming HSB can be at EVO. He missed many 50:50 setups that could have netted him early stocks, and instead went for hard reads that frequently went poorly for him.

I don't think that Pikachu is amazing in a default metagame, but Heavy Skull Bash has not been overhyped. This does not mean that it's easy to use or learn, but let me just say it again: this is a move that is the equivalent of a faster, aerial Bowser f-smash, on a character with autocanceling, frame-trapping aerials, one of which starts on frame 4.

This is the kind of setup that I expect to see used with HSB:

Bowser fsmash hits a huge area. Heavy Skull Bash hits a tiny area with the real power (it hits a big area but most of the area it hits it does horrible damage and knockback). Even Pikachu has a hard time being in advantage enough for a 50-50 in a spacing in which HSB is a credible kill threat. If you ever HSB and don't hit, you are punished by anything the other side wants since it's one of the most unsafe moves in the game. It also wasn't just ESAM. There were 1926 players competing for a pot of almost $20,000. Any of them had the opportunity to abuse Heavy Skull Bash, and none of them did successfully. ESAM had one kinda ugly match against that G&W player, but even then, I'm pretty sure the G&W would have won if he were using up-2 (for the powerful chases in juggle situations). It's easy to cherry pick matches and claim they look dumb, but as a general move, HSB just doesn't generate results. For my part at least, I'm really unimpressed with the potency of this move relative to the hype.

 

[NairWizard]

Bowser fsmash hits a huge area. Heavy Skull Bash hits a tiny area with the real power (it hits a big area but most of the area it hits it does horrible damage and knockback).

The area of impact has nothing to do with the strength of Bowser f-smash. Its kill power/ability to punish a mistake in neutral has everything to do with it on the other hand, and while it often fails to do what it's supposed to do because of being too slow to punish all but shield breaks, Heavy Skull Bash does not suffer the same affliction and in fact arguably has more range where it matters most.

Even Pikachu has a hard time being in advantage enough for a 50-50 in a spacing in which HSB is a credible kill threat.

This is demonstrably false; Pikachu is one of the best characters in the game at maintaining advantage due to Quick Attack and high ground speed. He can always be ready to set up a landing trap on you.

If you ever HSB and don't hit, you are punished by anything the other side wants since it's one of the most unsafe moves in the game.

It's not any more punishable than Sheik's Vanish mixup out of a d-throw, which has a 50:50 chance to seal the stock and is almost always worth the risk of missing.

You aren't getting hit by someone's f-smash because you missed Heavy Skull Bash. You are getting hit most likely by a dashgrab, and if you HSB'd and missed and were sent offstage, you're possibly getting hit by nothing. The lag is offset strongly by the distance traveled in almost every instance where you would be using this move; the risk:reward ratio here is better than that offered by ZSS' Boost Kick for a non-trivial example; ZSS gets hit way harder by missing Boost Kick than Pikachu ever does by missing HSB, usually because the opponent only has to fall toward the ground to punish ZSS but has to travel through the air horizontally to punish Pikachu. Most characters don't have the drift or run speeds to punish HSB consistently and meaningfully.

It also wasn't just ESAM. There were 1926 players competing for a pot of almost $20,000. Any of them had the opportunity to abuse Heavy Skull Bash, and none of them did successfully.

Ally didn't even use Scalding FLUDD, which is arguably one of Mario's best customs or even best customs in the game, or Crescent Slash, which is obviously Marth's best custom. Neither did any other Mario or Marth that we saw on stream. Does that make these customs less potent?

What is your point here? Most players aren't even playing at a high level right now, let alone top level like ESAM. Before ESAM showcased the move against MVD in that one Florida tournament, we largely didn't even consider it to be an important tool in Pikachu's kit.

The move has not shown its potency in tournament play yet, but at the same time it's not theoretical potency; the setups are obvious to anyone who labs with it. Incorporating it into gameplay is difficult, but not any more so than Greninja's footstool combos; in time these setups should be staples of Pikachu gameplay at high level and beyond.

It's easy to cherry pick matches and claim they look dumb, but as a general move, HSB just doesn't generate results. For my part at least, I'm really unimpressed with the potency of this move relative to the hype.

Please tell me how it's cherry-picking to show a 50:50 kill setup on the left side of Smashville, that ended a stock at ~30%, available to one of the fastest characters in the game with some of the most damaging strings, and then suggest that when used properly the move driving this kill setup will be overwhelming in most matchups? Imagine giving such a setup to characters like Duck Hunt Dog, Mario, or Megaman, and just go through the list of their matchups and see what effect it would have.


I appreciated your post in general (great insights about Little Mac and Duck Hunt Dog), but I strongly disagree with your analysis of this move and feel that, much as with Rosalina (except in an inverse fashion), you'll find that you were mistaken in time. I'm not pessimistic about customs in general, and I would love to be proven wrong here, but I don't think it's fair to this move to disregard its setups on the basis that they aren't producing results yet.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

I have to ask, cuz I can't tell.......what's the verdict on customs?

I want them to be legal and standard (seriously if you complain that it's jank, I think you just haven't prepared as each custom does some for of trade off), but they aren't no sweat.

I really don't even know if there's a consensus on that. Or if it really matters that much considering how many default sets we had at EVO. I'm down with whatever happens though.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

I think you're just really, really underestimating just how tiny the strong hit on HSB is and how much this matters. Hitting with HSB's strong hit is like hitting with Rest; you just have to be so crazy close that it makes it really hard and often impractical. Also, when I say it's the most unsafe move in the game, I'm assuming you block it. On shield, HSB is pretty much the worst thing ever.

The side of Smashville thing is IMO an artifact of people not understanding how important stage position is. If you're near the side of a stage, that's dangerous! Denti did not exit that super precarious platform position with any urgency and in fact kept trying to do stuff so close to the blastzone. Even once he got hit, he didn't try to avoid the platform that was so far to the left. He then was confronted with a 50-50 in which one option could kill and the other side wouldn't, and he airdodged with the timing to avoid the non-fatal option. I... don't see how that shows a problem with HSB as a move. Denti messed up really badly in that match. That's fine; we all make huge mistakes in matches, but losing to a move after making a huge mistake to me isn't indicative of a problem with a move. Further, lots of stupid stuff like this happens on Smashville in particular; why would we first suspect the move instead of the stage as being the primary factor?

 

[C0rvus]

I have to ask, cuz I can't tell.......what's the verdict on customs?

I want them to be legal and standard (seriously if you complain that it's jank, I think you just haven't prepared as each custom does some for of trade off), but they aren't no sweat.

There isn't a unified stage list, or a total consensus on stock count even. Though customs will likely go until they are present at another major.

 

[Speed Boost]

Bowser fsmash hits a huge area. Heavy Skull Bash hits a tiny area with the real power (it hits a big area but most of the area it hits it does horrible damage and knockback). Even Pikachu has a hard time being in advantage enough for a 50-50 in a spacing in which HSB is a credible kill threat. If you ever HSB and don't hit, you are punished by anything the other side wants since it's one of the most unsafe moves in the game. It also wasn't just ESAM. There were 1926 players competing for a pot of almost $20,000. Any of them had the opportunity to abuse Heavy Skull Bash, and none of them did successfully. ESAM had one kinda ugly match against that G&W player, but even then, I'm pretty sure the G&W would have won if he were using up-2 (for the powerful chases in juggle situations). It's easy to cherry pick matches and claim they look dumb, but as a general move, HSB just doesn't generate results. For my part at least, I'm really unimpressed with the potency of this move relative to the hype.

I feel like most customs are overhyped. For all the complaining about Heavy Skull Bash, Helicopter Kick, Counter Sapling, Hammer Spin Dash, and Kong Cyclone only HSB even made it to Top 8. It also had very little impact.

To me these results should bode well for customs going forward, but everyone seems resigned to the fact they will be less prevalent now.

 

[Locke 06]

If you're using HSB on the ground in a situation where your opponent can shield, you're not doing HSB right.

I'd be interested in a picture of HSB's strong hitbox range from where Pika charges. Shouldn't be hard to make if anyone is inclined to do so.

 

[FullMoon]

Anyone with high speeds or throw combos beats him, essentially.

Sonic is theorized to be only so-so against ROB, and I'm not convinced Zero Suit, Pit(s), Yoshi, or Diddy beat him.

I know that's more of a generalization but still, those two statements seem rather contradictory without any explanation given.

 

[Locke 06]

For those who think customs had no impact on top 8 clearly do not understand that top 8 could have gone very differently without customs. Even before top 8, those who appeared in top 8 may have been switched around; one example would be that Dabuz may not have been in loser's, or a dark horse may have been beaten before they could make it. Furthermore, in top 8, Abadango's speed bike Wario (luma killer) was important, as was Nairo's custom paralyzer that trades with needles. And lest we forget HSD and the double spring match?

May the results have been similar or the same without customs? Maybe, but they noticeably impacted the games that were played in some manner.

 

[shrooby]

I dunno man, I was at a tournament yesterday and there were some people there being like "I think Dedede has some real potential to be good." and I had to be like "Well the thing is..."

The message needs to be spread more, it seems!

Who do these uneducated cavemen think they are telling me my character could be potentially be good?
What nerve.

 

[Speed Boost]

For those who think customs had no impact on top 8 clearly do not understand that top 8 could have gone very differently without customs. Even before top 8, those who appeared in top 8 may have been switched around; one example would be that Dabuz may not have been in loser's, or a dark horse may have been beaten before they could make it. Furthermore, in top 8, Abadango's speed bike Wario (luma killer) was important, as was Nairo's custom paralyzer that trades with needles. And lest we forget HSD and the double spring match?

May the results have been similar or the same without customs? Maybe, but they noticeably impacted the games that were played in some manner.

Yes, customs had an impact in a customs enabled tournement. However, the customs that were being pointing to as OP didn't make an impact to merit what people had been saying about them.

If these customs were truely as broken as people talk about they would have had a more profound impact than just being relevant.

We didn't see someone like DK Will or 6WX make a big splash because of overpowered customs.

These results point more toward customs being balanced, alternate moves that help make the game more balanced and diverse overall.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

"You know nothing John Cyclone; Summer has come"
Smash 4 has now been out for close to three quarters of a year and it's crazy to think how much is different between now and the same point of time as Brawl. Even back then (about 6 months after release) we knew a tier list would be imperfect with the way the metagame advanced disproportionately across the cast. Now with balance patches coming in frequently, a major contrasting game play choice in customs on or off and a growing cast we're [hopefully understandably] behind. Behind the scenes at Smashboards we've been very wary of making an official list under these conditions, but I believe we can still proactively produce something that reflects some of our current understanding and create constructive discussion from it's results as we advance on.

The format I concocted covers roughly half the cast, focusing on the areas of viability which should be most distinct; the top and bottom contenders. The idea being that due to the volatile nature of character perception we are seeing in Smash Four that we should consider less and update on a frequent basis, hopefully having positive impact on competitive discourse (+ maybe becoming accurate/accepted... eventually). I queried over twenty high ranked players of their interest and to answer a survey of who they personally felt were the fifteen greatest threats and ten most underwhelming characters in the cast. I attempted some regional diversity but most asked were in the top thirty area of the Smashboards Rankings and were readily and easily contactable for me.

I left terms ambiguous in the survey but as responses came in that trended towards customs off and more 'tier bound' (rather than personal, the 'character main and regional ruleset' contrasting intention fell through) I informed others and they followed suit. In the future I hope to derive more from the data, increase the sampling size while making the process more seamless (what was hoping to take a week or so became over three).
Anyway without further ado...

The [15] Greatest Threats (ordered by mean)

​

Notable (unordered): []

The [11] Perceived Weakest (ordered alphabetically)

​

Spoiler: Condensed version

1. Sheik
2. Rosalina and Luma
3. Pikachu
4. Luigi
5. Zero Suit Samus
6. Fox
7. Sonic
8. Mario
9. Ness
10. Yoshi
11. Diddy Kong
12. R.O.B.
13. Falcon
14. Olimar
15. Meta Knight
16-20. Pits, Lucario, ["Customs Legal"] Mii Brawler, Villager, Wario

~

"44th to 54th"
King Dedede, Doctor Mario, Ganondorf, Jigglypuff, Lucina, Mewtwo, Mii Gunner, Mii Swordsman, Samus, WiiFit Trainer, Zelda

DISCLAIMER

1. These are only tallied opinions and are geared more towards results and the current metagame. This shouldn't be taken literally as a list of the best and worst characters but rather those which have shown the greatest impact and those of little influence.
   
   
2. I did not force any one paradigm onto surveyed players, force them to justify themselves or otherwise. How you would perceive these questions and how you would respond is your own prerogative. Just like we clash with Japanese perceptions, players at different levels can also contrast heavily (although all share relevancy).
   
   
3. The game changes fast enough for answers from an individual to be feasibly quite different now to what they provided merely recently. Every weekend things can drastically change; an upset with a relatively unseen character or balance change inferences either actuating or flopping in the short term; relaaax.

Result Synopsis
The top eleven characters in voting were virtually static, even in placement order; with the mean of subsequent character's tallies being roughly +1 higher than the previous; Sheik averaged 1.57 to Diddy Kong's 11.32 (years of Brawl Tier Lists made this surprising). Opinions for those after strayed greatly with eight frequently tallied but when scaled by frequency were far from the aforementioned eleven. Twenty-nine different characters were seen in the upper votes.
As stated, most respondents considered things with customs unavailable; however Mii Brawler appeared in several lists and also sometimes noted as "if customs legal X ... otherwise Y". Brawler, unlike most characters, can be seen as a definite instance of a huge skew of viability based only on customs. If I were to count those latter instances he would've been roughly 16th, although many indicated they felt Brawler is top 10 level with full option availability. "Four" other characters didn't make the cut while being fairly close and I felt that noting them would be constructive. For the Pits, it is a lot easier considering them as one character when considering viability and this is a growing standard.

For the bottom ten, I did not consider orderings in the results, I felt certain it would not be appropriate at this time (also significantly more difficult to answer). Unlike the top part, no characters were unanimously listed and although fielding a third less input still had a range of 27 characters. We ended up having a tied 10th place, so an eleventh has been included. As a rehash of the disclaimer, I don't believe any characters listed are definitively unviable or 'worst in the cast', but their meta advancements and exposure are under appreciated, a lot can be done to remedy this! Do all these characters deserve buffs [more so than others]?

Five characters appeared in the lists of both high and bottom; excluding outliers the three notable were Ike, Kirby and Mii Brawler. Only four characters did not appear in any list, but again excluding outliers the characters with no particular indications were Bowser, Bowser Jr, Duck Hunt, Falco, Lucas, Megaman, Pacman and Shulk.

Credits
All of the following contributed and they're all great people who care for our community. Right now many are competing at Evo2k15 and you can show your support to them through messaging them through Twitter or here. Most have helpful youtube channels or frequently stream and are fantastic to learn from and for getting to know them, so if you haven't already you should check them out.
A lot more "things" should be coming in the near future on Smashboards and this is hopefully a good precursor for that. I didn't contribute a vote but I'm a pretty keen metagame analyst, feel free to ask me questions here or to my Twitter @JPShaya

@Nairo @Dabuz @LarryLurr @MVD @ESAM
@6WX @NickRiddle @Seagull Joe @RichBrown @8Bitman
@Xzax @AeroLink @Rayquaza07 * @Espy Rose @J.Miller
* respectable hermit (but maybe with enough love will get a twitter account)

Seems alright but I can't really agree with dr. Mario wft and Jigglypuff being that low. I also don't see how shulk and Robin aren't in the bottom of the cast.

Also I really really think highly of Falco right now and I think he can be considered a threat. I'd put him in the top 20 before dark pit. I think Falco is on the come up. His mobility on the ground leaves a lot to be desired but he has some really good things going for his.

 

[Djent]

I actually wanted to see more custom abuse in top 8. Most top players would go on hating them anyway, but it would have meant better odds that the few stupid ones get fixed in the next patch. We've seen public opinion shift away from customs rapidly over the past few months, starting with 1.0.6 and continuing through the most recent patch. There's no reason that future patches couldn't sway people's opinions back in customs' favor if they made the right adjustments.

We're entering a stage in the game's life where people are actually starting to understand enough about character viability in order to start making ruleset decisions based on what strategies dominate. If customs are to survive, it'd really help if they got balanced along with the rest of the game during this phase. That (IMO) would be worth enough to offset the negativity produced by skewed risk:reward and degenerate strategies in the short-term.

 

[Pyr]

I actually wanted to see more custom abuse in top 8. Most top players would go on hating them anyway, but it would have meant better odds that the few stupid ones get fixed in the next patch. We've seen public opinion shift away from customs rapidly over the past few months, starting with 1.0.6 and continuing through the most recent patch. There's no reason that future patches couldn't sway people's opinions back in customs' favor if they made the right adjustments.

We're entering a stage in the game's life where people are actually starting to understand enough about character viability in order to start making ruleset decisions based on what strategies dominate. If customs are to survive, it'd really help if they got balanced along with the rest of the game during this phase. That (IMO) would be worth enough to offset the negativity produced by skewed risk:reward and degenerate strategies in the short-term.

They were there, the stupid ones. They just drowned in pools. Makes me wonder if it's player skill that's the issue or... Maybe they aren't as stupid as everyone thinks. =O

Random thought, of course. Can be wrong. I'm a fan of the adaptation department, though. I've got the foam finger and everything.

 

[Djent]

They were there, the stupid ones. They just drowned in pools.

I actually wanted to see more custom abuse in top 8.

 

[Pyr]

Point is that the actual abuses didn't make it. With that top 8 and with those players, there wasn't much else to abuse. =p

 

[Pazx]

Post EVO thoughts, limited to characters I play: (still no main, sry)

First, major shoutouts to @kingkaruso, @Jaxas & crew, @ Amazing Ampharos , and @Junglechief for giving me limited but absolutely crucial warm-up matches prior to the event. I didn't play a single one of you guys' characters in the initial pools, but I am 90% sure I would have drowned hard in pools (including losing my first match, which was difficult/close) if I had even the slightest bit less practice. Going to EVO after not having played for 2 months was really suboptimal, but you guys empowered me to make the most of it and break into the top 128 regardless.

is the character I actually played the most at EVO, at least in-bracket. As I mentioned before, for some reason two different people cp'd DDD against me? I didn't get it; of all the characters I play I'd pick Mac to fight Dedede given the choice! (Sure enough, I took like 30% total in those matches) I lost to GimR via two brutal throw combos (d-throw -> u-tilt -> bair _> ...), thanks to knowing nothing aobut G&W; I labbed it up immediately afterwords and verified that Mac can indeed up-b out of both initial gaps. If I fought a G&W again, I'd probably prefer Mac. I decided to play Mac in quarterfinals against Ish's Fox, despite previously thinking this was a bad matchup. (@ Amazing Ampharos 's encouragement to do so pushed me over the edge.) I played a radically different Mac, that was way less focused on hard reads and up-Bs--minimizing Fox's disproportionate punish power--and it worked out well.

continues to be a good character with a simple gameplan. Yes, he loses to Rosa, even if the Fow/Dabuz matches were clearly a WORST CASE scenario. But he's still clearly a dominant metagame force.

I only played once, in a ditto. I increasingly find myself preferring LM in most matchups I'd prefer Ganon in. Maybe if I encountered a Greninja or something it'd be different.

I only played against falln's Rosa. I lost (hard), but it was still the best choice. I also played a ton of WFT in teams friendlies; she works well on a variety of teams.

and I barely touched, even in friendlies.

though, I played in friendlies a lot. A whole lot. And I was doing... pretty great, to the point that I am strongly considering maining Duck Hunt. Of note: Rosalina and Villager both actually has significant issues with ZZS, instead of, you know, beating Duck Hunt at least 8:2. This was one of the things holding me back from the character before. Beyond that, my Duck Hunt was consistently doing very well against everyone I played friendlies with, nontrivially better than my other characters in most matchups.


So yeah:

1. Practice and for EVO
2. Win with //
3. Lose with
4. Decide to main

Makes sense to me.



I'd believe . I go Ness against every ROB I see, unconditionally.

ROB mains think Ness/ROB is evenish but having played the matchup from both sides I think it heavily favours Ness to the point where it might be his best matchup against a relevant character (Fox?). It's funny that ROB mains think it's so close because they beat Ness offstage, the fact of the matter is almost every character in the game has an easy time gimping Ness if he's forced to up-b but despite that he's still a top tier threat. Sheik and ZSS are probably still worse for the robot.

 

[Ffamran]

Unrelated to the current topic, but Samus's jab... It's the same, well, hit frames are, as in Melee and I will assume in Brawl. What makes it worse in Smash 4? Changes in hit stun mechanics? Maybe knockback changes I'm not aware of? Plup was able to jab and run or jab again easily, but in this game, Samus's jab is just... Bad. The game tells you that it doesn't finish "properly" which is fine as people don't "properly" finish Fox's, but if so, then what's up with Samus's? If she could jab and run, jab again, and basically donkey punch you silly, that would be great, but for some reason, I don't think that's possible.

 

[Myran]

If anyone has questions about Olimar I'm more than happy to help. He has a lot of little quirks and what not that he can use to even up a match where it looks like he may just flat out lose on paper.

 

[Speed Boost]

Seems alright but I can't really agree with dr. Mario wft and Jigglypuff being that low. I also don't see how shulk and Robin aren't in the bottom of the cast.

Also I really really think highly of Falco right now and I think he can be considered a threat. I'd put him in the top 20 before dark pit. I think Falco is on the come up. His mobility on the ground leaves a lot to be desired but he has some really good things going for his.

Falco has a good advantaged state, but so does Dark Pit. Falco's neutral state on the other hand is defiantly worse than Dark Pit in my opinion. Dark Pit has a superior Dash Grab, Pivot Grab, Dash Attack, and FTilt. He also has SH aerials that are better suited for spacing on shield. Falco's laser is a significantly worse projectile that Dark Pits arrows too.

I think if you look at both characters move sets Falco has to many moves that aren't good in neutral. I main DP, but Falco is one of the characters I play most and I always feel like I'm using a worse character, because it's harder to get to an advantaged state.

 

[Ffamran]

There's also the fact that the Pits have natural disjoints while Falco only has Dtilt, landing Fair, Blaster, and Reflector. A comparison between them isn't fair not to mention that they fight differently.

 

[Locke 06]

Yes, customs had an impact in a customs enabled tournement. However, the customs that were being pointing to as OP didn't make an impact to merit what people had been saying about them.

If these customs were truely as broken as people talk about they would have had a more profound impact than just being relevant.

We didn't see someone like DK Will or 6WX make a big splash because of overpowered customs.

These results point more toward customs being balanced, alternate moves that help make the game more balanced and diverse overall.

The amount of impact that "merits" what people had been saying about them is subjective. If I think it impacted EVO significantly because Dabuz lost to Static Manny earlier and would have been in winner's, who are you to say "no, that's not significant enough?"

I could easily say that customs did not make an impact on character viability/balance/diversity to merit what people had been saying about them. If these customs were truly as balanced as people talk about, they would have had a more profound impact than just being relevant.

See what I did there? Also, generalizing "people" to statements you want them to say is a good way to be a politician.

 

[Speed Boost]

The amount of impact that "merits" what people had been saying about them is subjective. If I think it impacted EVO significantly because Dabuz lost to Static Manny earlier and would have been in winner's, who are you to say "no, that's not significant enough?"

I could easily say that customs did not make an impact on character viability/balance/diversity to merit what people had been saying about them. If these customs were truly as balanced as people talk about, they would have had a more profound impact than just being relevant.

See what I did there? Also, generalizing "people" to statements you want them to say is a good way to be a politician.

Say what you will, but we didn't have a Top 8 or even a Top 16 full of Sonic, DK or Villager.

 

[Ikes]

why does no one mention Wario when talking about the high tiers

I personally think the Wario matchup is becoming increasingly important considering that Wario has slowly been attracting more players and is clearly a contender for top 12

We simply cannot ignore him considering Abadango placed 4th at EVO using mostly Wario and Pac.

 

[Shaya]

Okay, I'm going to evaluate the contrasts between Evo top 16, and CEO top 16.

Top 16 CEO (500~ entrants) | Top 16 Evo (1900~ entrants)

1. ZeRo
2. Nairo
3. Dabuz
4. Larry Lurr
5. MVD
6. ESAM
7. Shaky
8. VS NickRiddle
9. Vinnie
10. VS Master Raven
11. Mr. R
12. Static Manny
13. UGC NME Tyrant
14. Fresh Die Nasty
15. ANTi
16. KamiKario

|

1. ZeRo /
2. Mr R
3. Nairo
4. Abadango //
5. Dabuz /
6. Ally
7. ESAM
8. FOW
9. Larry Lurr /
10. Rain
11. SS
12. Static Manny
13. False
14. DaPuffster
15. Regi
16. Mocha

"Forcing" smashboard tables to work nicely for me. Color coding is "actually the same placement". Bolding are those who appear in both. Italics are those who didn't compete at the other (although please let me know if I've missed someone).

So before I start, let me just say that Evo is a much bigger/important tournament than CEO was. Whilst CEO had some foreign continental visitors it definitely lacked the "MAJOR" "INTERNATIONAL" feel Apex had; customs on or otherwise, results at EVO mean a lot more than CEO.

Of those who competed at both, only ZeRo, Nairo, Dabuz, Ramin, Larry, ESAM and Manny reached top 16. Seven out of 16.
The remaining 9 out of 16 were all unique to Evo. Anti was the only CEO top 16 not to compete at both I believe (Kami maybe as well?)
On one metric, competition at Evo was roughly 4x as fierce as CEO by entrant numbers. On another by the contrasts in top 16 results, it was over 2x as "harsh".
Out of the other 9 CEO placers; Tyrant, Shaky, Falln and Vinnie placed top 32 at Evo. 11/32; so with enlarged sample size the comparator becomes "3x". The rest of CEO's top 32 didn't show up at Evo top 32 with the exception of 8bitman.

So what happened?

• Firstly I thought Awsum knocked out Rain (I guess just into losers?)
• The Sheik slayer of MVD (his first S4 non-major top 8 result) was slain, as was Dabuz, by StaticManny. StaticManny placed the same at CEO as he did Evo although the competition was arguably 2-4x harder, taking out players who outplaced him noticeably from before.
  
• Villager, unseen at CEO top 32 comes up with three placers, however SS and awsum did not attend CEO.
• Four Sonics showed up in top 32 at CEO but only two showed up at Evo. 1 of the CEO Sonics may not have attended, and the other 2 are known for their results with customs-off Sonic. I can't say anything about Mocha, who I may not know (the only one I recall is a female vegas player, but I don't remember Sonic?).
• Nairo and ZeRo are obviously two of the best three smash four players on Earth.
• Ramin did not seem to run into any "kryptonite" on his run to second place, no "early" MVD/Larry/Dabuz/ZeRo (previous major losses to) [but i'm not 100% sure who ramin played actually].
• Rain, a player who has dominated Japan to an extent not too unlike ZeRo (well, Rain has dropped tournaments), got 9th. Japan's last major attendance of Apex had Nietono at 5th. Japan's best placement this time being Abadango at 4th.
• Abadango used two characters relatively unseen in the West plus used customs (the only Japanese player who seemed to obviously have labbed extensively with them), his results back home have him as Nineteenth in their rankings. Not to take away from Abadango, but one could say his results are just as "unusual" as Captain Awesum (although he did get 7th at Apex). People should be quite wary of hyping up Wario either way.
• Ness players yet again are forced into playing Dabuz and wasting 3-5 minutes of their life when they could've forfeited and started drinking. Otherwise still, the character maintained their "representation" in a harder environment, (two Ness' in top 32 compared to 1 at CEO). FOW, one of the most underrated top level smash players of all Brawl/S4 time, bows out unable to place any of the other top players on his mantle (this guy essentially only has losses against ZeRo, Tyrant (pre-diddy nerf) and Dabuz).
• Sheik, like Ness maintains it's "representation". Considering everything, this goes to show Sheik is not just strong, but really really strong. Many are non-customs Sheik players, with some probably taking a grenade custom because they can. Her kit can seemingly handle everything in this game and come out on top with little variance in expectation. I could argue that Sheik is even more dominant in a custom meta due to her more even match ups existing in Vanilla not being as capable/strong in the customs meta. If we're going by results, Sheik loses most often to Diddy, Rosalina, ZSS and Sonic, and the former two struggled against the latter and others. Is sheik more of a sore thumb in the customs meta as she maintains no poor match ups whilst her even match ups gain feasibly many poor match ups?
• Larry went with the tide getting 9th over 4th. Fox gets potent customs but obviously not enough.
• Mii Brawler breaks top 16 with negligible non-custom results (tis obvious why) to compare it to.

Okay so overall I think the following things are "upsets" (based on consistency measures):
1. Abadango (significantly outdoing his home-based results). Well versed with customs usage.
2. Rain; undoubted best player in Japan with losses to customs.
3. MVD not placing top 32 although he's placed top 8 at every other major/national thus far (but all were customs off).
4. StaticManny overcoming the 2-3x competition increase, the main custom meta star for Sonic, while other notable Sonics drowned.
5. Dabuz went with the tide, but this is his worst Smash4 tournament result thus far. Rosa/Oli seemingly not being able to "ignore" customs like Sheik can.

ESAM placed 7th over 5th. Custom Meta star for Pikachu. Did 1.25x worse. Soso point.

Anyway just my observational evaluation, remember: subjective and I'm slightly anti-customs.

 

[Man Li Gi]

"Ness players yet again are forced into playing Dabuz and wasting 3-5 minutes of their life when they could've forfeited and started drinking."

This line alone made me laugh so hard. Shaya, the king of comedy. Who knew.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

Falco has a good advantaged state, but so does Dark Pit. Falco's neutral state on the other hand is defiantly worse than Dark Pit in my opinion. Dark Pit has a superior Dash Grab, Pivot Grab, Dash Attack, and FTilt. He also has SH aerials that are better suited for spacing on shield. Falco's laser is a significantly worse projectile that Dark Pits arrows too.

I think if you look at both characters move sets Falco has to many moves that aren't good in neutral. I main DP, but Falco is one of the characters I play most and I always feel like I'm using a worse character, because it's harder to get to an advantaged state.

Looking at the frame data Falco's ftilt is vastly superior to dark pit's out on frame 6 ends on frames 27 compared to d pit which is out on frame 10 ends of frame 40. Granted the range goes to Dark pit.

Also almost all of pits aerials are slower than Falco's. Pits nair is 4 frames Falco's is 3 pits fair is 11 frames Falco's is 10 pit's uair is 12 frames while Falco's is 7 frames pit's bair is 10 frames while Falco's is 4 with tremendous kill powe and probably the best bair in the game. Pit dair is 10 frames while Falco's is 16. This is the only aerial pit has over Falco in terms of speed.

Pits grabs are superior but falco has better follow uls from grabs. I think most of their ground moves goes towards Falco in terms of Speed. Looking at Falco's frame data is going to be pretty hard to deny this character IMO. His stuff looks extremely potent.

@ Shaya nice breakdown but there's one more thing I'd like to point out. Which is the numver of players from nj/ny in top 32. I know people say tristate isn't the best region. However, these results show just how strong this region is.

 

[Jams.]

Okay so overall I think the following things are "upsets" (based on consistency measures):
1. Abadango (significantly outdoing his home-based results). Well versed with customs usage.
2. Rain; undoubted best player in Japan with losses to customs.
3. MVD not placing top 32 although he's placed top 8 at every other major/national thus far (but all were customs off).
4. StaticManny overcoming the 2-3x competition increase, the main custom meta star for Sonic, while other notable Sonics drowned.
5. Dabuz went with the tide, but this is his worst Smash4 tournament result thus far. Rosa/Oli seemingly not being able to "ignore" customs like Sheik/ZSS can.

ESAM placed 7th over 5th. Custom Meta star for Pikachu. Did 1.25x worse. Soso point.

Anyway just my observational evaluation, remember: subjective and I'm slightly anti-customs.

This post may be mostly focusing on top 8 or top 32, but I feel like the largest upset of this tournament was when Nietono was double eliminated by Tearbear and drowned in pools.
I'm not too sure how to interpret this however. Nietono is currently ranked 7th (might be wrong here) in Japan, so it's not likely that his skill degraded. It may suggest the Sheik/Falcon matchup is not as bad as once thought, though Tearbear subsequently lost to Cacogen's Sheik in pools. I guess the most reasonable explanation is that Nietono had an off day at the worst possible time.

 

[Man Li Gi]

Falco's is 4 with tremendous kill powe and probably the best bair in the game.

Don't take away the one thing DK has on the cast (best bair in game). This is DK only move in the air. If it was on like Ganon or other characters.....my goodness.

Falco's bair is good, but not DK good.