Official Viability Ratings v2 | Competitive Impressions

[Sir Tundra]

When it comes to viablity I often can't decide between Results and Potential. Now it's no doubt that tournaments play a huge role when it comes to viability since tournaments often reflect how a character fairs in the meta. But then you have a character who despite having very little high placements is considered to a great character and the biggest example of this is . Yoshi is a character we know is good but yet out of the top 15 or even 20 for that matter yoshi has the least amount of results. Yet it's due to his potential alone people often rate him so high in their personal tier list despite the low amount results.

I hold matchup spreads second. While matchups are often reflected from results it's often theorized and my fall short at times much like what @ Shaya adressed.

A matchup I believe that is very similar to ZSS vs Sonic is Fox vs Luigi.

Just like how Zss unequivocally beats sonic in tournaments. The same goes for how Luigi unequivocally dominates fox in every tournament their in. Most people theorize that due the fact that luigi can escape out of fox's combos and combo him really hard cause of his falling speed. However fox can take advantage of luigi's terrible landing options so it works out.

I then hold representation the least. Since imo a character shouldn't be deemed viable because of how many people use him/her/it. If that was the case wouldn't deemed top 10 just because only one person *cough*(Esam) is able to place really high with him in tournaments.

 

[Minordeth]

Results are the dividing line between the questions "Who is viable now" and "who could be viable." Yoshi could be viable. Ultimately, and unfortunately, you need skilled representation to push a character from one side of the line to the other. Pikachu is viable because of ESAM. Villager is viable because of Ranai, and so on.

Once we have established viability, the question that naturally follows is "how viable is this character?" It's the question that naturally dogs characters with only one top-player rep. It also follows characters with suspect MUs. We know Luigi is viable, but the question is, what is the ceiling for his viability? Is there one? The only character that escapes is the only character at the top of the heap.

I think people, early on, get caught up in results when a character has only one player repping them. They miss what should be obvious: why is this character only succeeding with this player? For instance: I don't think ESAM is low tier heroing it in Sm4sh. Pikachu is a good character. But his massive success covered up the fact that Pika has no other high level reps. Placing Pika at 2 or 3 in a tier list is being short sighted because, especially early on, you have a top player dedicated to heavily advancing the meta of one character, so we see advanced play early as opposed to other characters who develop based on the skill and national presence of their reps who may be bouncing around or switching mains between games.

EDIT: We also naturally overrate nationals for character viability, at least at this point. We have a sample size of what, three? over how many patches and custom use?

 

[Trifroze]

People also keep mentioning Sheik and ZSS in the same sentence too often when speaking of successful characters. Why is this? We all know it's because of Nairo, a player who might as well pick Mario, Fox, Diddy, Ness, Pikachu or Rosalina (ignoring possible playstyle incompatibility on that last one) and place just as well. Pikachu in 3rd, like said, is even more skewed because of a single player and it really shouldn't work that way. Here's some recent majors and their results to show just how little representation ZSS and Pikachu have, using Sheik just so people will stop mentioning her and ZSS in the same sentence:

CEO 2015
Sheik: 1st, 9th, 9th, 9th, 13th, 13th, 17th
ZSS: 2nd, 7th
Pikachu: 5th

EVO 2015
Sheik: 1st, 2nd, 9th, 9th, 13th, 25th, 25th, 25th
ZSS: 3rd
Pikachu: 7th

SSC
Sheik: 1st, 5th, 7th (secondary)
ZSS: 3rd
Pikachu: 2nd, 7th (secondary)

Who else would deserve 2nd or 3rd on the tier list then? Well, Rosalina, Sonic, Diddy and Fox all have more or as much results as ZSS, and definitely more than Pikachu. You can talk theory all you want, but there's nothing to say or show that ZSS or Pikachu are any better than characters like Rosalina, Sonic, Diddy, Fox or arguably even Mario. I think this is also a subject where a lot of top players have skewed views because Nairo and ESAM are just so good.

I asked this question when I started posting here again after SSC; are we sure ZSS and Pikachu are 2nd and 3rd or is it the players themselves? Here are the results of the other top-tier-deemed characters in comparison:

CEO 2015
Diddy: 1st (secondary), 5th
Rosalina: 3rd, 17th, 25th, 25th
Sonic: 9th, 17th, 17th, 25th
Fox: 4th
Ness: 7th
Mario: 13th

EVO 2015
Diddy: 1st (secondary), 17th, 17th
Rosalina: 4th (secondary), 5th, 25th
Sonic: 9th, 13th
Fox: 9th, 17th
Ness: 7th, 25th
Mario: 5th

SSC
Diddy: 5th, 9th, 25th, 25th
Rosalina: 9th, 13th, 17th, 25th
Sonic: 9th, 13th
Fox: 7th (secondary)
Ness: 7th, 13th
Mario: -

Most of these results are weaker, but there's more than one player getting them. Rosalina and Diddy stand out, Sonic has plenty of results but no top 8s, while Fox and Ness doing alright. Mario has been lacking representation since Ally didn't enter CEO or SSC, but EVO which he did enter put Mario to 5th and he still got 13th at CEO. All these characters have plenty of theory to support them as well, and all of them have their own share of unfavorable matchups along with ZSS and Pikachu.

Gonna go against the majority here somewhat and say:

S:
A:
B: (not ordered, might include others)

The ones with the most potential are probably Sheik, ZSS, Mario and Pikachu, and I wouldn't be surprised if they eventually were the top 4. Short explanations:

- Sheik dominates every tournament and seemingly (although always more and more clearly) has an answer for any situation. Such frame data, range and projectile really shouldn't be on one character like that without some weaknesses to balance it out.

- Diddy has been shown in theory and practice to be the only character to contest Sheik and he's solid all around, low recovery really being his only problem. I think the nerfs made people underestimate him, his reward did get decreased considerably but his kill potential didn't really suffer that much. Even if uair and fair didn't get nerfed as much as they did, bananas and dtilts into smashes would've probably been better choices for getting kills eventually or in many situations.

- ZSS' punish game is in a class of its own and can only be perfected more and more, and her only real problem is the way her grab limits her options in certain situations and makes her prone to large punishes. She however literally needs half the punishes of her opponent to achieve the same result, and definitely has the means to take advantage of it.

- Rosalina might fall eventually due to her possibly having more polarized matchups than the others, for both better and worse, since she either walls the opponent out long enough that they die first or she doesn't.

- Mario probably the hardest to pinpoint weaknesses from, since he has the best overall frame data in the game, good mobility, decent damage output, a combo throw, a kill throw, an above-average recovery and a workable projectile. He only seems to struggle from his lack of range on characters who can space him out because all his damage and kills come from getting very close to the opponent.

- Pikachu struggles to kill outside of gimmicks because he doesn't get reliable kills off of grabs and lacks attacks with decent range that he could just throw out safely. Has a fairly strong neutral because of thunderjolts and QA despite his lack of immediate range, and he's got one of the hardest recoveries to gimp. Definitely among the characters with the most untapped potential, but Pikachu's weaknesses are pretty clear.

- Sonic isn't the only character I could see timeout / pressuring with the lead being a good tactic, but he definitely does it the best and it seems to work so far. Has arguably several kill throws to kill you with once he has played his hit and run long enough. A pretty polarizing character as well.

- Ness will never be bad as long as he has the grab reward and aerials he currently has, but I think his average neutral and poor recovery will only push him lower. Not by more than a few spots though, unless some other characters get massive buffs and go past him or if Ryu/MK really are better than what everyone thinks.

- Fox's damage output is pretty ridiculous for the frame data he has, but whereas Sheik has ridiculous properties without weaknesses, Fox is actually balanced by having an exploitable recovery and lacking the grab reward of other top tiers. Outside of his dair and nair to up smash setups, killing with him is pretty unsafe despite the power he has.

 

[Ghostbone]

Nairo plays ZSS because ZSS is so good.
Maybe Nairo would get similar results with someone like Mario, it's hard to tell though, since Ally plays Mario and generally places lower than Nairo (both being top players in Brawl). But Nairo doesn't pick Mario (or Fox, Diddy, etc.), he picks ZSS because he believes in the strength of that character.

That should tell us a lot about how good she is.

Pikachu at 3rd is a lot more debated, but I think we're pretty sure ZSS is 2nd.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Also wins don't mean as much as results... A non-viable character can beat a viable one, since that character isn't the reason the other is non-viable.

But at the same time a character can get quite far in tournament without being viable if the circumstances are in his favor. Like, when Ocean placed 9th / 2XX players at Apex 2012 "all" he had to do was beat an IC player [possibly in ROB's favor], Ramin's Marth in R2 [matchup is in ROB's favor] and M2K [who wasn't in shape at that time and had no exp against ROB].

At no point in Brawl was ROB ever a 'viable' character but under the right circumstances he could make it very far like that. So I think you can't really say that wins "don't mean as much" as results. Ocean placing 9th had ultimately no effect on ROB's viability. The fact that ROB players kept beating Marth in tournament though was quite indicative of how the matchup went. At the end of the day it's the overall matchup spread that really tells us how good a character is and wins/losses in a specific matchup tell us more about that than the mere placing of a character without looking at the context.

I personally think there are few specific scenarios where Lucina is better than Marth, like dealing with fast/small characters that want to commit, get uncomfortably close or trade hits, but yeah, the overall balance favors the Hero King.

From the perspective of a Fox player I can assure you that this is by no means the case.

Marth's jab being able to setup tipper fsmashes is a much bigger threat than anything Lucina can do to Fox. Not only can Marth actually fight back in close range now but being able to setup a kill from neutral with relative ease is something Lucina can't do and for a lightweight that's a huge difference.

Just to put it a bit in perspective: before he had his jab buffed the Marth matchup was like +2 in Fox' favor. Now it's just about even. Lucina on the other hand is still kinda free for Fox [not actually free but so much less scary than Marth ...]

A matchup I believe that is very similar to ZSS vs Sonic is Fox vs Luigi.

Just like how Zss unequivocally beats sonic in tournaments. The same goes for how Luigi unequivocally dominates fox in every tournament their in. Most people theorize that due the fact that luigi can escape out of fox's combos and combo him really hard cause of his falling speed. However fox can take advantage of luigi's terrible landing options so it works out.

Actually, Fox does have more tournament wins against Luigi than Sonic does have against ZSS. I actually think Sonic has *no* wins against ZSS at all in high/top level play whereas Fox has at least two notable wins [Larry beating Concon and CRZ beating Miller] and ... I don't even know what losses Fox has to Luigi in tournament.

 

[Trifroze]

Nairo plays ZSS because ZSS is so good.
Maybe Nairo would get similar results with someone like Mario, it's hard to tell though, since Ally plays Mario and generally places lower than Nairo (both being top players in Brawl). But Nairo doesn't pick Mario (or Fox, Diddy, etc.), he picks ZSS because he believes in the strength of that character.

That should tell us a lot about how good she is.

Pikachu at 3rd is a lot more debated, but I think we're pretty sure ZSS is 2nd.

It tells us a bit but not a whole lot because any top player will eventually pick one character among the good ones. Doesn't mean they were better than the other 3-5 choices, just that they ended up liking them the most whether it's because they judge them better or like their playstyle. What also tells us something is the fact that when Nairo picks Pit he performs pretty much just as well.

 

[Nu~]

No, he actually beat all of them. Ally lost to Slayerz and Concon.



You overrate Pacman's results (I dont know much about DK) and underrate Peach's. He literally mentioned Umeki, but other than those there are Peaches such as Crow, llod and EOE (and probably more) who have also enjoyed success using solo Peach. Meanwhile Abadango gets first using Pacman in GF, but aside from Pacman he also used Rosalina and Meta Knight a lot. In a Japanese interview, he said that he was unsure whether his Pacman could beat Umeki's Peach, which is why he used his Meta Knight. He probably felt the same va taranito's Ness, against whom he used Rosalina. Abadango's results dont necessarily proof Pacman's viability as a solo main. He did show that Pacman may be a good choice vs Sheik and some other characters though.

Anyway, by your logic we might as well kick Pikachu and Villager down. Even though they have a few other players getting results with them, ESAM and Ranai are by far superior and the only ones getting really big results. Although some do feel these characters are overrated because of said players, imo the fact that a player can get such high results using a particular character is already proof enough of that character's potential. Having one player getting high results is much more representative of a character 's potential since they show how truly powerful a character can be when played at a high level, than having a lot of players getting average results. Getting high results is very difficult and definitely not something that can be done with every character. Expecting high results of many players for a character that isnt popular seem very exigent to me.

(also I dont see why you're picking on Peach when you have characters like Roy in the same tier)

Meanwhile, Dee wins a SHI-G gaming tourney with solo Pac-Man. Getting the bracket reset against taranito's ness 2-1, and then annihilating him 3-0 in the second set.

 

[Shaya]

But at the same time a character can get quite far in tournament without being viable if the circumstances are in his favor. Like, when Ocean placed 9th / 2XX players at Apex 2012 "all" he had to do was beat an IC player [possibly in ROB's favor], Ramin's Marth in R2 [matchup is in ROB's favor] and M2K [who wasn't in shape at that time and had no exp against ROB].

The fact that ROB players kept beating Marth in tournament though was quite indicative of how the matchup went.

Actually, Fox does have more tournament wins against Luigi than Sonic does have against ZSS. I actually think Sonic has *no* wins against ZSS at all in high/top level play whereas Fox has at least two notable wins [Larry beating Concon and CRZ beating Miller] and ... I don't even know what losses Fox has to Luigi in tournament.

Considering every where that shared both marth and rob mains felt even, and likely the most successful ROB in tournament in NA (Stingers) felt Marth slightly won. If it means anything I beat chibes in our friendlies; our one opportunity for a tournament set didn't happen because he didn't make it to loser's finals in pools :V.
Consider that's probably ramin's only loss to ROB ever, as it was for M2K. Everything else is kinda agreeable.

And Boss probably doing awful things to Snow and Feel Tension over and over again. And Jbandrew beating Megafox half the time or more at the moment.

 

[teddystalin]

Your comments on the DLC characters are almost literally the same exact things you chastised people for saying about Marth and Lucina. You can't have them one way. The DLC guys haven't been out for even 1/5 of the time the other characters have. Obviously they don't have results yet.

How long is this ridiculous argument going to come up? I feel as though we're going to keep seeing it this time next year.

Imagine if Doc had come out in June instead of Roy. The character is a similar kind of semi-clone: changed mobility specs, 2-3 unique moves, different properties on moves, etc. While his playstyle is different from Mario's, I don't think anyone is so delusional as to say that it takes three months or more to really get the hang of him and to let his meta develop. The simple fact is that Roy (and to a lesser degree, Lucas) have massive skill transfer from other characters and really aren't that hard to learn. The fact that his prominent mains like StaticManny and Sethlon have trouble taking a local with him is a direct reflection of the character himself, not any lack of player knowledge. There's a reason why ZeRo, despite hyping him up on release, never actually uses Roy in a situation where money is on the line.

Now, if Ryu was getting 0 results, their mains could hypothetically use this excuse. Ryu is a complex and unique character. But two months in, Ryu has shown himself capable of local and regional results. They don't need this excuse, and despite being able to hide behind it, they refuse to - because they actually have confidence in their character.

 

[bc1910]

People also keep mentioning Sheik and ZSS in the same sentence too often when speaking of successful characters. Why is this? We all know it's because of Nairo, a player who might as well pick Mario, Fox, Diddy, Ness, Pikachu or Rosalina (ignoring possible playstyle incompatibility on that last one) and place just as well. Pikachu in 3rd, like said, is even more skewed because of a single player and it really shouldn't work that way. Here's some recent majors and their results to show just how little representation ZSS and Pikachu have, using Sheik just so people will stop mentioning her and ZSS in the same sentence:

CEO 2015
Sheik: 1st, 9th, 9th, 9th, 13th, 13th, 17th
ZSS: 2nd, 7th
Pikachu: 5th

EVO 2015
Sheik: 1st, 2nd, 9th, 9th, 13th, 25th, 25th, 25th
ZSS: 3rd
Pikachu: 7th

SSC
Sheik: 1st, 5th, 7th (secondary)
ZSS: 3rd
Pikachu: 2nd, 7th (secondary)

Who else would deserve 2nd or 3rd on the tier list then? Well, Rosalina, Sonic, Diddy and Fox all have more or as much results as ZSS, and definitely more than Pikachu. You can talk theory all you want, but there's nothing to say or show that ZSS or Pikachu are any better than characters like Rosalina, Sonic, Diddy, Fox or arguably even Mario. I think this is also a subject where a lot of top players have skewed views because Nairo and ESAM are just so good.

I asked this question when I started posting here again after SSC; are we sure ZSS and Pikachu are 2nd and 3rd or is it the players themselves? Here are the results of the other top-tier-deemed characters in comparison:

CEO 2015
Diddy: 1st (secondary), 5th
Rosalina: 3rd, 17th, 25th, 25th
Sonic: 9th, 17th, 17th, 25th
Fox: 4th
Ness: 7th
Mario: 13th

EVO 2015
Diddy: 1st (secondary), 17th, 17th
Rosalina: 4th (secondary), 5th, 25th
Sonic: 9th, 13th
Fox: 9th, 17th
Ness: 7th, 25th
Mario: 5th

SSC
Diddy: 5th, 9th, 25th, 25th
Rosalina: 9th, 13th, 17th, 25th
Sonic: 9th, 13th
Fox: 7th (secondary)
Ness: 7th, 13th
Mario: -

Most of these results are weaker, but there's more than one player getting them. Rosalina and Diddy stand out, Sonic has plenty of results but no top 8s, while Fox and Ness doing alright. Mario has been lacking representation since Ally didn't enter CEO or SSC, but EVO which he did enter put Mario to 5th and he still got 13th at CEO. All these characters have plenty of theory to support them as well, and all of them have their own share of unfavorable matchups along with ZSS and Pikachu.

Gonna go against the majority here somewhat and say:

S:
A:
B: (not ordered, might include others)

The ones with the most potential are probably Sheik, ZSS, Mario and Pikachu, and I wouldn't be surprised if they eventually were the top 4. Short explanations:

- Sheik dominates every tournament and seemingly (although always more and more clearly) has an answer for any situation. Such frame data, range and projectile really shouldn't be on one character like that without some weaknesses to balance it out.

- Diddy has been shown in theory and practice to be the only character to contest Sheik and he's solid all around, low recovery really being his only problem. I think the nerfs made people underestimate him, his reward did get decreased considerably but his kill potential didn't really suffer that much. Even if uair and fair didn't get nerfed as much as they did, bananas and dtilts into smashes would've probably been better choices for getting kills eventually or in many situations.

- ZSS' punish game is in a class of its own and can only be perfected more and more, and her only real problem is the way her grab limits her options in certain situations and makes her prone to large punishes. She however literally needs half the punishes of her opponent to achieve the same result, and definitely has the means to take advantage of it.

- Rosalina might fall eventually due to her possibly having more polarized matchups than the others, for both better and worse, since she either walls the opponent out long enough that they die first or she doesn't.

- Mario probably the hardest to pinpoint weaknesses from, since he has the best overall frame data in the game, good mobility, decent damage output, a combo throw, a kill throw, an above-average recovery and a workable projectile. He only seems to struggle from his lack of range on characters who can space him out because all his damage and kills come from getting very close to the opponent.

- Pikachu struggles to kill outside of gimmicks because he doesn't get reliable kills off of grabs and lacks attacks with decent range that he could just throw out safely. Has a fairly strong neutral because of thunderjolts and QA despite his lack of immediate range, and he's got one of the hardest recoveries to gimp. Definitely among the characters with the most untapped potential, but Pikachu's weaknesses are pretty clear.

- Sonic isn't the only character I could see timeout / pressuring with the lead being a good tactic, but he definitely does it the best and it seems to work so far. Has arguably several kill throws to kill you with once he has played his hit and run long enough. A pretty polarizing character as well.

- Ness will never be bad as long as he has the grab reward and aerials he currently has, but I think his average neutral and poor recovery will only push him lower. Not by more than a few spots though, unless some other characters get massive buffs and go past him or if Ryu/MK really are better than what everyone thinks.

- Fox's damage output is pretty ridiculous for the frame data he has, but whereas Sheik has ridiculous properties without weaknesses, Fox is actually balanced by having an exploitable recovery and lacking the grab reward of other top tiers. Outside of his dair and nair to up smash setups, killing with him is pretty unsafe despite the power he has.

Interesting post with good explanations.

I do think that once again this creeps into "results are everything" territory.

As I and others have explained before, we know how important results are, but there is no point basing almost everything on results because we end up with a very simple ranking system. If we aren't discussing potential and theory then what is the point of this thread? Just list some results and call it a day.

I do appreciate your point that ZSS and Pikachu have only one very strong representative each.

I also think you're right with what you said about the "Sheik and ZSS" grouping that we're seeing more and more often. I don't think ZSS matches up to Sheik in terms of either potential or results.

Overall though I think this list is too skewed in the results direction particularly with the placement of Diddy. Yes, he continues to place well and has probably the most competitive MU with Sheik, but I agree with the common opinion that at least ZSS is a stronger character than Diddy even though her overall results aren't quite as good. Some of Diddy's continued results could well be down to the sheer amount of players and development he had before his nerfs, so he's still further along in that sense than most characters.

 

[Gawain]

How long is this ridiculous argument going to come up? I feel as though we're going to keep seeing it this time next year.

Imagine if Doc had come out in June instead of Roy. The character is a similar kind of semi-clone: changed mobility specs, 2-3 unique moves, different properties on moves, etc. While his playstyle is different from Mario's, I don't think anyone is so delusional as to say that it takes three months or more to really get the hang of him and to let his meta develop. The simple fact is that Roy (and to a lesser degree, Lucas) have massive skill transfer from other characters and really aren't that hard to learn. The fact that his prominent mains like StaticManny and Sethlon have trouble taking a local with him is a direct reflection of the character himself, not any lack of player knowledge. There's a reason why ZeRo, despite hyping him up on release, never actually uses Roy in a situation where money is on the line.

Now, if Ryu was getting 0 results, their mains could hypothetically use this excuse. Ryu is a complex and unique character. But two months in, Ryu has shown himself capable of local and regional results. They don't need this excuse, and despite being able to hide behind it, they refuse to - because they actually have confidence in their character.

And that reason is because he plays Sheik and Diddy, who are objectively better. StaticManny does not main Roy, he plays him on the side. And Sethlon wasnt even really playing Smash 4 until Roy came out.

Just because Roy isnt as good as the characters Zero use does not mean hes instantly ****. In the same way that just because he has no results right now doesn't mean it either. Lots of characters with weak/no results are still considered good, because they have just one standout dedicated main. That's how it always is.

So to answer your question, yeah this "ridiculous" conversation will continue to come up because some people are unwilling to accept that Roy might actually be pretty decent for some reason, and will never do so until he takes first at a major or some ridiculous requirement like that. And the excuse will always be to fall back on "lel is just dlc hype guise"

 

[TTTTTsd]

I don't think Roy is **** (do a lot of people here? Last I checked it was like, maybe 2-3 people) most just tend to agree he's worse off than Marth for his flaws but still okay-ish.

I think the crux is not that he's bad but some people are like, overrating him super hard.

I do think Roy can exploit characters with poor landing options a bit easier in practice though, but that crops up less vs. the better characters of the game which is where my main disparity between him and Marth comes in.

 

[RedBeefBaron]

I like Roy, I really do, but he looks to again be an inferior choice compared to Marth.

The speed difference and grab combos really don't compare to Marths ability to comfortably go offstage and his tipper, IMO. Marth is able to get the same reward with less risk and play safer in general.

The fact that Roy can't get guaranteed dthrow to blazer kills against most characters seriously sucks as he really needs to be able to kill off of a grab reliably to keep up with Marth's major buffs of you ask me.

 

[Gawain]

I don't think Roy is **** (do a lot of people here? Last I checked it was like, maybe 2-3 people) most just tend to agree he's worse off than Marth for his flaws but still okay-ish.

I think the crux is not that he's bad but some people are like, overrating him super hard.

I do think Roy can exploit characters with poor landing options a bit easier in practice though, but that crops up less vs. the better characters of the game which is where my main disparity between him and Marth comes in.

How is Marth better? I have never heard a decent explanation. Legit question, because I'm not seeing it at all. Literally all of Marths kill setups are beaten by just jumping away, and he's not fast enough to stop most characters from resetting after that. Jab one doesn't true combo into anything that kills except for dolphin slash at high percents (over 120-140,position dependant) as much as Marth mains love to hype it up. Marth isn't getting a tipper fsmash unless his opponent doesn't know the matchup and doesn't jump after a jab, or if his opponent otherwise makes a big error.

So he's left with just hitting with raw strong attacks or edgeguarding. He has no actually reliable kill setups, because everything that combos into his kill moves (namely, up airs and nair hit 1) are ridiculously easy to see coming because he falls so slow. I've never seen a Marth combo these into a kill vs anyone decent.

Roy is the opposite, he DOES have moves that combo into kills, he does have a throw that leads into more than 10 damage and can also confirm kills (though these are DI dependant).

I know this is going to rile up the bias in these threads so I'm not even going to talk about Roy right now, but I will wait to see actual explanations for Marth being better. Which I doubt I'm going to get, is probably just going to be someone throwing frame data around and calling it a day.

 

[Trifroze]

Interesting post with good explanations.

I do think that once again this creeps into "results are everything" territory.

As I and others have explained before, we know how important results are, but there is no point basing almost everything on results because we end up with a very simple ranking system. If we aren't discussing potential and theory then what is the point of this thread? Just list some results and call it a day.

I do appreciate your point that ZSS and Pikachu have only one very strong representative each.

I also think you're right with what you said about the "Sheik and ZSS" grouping that we're seeing more and more often. I don't think ZSS matches up to Sheik in terms of either potential or results.

Overall though I think this list is too skewed in the results direction particularly with the placement of Diddy. Yes, he continues to place well and has probably the most competitive MU with Sheik, but I agree with the common opinion that at least ZSS is a stronger character than Diddy even though her overall results aren't quite as good. Some of Diddy's continued results could well be down to the sheer amount of players and development he had before his nerfs, so he's still further along in that sense than most characters.

I did put ZSS, Mario and Pikachu higher than what results would indicate because I think they can all do much more than what's been shown so far in relation to other characters despite all three having amazing representatives to push them. Yet, at the same time, you have to take results into account because good characters are bound to attract players and get results, and if some character is considered good but isn't attracting players or getting results, I think there's reason for more or less skepticism. ZSS and Mario do have plenty of local and regional success whereas Pikachu isn't really seen that often, which is why he falls out of top 5 for me. What you don't see is that without his potential and the theory behind him he wouldn't even be top 10, but I put him 6th because results isn't all that matters. I also put ZSS above Rosalina despite the weaker overall results.

Diddy I never really had a strong opinion of, I simply thought of him as a top 5 character in my mind where basically everyone between 2-9 was blurry until I decided to get my thoughts together into the post I made. What made me decide to put Diddy above everyone else was Zero doing better with him than with Sheik versus Vinnie when he was struggling to keep his streak. You could say Zero is bad at the ditto or that he has more experience with Diddy (I question the latter though), but the fact that he made it through with Diddy before figuring the situation out with Sheik who's supposedly S tier should give Diddy a lot of credit. He's also the character people have been suggesting for the second best neutral in the game because of the banana, and I agree with that. If Diddy can contest Sheik the same way Sheik herself can, he probably won't have too much trouble versus anyone else either because there is no single quality that makes a character good against Sheik, they just have to be really solid overall which is what Diddy might've proven to be.

Sonic, Ness and Fox were the hardest to get into any kind of an order so I pretty much just looked at how exploitable their weaknesses are as well as the strengths they have, while making sure they aren't above the characters I already mentioned because I think they lack the theory as well as the results to be there right now. Sonic forces almost every other character to play his game (and still retains decent tools for the rest of his matchups), Ness has solid advantage, plenty of kill options and good survivability bar his terrible recovery if forced low, and Fox has a great neutral, high damage output but a less easy time killing and worse disadvantage than Ness (possibly worse recovery overall too).

Though yes, results play a strong part in my opinion because like I mentioned I think good characters are bound to get popularity and therefore results. There are definitely exceptions, but I'll rather be surprised by them with time than downplay results because characters like those might exist (and most likely do). Still, theory plays an equally strong part and always should.

 

[ARGHETH]

Jab one doesn't true combo into anything that kills except for dolphin slash at high percents (over 120-140,position dependant) as much as Marth mains love to hype it up. Marth isn't getting a tipper fsmash unless his opponent doesn't know the matchup and doesn't jump after a jab, or if his opponent otherwise makes a big error.

I'd just like to point out that by this line of logic, Lucina is almost as good as Marth.

I know this is going to rile up the bias in these threads so I'm not even going to talk about Roy right now, but I will wait to see actual explanations for Marth being better. Which I doubt I'm going to get, is probably just going to be someone throwing frame data around and calling it a day.

Also, if you want an actual discussion, that is not the way to do it.

 

[teddystalin]

And that reason is because he plays Sheik and Diddy, who are objectively better. StaticManny does not main Roy, he plays him on the side. And Sethlon wasnt even really playing Smash 4 until Roy came out.

Just because Roy isnt as good as the characters Zero use does not mean hes instantly ****. In the same way that just because he has no results right now doesn't mean it either. Lots of characters with weak/no results are still considered good, because they have just one standout dedicated main. That's how it always is.

So to answer your question, yeah this "ridiculous" conversation will continue to come up because some people are unwilling to accept that Roy might actually be pretty decent for some reason, and will never do so until he takes first at a major or some ridiculous requirement like that. And the excuse will always be to fall back on "lel is just dlc hype guise"

I actually do think Roy is pretty decent, but the "too soon to tell" argument is basically just the opposite of the dlc hype argument and still doesn't hold water.

Really though you can understand the counter hype when the level of discussion on the Roy boards consists of people saying "people say Roy is like captain falcon, therefore he must be at least top 15, maybe top 10 with time." I don't have a strong opinion on whether Roy or Marth is better, but you can bet it's a more logical comparison than the one with CF.

 

[LightLV]

Ok let me rephrase so you can understand.

Marth is better. All this nonsense you are spewing is just that. Nonsense.

Marth has kill moves that Lucina simply does not have. Period. Combos are not exclusive to Marth. But he has more combos at lower percents and higher percents then her due to his mechanics.

Gonna say it again. Marth is better.

Now please cut the ****.

Nonsense? Haha, whatever.

Anytime someone wants to talk about how Marth is FACTUALLY better than Lucina, people love to bring up these mythical tipper JAB TO FSMASH "true combos" that are so amazingly great.

Yet nobody is able to show me a video of it ever happening in a real match, nor explain how it's "true" when you can simply move out of the way of Marth's garbage hitboxes. Apparently "TRUE" means something different in Smash, i dont know.

Or how Marth is "safe" when he gets his **** pushed in on block just like everyone else who isn't S-tier.

Ill say it for the millionth time, if you're going to lose to a good Marth, you're going to lose to Lucina too.


Until someone can show me something real...and by REAL i don't mean no bull**** training theorycraft mode videos, i mean someone competent actually playing someone competent...and Marth is able to consistently take advantage of his strengths, i'm standing by my opinion. They aren't that far off from one another, and if you have to stretch Marth's advantages so far for the sake of such a silly comparison...well, you shouldn't.

the sad thing is, people keep bringing up all this stupid stuff (that never happens) that Marth can do, while nobody ever brings up things that ACTUALLY do make a difference. Like Fsmash tipper on ledge vulnerability, or his Uair tipper being decent, ect. Just "LOLMARTH IS SAFE" (haha) or "TRUE KILL COMBO" (mhm) all day.

 

[TTTTTsd]

How is Marth better? I have never heard a decent explanation. Legit question, because I'm not seeing it at all. Literally all of Marths kill setups are beaten by just jumping away, and he's not fast enough to stop most characters from resetting after that. Jab one doesn't true combo into anything that kills except for dolphin slash at high percents (over 120-140,position dependant) as much as Marth mains love to hype it up. Marth isn't getting a tipper fsmash unless his opponent doesn't know the matchup and doesn't jump after a jab, or if his opponent otherwise makes a big error.

So he's left with just hitting with raw strong attacks or edgeguarding. He has no actually reliable kill setups, because everything that combos into his kill moves (namely, up airs and nair hit 1) are ridiculously easy to see coming because he falls so slow. I've never seen a Marth combo these into a kill vs anyone decent.

Roy is the opposite, he DOES have moves that combo into kills, he does have a throw that leads into more than 10 damage and can also confirm kills (though these are DI dependant).

I know this is going to rile up the bias in these threads so I'm not even going to talk about Roy right now, but I will wait to see actual explanations for Marth being better. Which I doubt I'm going to get, is probably just going to be someone throwing frame data around and calling it a day.

I'll bite, whether you like my answer or not. I don't have a clear bias towards Marth or Roy, they're both ok.

I think the main reason I consider Marth better is his disadvantaged state. Other people have chimed in on other things (mostly things like commitment, Marth being able to play it safer and less risky ergo less errors and more economic @ Shaya can elaborate on this, I think he talked about it quite a deal of pages back), but this is my personal biggest one.

I feel like both Marth and Roy lack a true, reliable kill setup. Roy has stuff you can DI out of as you said, and of course, Jab -> Tipper FSmash is not guaranteed.

Roy's disadvantaged state is, pretty frankly, terrible. Being a fastfaller with no aerial that's particularly fast and not a lot of air control (his max velocity in the air is good but I don't think he can drift that well when landing IIRC) means he is punished empirically harder for every single mistake he makes vs. Marth who, while still not great in disadvantage, is floaty and drifty, which lets him squeeze out a bit better. I can't really think of any way to elaborate more on this but Roy is gored far harder for minimal mistakes vs. Marth. It's because of this that I can't think of a MU vs. the top tiers he does better than Marth in, I haven't seen it and my opinion on the character probably won't persuade me to see it unless I am shown. I am of the belief that he beats the lower tiers and chars with weaker landings a lot better than Marth, however, because his kit seems to be very good specifically at exploiting weak landing options which do occur more frequently in the middle/lower tiered sections of the roster.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying he's bad at all! But I do think he's slightly worse than Marth. Some think more than slightly, I think slightly. Others think he's better, that's cool too! But I have my reasons for otherwise.

I think, to tl;dr it, it's mostly him having to commit harder and how hard he's punished for a mistake in comparison. I also think he's edgeguarded way, way easier even though both his and Marth's recovery are not that great (although Marth's is better)

I do also think being able to edgeguard better is pretty relevant in the scenarios in which trades or stray hits occur. Esp. vs. mediocre/bad, or even good recoveries.

 

[Amadeus9]

How is Marth better? I have never heard a decent explanation. Legit question, because I'm not seeing it at all. Literally all of Marths kill setups are beaten by just jumping away, and he's not fast enough to stop most characters from resetting after that. Jab one doesn't true combo into anything that kills except for dolphin slash at high percents (over 120-140,position dependant) as much as Marth mains love to hype it up. Marth isn't getting a tipper fsmash unless his opponent doesn't know the matchup and doesn't jump after a jab, or if his opponent otherwise makes a big error.

So he's left with just hitting with raw strong attacks or edgeguarding. He has no actually reliable kill setups, because everything that combos into his kill moves (namely, up airs and nair hit 1) are ridiculously easy to see coming because he falls so slow. I've never seen a Marth combo these into a kill vs anyone decent.

Roy is the opposite, he DOES have moves that combo into kills, he does have a throw that leads into more than 10 damage and can also confirm kills (though these are DI dependant).

I know this is going to rile up the bias in these threads so I'm not even going to talk about Roy right now, but I will wait to see actual explanations for Marth being better. Which I doubt I'm going to get, is probably just going to be someone throwing frame data around and calling it a day.

?? Marth vs. Roy has been a primary topic of discussion on this very thread for weeks. You can name call and make a stink but if you're not even going to go through historical posts here that address your misgivings and then have the gall to claim that the discussion hasn't been given a fair chance then your opinion can be patently discarded.

 

[Gawain]

I'll bite, whether you like my answer or not. I don't have a clear bias towards Marth or Roy, they're both ok.

I think the main reason I consider Marth better is his disadvantaged state. Other people have chimed in on other things (mostly things like commitment, Marth being able to play it safer and less risky ergo less errors and more economic @ Shaya can elaborate on this, I think he talked about it quite a deal of pages back), but this is my personal biggest one.

I feel like both Marth and Roy lack a true, reliable kill setup. Roy has stuff you can DI out of as you said, and of course, Jab -> Tipper FSmash is not guaranteed.

Roy's disadvantaged state is, pretty frankly, terrible. Being a fastfaller with no aerial that's particularly fast and not a lot of air control (his max velocity in the air is good but I don't think he can drift that well when landing IIRC) means he is punished empirically harder for every single mistake he makes vs. Marth who, while still not great in disadvantage, is floaty and drifty, which lets him squeeze out a bit better. I can't really think of any way to elaborate more on this but Roy is gored far harder for minimal mistakes vs. Marth. It's because of this that I can't think of a MU vs. the top tiers he does better than Marth in, I haven't seen it and my opinion on the character probably won't persuade me to see it unless I am shown. I am of the belief that he beats the lower tiers and chars with weaker landings a lot better than Marth, however, because his kit seems to be very good specifically at exploiting weak landing options which do occur more frequently in the middle/lower tiered sections of the roster.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying he's bad at all! But I do think he's slightly worse than Marth. Some think more than slightly, I think slightly. Others think he's better, that's cool too! But I have my reasons for otherwise.

I think, to tl;dr it, it's mostly him having to commit harder and how hard he's punished for a mistake in comparison. I also think he's edgeguarded way, way easier even though both his and Marth's recovery are not that great (although Marth's is better)

I do also think being able to edgeguard better is pretty relevant in the scenarios in which trades or stray hits occur. Esp. vs. mediocre/bad, or even good recoveries.

Thank you for giving a real response. I can see where you're coming from and I agree in some respect, but I disagree with how you are weighting the value of some aspects. The big one imo is edge guarding. In the matchups that matter most, both Roy and Marth are better off staying on stage and trumping or covering the ledge. You're not gonna edge guard a good Sheik or ZSS with either of them very often its a pipe dream.

Also, it is my belief that you are undervalueing Roys kill setups (understandably). In a practical match, jab into up b is very potent, especially near the ledge at highish percent where most people will instinctively DI in.

But regardless I'm grateful for the perspective without relying on cherrypicking framedata

 

[TTTTTsd]

You're not gonna edge guard a good Sheik or ZSS with either of them very often its a pipe dream.

Agreed on there, I do think some of this game's other bests have susceptible recoveries to Marth to some degree. I think the most notable one is Luigi.

Also Pikachu is really hard to edgeguard for both of them, probably in the same level as ZSS or Sheik. In fact they both hate short chars in general ughhh

 

[Sir Tundra]

Actually, Fox does have more tournament wins against Luigi than Sonic does have against ZSS. I actually think Sonic has *no* wins against ZSS at all in high/top level play whereas Fox has at least two notable wins [Larry beating Concon and CRZ beating Miller] and ... I don't even know what losses Fox has to Luigi in tournament.

Well for fox's losses against luigi in tourneys theirs Snow vs boss, Nakat vs false(I don't think I'd count this since this was months ago), and Feeltension vs Boss

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Yeah the tourney losses exist for sure. I'm just saying that Fox vs Luigi is not comparable to Sonic vs ZSS as far as results are concerned.

 

[RedBeefBaron]

What true kill setups does Roy even have? Falling tipper up air or nair to smash isn't guaranteed afaik and its very punishable if you whiff that smash. D throw and jab don't reliably combo to blazer at kill % against anyone who DIs except extreme fast fallers.

If they made jab and d throw better combo tools he would be much better at what he's supposed to have over Marth (close range) while still having noticeable weaknesses compared to Marth.

I'm actually quite surprised that Marth has been buffed so much and Roy is still completely untouched.

 

[TTTTTsd]

I REALLY do wish Roy could squeeze out more of his grab game at high %s. He's supposed to be all about really good ground and grab game punishes, which is why when you see them falter at higher %s you get kind of upset. Blazer killing off of D-Throw would not be incredibly broken and I don't think him having that would even come close to removing your reason to play Marth.

Would he be better than Marth at that point? Dunno, but I think it'd be better for Roy because I feel like his grab game should be rewarding at most %s, not just lower and middle ones.

His character design as a whole vs. Marth is so parallel. Marth spaces really well and nips at your shield and patience, and gets you with jab -> Grab and other jab mixups, Roy's answer to shield is just good movement and a grab, he should totally be able to squeeze more out of that.

 

[Sir Tundra]

Yeah the tourney losses exist for sure. I'm just saying that Fox vs Luigi is not comparable to Sonic vs ZSS as far as results are concerned.

My apologies it seems I misread your post. Looking back I think the whole fox vs luigi mu compared to zss vs sonic maybe a bit of an overstatement as far as results go. Fox at least won some tournaments against luigi. I can't say the same for Sanic against zss.

 

[Djent]

I thought people put ZSS second because of Nairo, Choco, Nick Riddle, V115, [insert mid-level players here], and the fact that her MU spread is theoretically pretty amazing?

 

[warionumbah2]

Nonsense? Haha, whatever.

Anytime someone wants to talk about how Marth is FACTUALLY better than Lucina, people love to bring up these mythical tipper JAB TO FSMASH "true combos" that are so amazingly great.

Yet nobody is able to show me a video of it ever happening in a real match, nor explain how it's "true" when you can simply move out of the way of Marth's garbage hitboxes. Apparently "TRUE" means something different in Smash, i dont know.

Or how Marth is "safe" when he gets his **** pushed in on block just like everyone else who isn't S-tier.

Ill say it for the millionth time, if you're going to lose to a good Marth, you're going to lose to Lucina too.


Until someone can show me something real...and by REAL i don't mean no bull**** training theorycraft mode videos, i mean someone competent actually playing someone competent...and Marth is able to consistently take advantage of his strengths, i'm standing by my opinion. They aren't that far off from one another, and if you have to stretch Marth's advantages so far for the sake of such a silly comparison...well, you shouldn't.

the sad thing is, people keep bringing up all this stupid stuff (that never happens) that Marth can do, while nobody ever brings up things that ACTUALLY do make a difference. Like Fsmash tipper on ledge vulnerability, or his Uair tipper being decent, ect. Just "LOLMARTH IS SAFE" (haha) or "TRUE KILL COMBO" (mhm) all day.

 

[DunnoBro]

Dthrow and fthrow are already great combo tools wtf lol

It's his options into them that are the issue.

Fthrow > Usmash is a 50/50, but a very risky one due to the start-up. You call out the air dodge with a charge and a jump with an instant release. The issue is, a good opponent knows the best option is almost always to jump so it isn't really a 50/50. Weaker, can fall out of it, and if roy guesses wrong he's getting punished hard due to the endlag.

Similarly with dthrow > blazer on floatier characters/higher percents.

His 50/50s are just too risky, and his disadvantage state is AWFUL which exacerbates the issue.

What I think would help him is to buff aerial blazer to make it a killing air dodge punish and follow-up tool. Killing about 20-30% later than grounded. If he's gonna be a risk/reward, give him some damn rewards.

 

[Rikkhan]

Speaking of results, I did this thread where I recopillated tournament results, if you want you could take a look:

http://smashboards.com/threads/tournament-data-project-character-rankings-and-usage.416049/

Adding to the discussion, and looking at results lucario seem to be a character that is understimated he has good placements on Nationals. Maybe he is more viable than it seems...

 

[TTTTTsd]

Dthrow and fthrow are already great combo tools wtf lol

It's his options into them that are the issue.

Fthrow > Usmash is a 50/50, but a very risky one due to the start-up. You call out the air dodge with a charge and a jump with an instant release. The issue is, a good opponent knows the best option is almost always to jump so it isn't really a 50/50. Weaker, can fall out of it, and if roy guesses wrong he's getting punished hard due to the endlag.

Similarly with dthrow > blazer on floatier characters/higher percents.

His 50/50s are just too risky, and his disadvantage state is AWFUL which exacerbates the issue.

What I think would help him is to buff aerial blazer to make it a killing air dodge punish and follow-up tool. Killing about 20-30% later than grounded. If he's gonna be a risk/reward, give him some damn rewards.

I mean I know they're already good but....you're basically saying what I meant (did I convey it properly? I have no idea.)

I agree, his rewards are pretty solid at lower %s but they falter at the killing %s. His disadvantaged state really, REALLY hurts him along with this, I find. He has to take risks but man they are HUGE risks that result in total backfire if you mess up, more than a lot of other characters.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

Other than the claim that DK can kill you at 40% with the ding dong, this video is pretty on point.
Tl;dr
DK is viable now, camp him out to win. Fight him as you would a gigantic Luigi with traction.

 

[TheReflexWonder]

I would really like some insight on this. Did some number-crunching on Sonic Forward-B/Down-B counterplay and I'm displeased with the results.

Can someone explain to me how I am supposed to reliably punish Sonic's Forward-B and Down-B? I'm running it by the numbers and they seem to force most opponents into making guesses and hard reads throughout.

Sonic Forward-B and Down-B hitboxes have normal hitlag multipliers. When you jump during a Forward-B or Down-B, there appears to be about a 4-frame gap between the end of (shield) hitlag freeze and the second hitbox generated by a buffered jump, which can be followed up by multiple aerials (Frame 5 F-Air, Frame 5 U-Air, Frame 6 N-Air), or an Up-B (Frame 4), all of which outspeed almost all out-of-shield options. If those numbers are correct, the only way to reliably punish after shielding the initial hit would be to powershield and then use a Frame 4 or faster move after dropping shield (which takes 0 frames due to the powershield). These gaps are too small for even the fastest Grabs (which are Frame 6) to beat. Alternatively, Sonic can choose not to follow up with an aerial after jumping and continue moving faster than the vast majority of the cast is able to reasonably chase.

Both the potential cancel into shield and start-up invincibility (~5 frames, and you can also cancel into a double-jump during that window or anytime after) on Forward-B discourage burst range tools from the opponent, and most lingering hitboxes outside of the range of Forward-B and Down-B allow Sonic to wait and punish on reaction.

Outside of select looping Jab1s with loads of active frames or significant disjoints (Captain Falcon and Pikachu are the only ones that come to mind; anyone telling you that Little Mac can is wrong) and certain projectiles, I don't know of any "just hold it out there" moves that can reliably discourage the sheer space control that Sonic's Forward-B and Down-B carry. This seems to force opponents without the tools to negate these specials in neutral altogether or the ability to chase and pressure Sonic after a blocked spin combination to make multiple reads just to be able to touch the opponent, which seems to make them ridiculously polarized in a 1v1 environment.

I would be very happy if someone could tell me my numbers are wrong and that there are bigger gaps between hits. I'm really at a loss.

 

[DunnoBro]

I mean I know they're already good but....you're basically saying what I meant (did I convey it properly? I have no idea.)

I agree, his rewards are pretty solid at lower %s but they falter at the killing %s. His disadvantaged state really, REALLY hurts him along with this, I find. He has to take risks but man they are HUGE risks that result in total backfire if you mess up, more than a lot of other characters.

I wasn't referring to you who said something about dthrow needing to be better...

Fun Fact: When Top Sheik's like Vinnie dthrow > instant uair for a kill and the opponent air dodges, they fast fall into usmash to cross their landing up for another kill opportunity.

Roy guesses wrong on his kill set-up off dthrow, he gets grabbed, comboed for 50%, and edgeguarded.

I would really like some insight on this. Did some number-crunching on Sonic Forward-B/Down-B counterplay and I'm displeased with the results.

Gotta find the safe/easy spindash stuffs/pressure your character can do, and pressure his landings.

Don't let him go on T&C or FD unless your char has dumb stuff there too. Otherwise, after he hits your shield with spindash and opts not to use an aerial, he's more likely to actually land for free. On smaller stages like smashville (where you'll likely end up) he'll be more likely to end up offstage or have to spring and you can pressure his return to neutral.

But yea, overall spindash is dumb.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Nonsense? Haha, whatever.

Anytime someone wants to talk about how Marth is FACTUALLY better than Lucina, people love to bring up these mythical tipper JAB TO FSMASH "true combos" that are so amazingly great.

Yet nobody is able to show me a video of it ever happening in a real match, nor explain how it's "true" when you can simply move out of the way of Marth's garbage hitboxes. Apparently "TRUE" means something different in Smash, i dont know.

Or how Marth is "safe" when he gets his **** pushed in on block just like everyone else who isn't S-tier.

Ill say it for the millionth time, if you're going to lose to a good Marth, you're going to lose to Lucina too.


Until someone can show me something real...and by REAL i don't mean no bull**** training theorycraft mode videos, i mean someone competent actually playing someone competent...and Marth is able to consistently take advantage of his strengths, i'm standing by my opinion. They aren't that far off from one another, and if you have to stretch Marth's advantages so far for the sake of such a silly comparison...well, you shouldn't.

the sad thing is, people keep bringing up all this stupid stuff (that never happens) that Marth can do, while nobody ever brings up things that ACTUALLY do make a difference. Like Fsmash tipper on ledge vulnerability, or his Uair tipper being decent, ect. Just "LOLMARTH IS SAFE" (haha) or "TRUE KILL COMBO" (mhm) all day.

I said jab to tipper is a guess. Uair to w/e is not a guess. You just have to not suck and be able to hit confirm.

Stupid stuff that never happens? Marth dtilting a shield vs Lucina dtilting a shield never happens? If I say Marth hitting a shield is safer then her hitting a shield in EVERY circumstance...that NEVER happens?

lol stop trolling. You are terrible at it.

My argument..oh sorry my FACTUAL OBJECTIVE STATEMENT was that Marth is better then Lucina.
Marth is now generally 2 to 4 frames safer on EVERYTHING he does when he is blocked compared to her.

How the **** is that NOT a big deal?

How that doesnt equate to "objectively better" in your mind is beyond my ability to comprehend.

 

[Trifroze]

I thought people put ZSS second because of Nairo, Choco, Nick Riddle, V115, [insert mid-level players here], and the fact that her MU spread is theoretically pretty amazing?

Only Nairo has been getting results with ZSS in major tournaments along with Nick Riddle placing 7th at CEO. He might get more results if he went to more tournaments, but it doesn't seem to be the case.

The theoretical MU spread by whom? People are very divided on that, but most agree ZSS loses to Sheik and Pikachu while beating Rosalina, Sonic and Luigi, basically all the high tiers (10th-20th) and all fatties (Falcon, DK and ROB at this point mainly). Mario, Diddy, Fox and Ness aren't really clear as far as I can tell, and they're important matchups. I think at least Diddy and Fox are a struggle because they can either get in her zone too easily or threaten it like Sheik and Pikachu. Mario might get zoned out but his aerial mobility and ability to use 2 of basically any aerial on a single shorthop is something that should really help him in that regard, and he does have his up smash to threaten ZSS' non disjointed aerial options. Ness certainly gets zoned out in the neutral department but his grab and advantage in general is something to be afraid of at any percentage since his neutral still isn't bad and back throw kills ZSS from the ledge at literally 80%. Missed grabs from ZSS are also dangerous in the Ness and Fox MUs in particular.

I suppose if she really does beat all the high tiers and fatties like MK, Falcon, Yoshi, Lucario, ROB, DK, Wario and Villager and doesn't lose to anyone worse than 40:60 she does have a good spread in theory (Sheik can have her 30:70 like with everyone else, but I really doubt it's ever going to be that bad). This is the best case scenario though, and that's not to say some other character besides Sheik couldn't do better overall. I'd still say Diddy may very well have a better spread, but I really don't know who he could lose to and how badly, or whom he beats for that matter. Could see Mario, Pikachu and Sonic also have a decent spread (few losing matchups). Besides Sheik, Mario and Pikachu probably lose to huge grab rewards since they kinda have to go in (Pikachu a bit less so) and characters who can break out of their combos easier, and Sonic loses to those few characters that can outright stop his nonsense (Sheik, ZSS, others?).

 

[Djent]

@ Trifroze IMO she loses to Sheik & Pika while the other MUs you mentioned are even. I'm currently working on a weighted MU chart (my own opinions + input from others to fill the gaps) and I can't find anyone else who comes close to having so few weaknesses. Diddy loses to Sheik & Luigi for sure, and might also struggle with Sonic/Pika so I'm not sold on him either.

 

[DanGR]

I would really like some insight on this. Did some number-crunching on Sonic Forward-B/Down-B counterplay and I'm displeased with the results.

Rosalina has a "just hold it out there" option (only against down-b. Haven't tested against close range side-b yet). You can slightly delay Luma's attacks via a few safe-ish methods in neutral, then d-tilt spam to prevent down-b from coming through. The alternating Luma/Rosalina d-tilt hitboxes cover grounded down-b reliably, and puts Rosalina in a good position after the clank. She can then crawl towards Sonic and potentially hit him with star bits if he stays in spin dash mode. It's not perfect, but it's something. But on block? Good luck.

 

[Djent]

A bit late, but RE: vs. , Komorikiri did beat Choco at KSB.