Official Viability Ratings v2 | Competitive Impressions

[_Sylvan_]

Has anyone tested anything with Pikachu? If so can they please let me know? Thank you :]

 

[|RK|]

I edited, but I want to make sure no one is confused. I misspoke - Fthrow to Upper Cutter is a thing. Fair to Upper Cutter is not.

 

[Nobie]

I was thinking about the issue of slow attacks, risk vs. reward, and what generally makes the best characters achieve their positions. Slow characters have tended to have problems competitively in Smash games due to an emphasis on mobility and safety, and while armor on attacks has helped some characters get around this, I wonder what would happen if more attacks had super armor at the end, rather than at the beginning.

Imagine if Bowser had super armor on the last few frames of his forward smash as he's recovering. He would still take damage and could even be grabbed out of it, but you wouldn't be able to exploit as easily for a KO in general. What this might do is make punishing the f-smash possible (hit him while he's winding up), but because you won't be able to wait it out as safely, he could throw it out as a "poke" of sorts, while at the same time forcing the opponent to jump straight into the mouth of the lion to counter it. In a way, it would be like how Meta Knight's f-smash is long startup, quick recovery, but something more in line with how heavies are in general.

That all said, the Shoryuken style of risk vs. reward is still A-OK, and I do think Smash 4 has done an incredible job of making heavies feel good to play. The above is just an idea I had about how a juggernaut character could be improved in neutral/disadvantage.

 

[Spinosaurus]

Please keep patch changes mostly to this thread:
http://smashboards.com/threads/tournament-mode-1-1-0-community-patch-notes.412130/#post-19790582

Quoting for the new page.

Move to that thread for the patch.

 

[Nysyr]

I've tested it, Fox's jab lock is removed but the multi hit part of his jab seems to hit more times before the opponent can escape.

This makes me soooo happy. Now the Lucario Fox matchup isn't down to "don't get jabbed."

Could probably change this from -2 to -1 with just that alone.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

Did we get any legal stages out of this patch by the way?
Also @ Man Li Gi try cargo up toss at mid percents.

 

[Man Li Gi]

Mario castle seems legit......just REALLY LARGE BOUNDARIES.

 

[Nobie]

This is related to the patch, but I wanted more to discuss some strategic applications, so I figured it'd be better off here.

Mewtwo's down smash got an increase in Knockback Growth (from 110 to 118, I think someone said?). Testing this out, the result is that now Mewtwo's D-Smash is a powerful kill move both vertically AND horizontally. Like, if you're near the ledge it can kill Mario at around 105-110%, but even if Mario's knocked towards the stage, at about 110-115% he just dies vertically instead. This is not factoring in DI of course.

It looks to me like Mewtwo now has two moves that pretty much work "anywhere," which are Up Throw and Down Smash.

 

[Mr. Johan]

Arcthunder guaranteed to combo into Fsmash if hit pointblank.

Arcthunder also guaranteed to combo into Arcfire at pointblank, which is then guaranteed to link into Usmash, which is a guaranteed kill on some characters at 85-95%, including Sheik and Fox.

Jesus. Must have been one potent Master Seal.

 

[Ikes]

can i get a full translated list of toon link changes?

 

[Blobface]

Ganon's U-throw is... less useless.

Ganondorf's F-air buff is a neat bonus. It's nothing big, but it does kill 5-20% earlier depending on rage/stage position, and damage is damage.

Ganondorf's D-smash buff is a huge deal. Not only is Ganon's D-smash frame 16 (read: almost unreactable), it's now almost as strong as his F-smash. This means Ganondorf should always be able to land optimal punishes regardless of what side of the stage he's on.

Full Rage fully charged D-smash can OHKO Jigglypuff on Smashville by the edge if it links properly. I know that's a mess of unlikely circumstances but still. What even.

 

[FullMoon]

So I think Greninja is a solid high tier character now.

His shurikens basically became Falco lasers now and he has footstool setups out of a throw, that's really big.

 

[Mr. Johan]

Robin is probably the biggest winner of this patch.

Getting a Hoo-Hah at 85%-105% depending on the character is crazy enough with that obscene Uair, but Arcthunder getting less cooldown means he has a reliable means to get that grab that doesn't lose to shield. Getting no changes in his autocanceling, disjointed aerial game is icing.

They gave Robin exactly what he needed without changing his mobility one bit. Fire Emblem Tier is eradicated completely now.

 

[TriTails]

Ganondorf's D-smash buff is a huge deal. Not only is Ganon's D-smash frame 16 (read: almost unreactable), it's now almost as strong as his F-smash. This means Ganondorf should always be able to land optimal punishes regardless of what side of the stage he's on.

Good. His D-smash was like a worse F-tilt/F-smash.

 

[Mario766]

Ike has more reasons to pick up Halberd and Delfino for his counter-picking choices, and makes Dream Land an even worse nightmare against him due to him now covering the top platform with a very dangerous, huge disjointed aerial that WILL you kill you on hit and can lead into very obscene air dodge read situations where you air dodge ONCE and die to up air at 70+.

 

[PK Gaming]

Sakurai and his team must have realized that Robin was literally on life support, and hooked him with an IV drip filled with buffs.

He's still shaky, but I think he'll make it.

 

[SpottedCerberus]

Meanwhile, Samus is as bad as she always was......except now she doesn't have as much company in the bottom tier.

She is lonely.

 

[C0rvus]

I'm still unsure of how the buffs will affect Robin's matchup spread, but his reward is on par with the upper cast now, which is awesome. Still slow with a bad grab and mediocre recovery, but we're in there. His weaknesses have gotten no better, though, so I doubt it will impact his placement on the tier list much at all.

At least Fox doesn't win against Robin for free anymore. Or Shulk. Or a bunch of others with no way out of the jab nonsense. This patch makes me happy.

 

[bc1910]

Greninja may be the biggest winner of this patch so far, certainly second behind Robin at least.

He can rep Shurikens at a rate only 2 frames slower than pre-1.0.4, and that rate was "outcamp Link" level.

Dthrow gives Greninja a true 50/50 kill setup at high% when it starts true comboing into Fair, airdodges can be baited and hit with sweet spot Usmash.

Unsure how the Dthrow buff will affect him (DI will probably ruin things) but the shuriken buff is huge.

Greninja got exactly what he needed.

 

[⑨ball]

Metaknight's sword trails match his animation. It's something I complained about for a long time, but now that I see it I'm conflicted because it reminds me how real the butter knife is.

Tbh even though Fox's jab cancels made a lot of MUs rougher than I'd like them to be, I was kind of ok with it because Fox has always been geared towards being a strong CQC fighter. He still is so I personally wouldn't call it a huge loss, but I don't main Fox. How reliant would players more familiar say he was on this?

WFT got her first set of buffs this patch. We're pretty happy about them.

 

[Mr. Johan]

@ C0rvus Robin basically got a new grab now. Arcthunder is now a mega-size grab that's disjointed, beats spotdodges, and does 10% "pummel damage" on top of the throw damage, at the cost of about 12 frames startup. That's not insignificant.

 

[Lavani]

I need to take this time to say I'm blown away by the Greninja buffs

All I wanted was for them to revert the endlag on Water Shuriken. Not only did they take it off the startup instead, but they reworked his dthrow on top of that?

I think I might actually be playing my secondary again.

Also this patch in general is just really cool.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

I need to take this time to say I'm blown away by the Greninja buffs

All I wanted was for them to revert the endlag on Water Shuriken. Not only did they take it off the startup instead, but they reworked his dthrow on top of that?

I think I might actually be playing my secondary again.

Also this patch in general is just really cool.

I was thinking the same thing I'm going to have to mess around with some characters but some of these changes are legit. I really like Lucas's changes makes .e rethink him now.

 

[Vipermoon]

Oh so Marth was sort of like heavily buffed and stuff.

His Nair damage now makes sense and it kind of is literally the strongest Nair in the game.

He happens to lag less on landing on his Fair, Bair, Uair, Dair, and Dolphin Slash.

Shield Breaker and Utilt (again) also lag less.

All of this stuff is confirmed I'm just spreading the word.

 

[Shaya]

Yoshi's back air is now secretly the goat (I'm guessing it now auto links IIRC what 366 is).
SDI modifier of 0.5 on first/second hits... it's probably going to be quite hard to fall out of now lol.

 

[Superbat]

Sinister Slush got his wish then lmao.

 

[Teshie U]

Samus missiles moving faster feels like a detriment in higher level play. The main reason she is alot better in customs is the slow missiles that set up intricate traps and cover her approaches.

 

[Ikes]

i've been thinking about nerfs for sheik and I came up with something

increase the startlag on needle charge and needle toss, reduce needles charged by 1
increase base knockback by fair so it cant be chained, but give it lower knockback growth
increase endlag on ftilt marginally and increase the base knockback
give the needles proper damage falloff
make the needles have random deviation, so each needle tossed will go at a slightly different angle, up or down. This way, needles have the potential to whiff one or two. but make the spread tight.

any thoughts?

 

[Tobi_Whatever]

i've been thinking about nerfs for sheik and I came up with something

increase the startlag on needle charge and needle toss, reduce needles charged by 1
increase base knockback by fair so it cant be chained, but give it lower knockback growth
increase endlag on ftilt marginally and increase the base knockback
give the needles proper damage falloff
make the needles have random deviation, so each needle tossed will go at a slightly different angle, up or down. This way, needles have the potential to whiff one or two. but make the spread tight.

any thoughts?

Random deviation on needles sounds awful. Why would you willingly implement RNG?

 

[Teshie U]

^I honestly would like to see her get her Melee fair back but maybe with a bit more lag. It would set up tech chases instead of auto combos.

But honestly I think she is fine. The development team is amazingly gearing more towards buffing weak characters instead of nerfing the hell out of strong ones.

Falcon, Sheik, Sonic, Rosa, Diddy and Fox got rebalances (some nerfs, some buffs) and contenders for worst in game are getting waves of power ups.

Hopefully in the future all characters can be fluid, safe and dangerous like Sheik.

 

[DunnoBro]

Luigi is wayyy dumber now holy crap

Around 30-50 for most middleweight/floaty chars, dthrow fair x2 (or fair > upair) works and puts the opponent in a situation where they can air dodge a third. But if luigi reads it, it happens just as he's landing and can shoryuken them. With the buffs to shoryuken, and the nerfs to fair creating this positioning at this percent (conveniently just after the percent of a 0% grab string on most chars) this means for most chars the optimal route is taking 40+% and having to worry about rage mode luigi cyclone killing them if they try to make a comeback

Of course, fast fallers have it even worse with regrab combos and general crap.

All this patch did for luigi was polarize him around his lack of an approach even more. Prepare to see a lot of timeouts if top players have to play against this mess more often.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

Luigi is wayyy dumber now holy crap

Around 30-50 for most middleweight/floaty chars, dthrow fair x2 (or fair > upair) works and puts the opponent in a situation where they can air dodge a third. But if luigi reads it, it happens just as he's landing and can shoryuken them. With the buffs to shoryuken, and the nerfs to fair creating this positioning at this percent (conveniently just after the percent of a 0% grab string on most chars) this means for most chars the optimal route is taking 40+% and having to worry about rage mode luigi cyclone killing them if they try to make a comeback

Of course, fast fallers have it even worse with regrab combos and general crap.

All this patch did for luigi was polarize him around his lack of an approach even more. Prepare to see a lot of timeouts if top players have to play against this mess more often.

I saw mrconcon post a video where he does grab dthrow fair nair regrab dthrown fair nair regrab dthtow dair luigi cyclone for the gimp. Looked pretty neat. I may have to pick up weegee.

 

[Ghostbone]

Yea Luigi got buffed lmao.
Fireball is worse but it still does its job of forcing the other player to react if they don't have a better projectile, and fair does less damage but links into other stuff for longer, and d-throw > up-b is way easier now (and trapping your opponent into grounded up-b is way more threatening).

 

[bc1910]

Sheik's Fair change is really bizarre. Less damage makes little difference since damage dealt was never the problem with that move (though it is getting really low now...). More landing lag is like whatever because the autocancel window is still insane, for which she gets no landing lag at all. The knockback change makes it harder to chain off the stage but it still combos into Bouncing Fish really well, even better at some percents, so damage output hasn't really been nerfed there.

Seems really pointless overall. Why would you nerf the landing lag and not the autocancel window?

 

[The pig-keeper]

Woohooooo !

They got it all right on fox's jab this time !
it's like.. No nerf (it can be argued) no buff but what any sensei would fight for : Balance.

Oh and yeah,it seems they've finally decided to give lucina what she deserves. And by that I mean that she obviously needs more consistent damage. Even though it was just seen as an obligation since marth got buffed.. But hey, no big deal !

 

[Ikes]

so do people just find it impossible to actually play somewhat aggro as luigi?

I dont buy the "he has no approach" BS, That's what fireball covers, it's not just a grab tool.

I just don't see how people find Luigi that terrible to fight, I dont see why anyone would let the timer run out ever, I don't even see how luigi can reliably manage that.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Sheik's Fair change is really bizarre. Less damage makes little difference since damage dealt was never the problem with that move (though it is getting really low now...). More landing lag is like whatever because the autocancel window is still insane, for which she gets no landing lag at all. The knockback change makes it harder to chain off the stage but it still combos into Bouncing Fish really well, even better at some percents, so damage output hasn't really been nerfed there.

Seems really pointless overall. Why would you nerf the landing lag and not the autocancel window?

Nah, Sheik fair damage nerf is really huge. Look at it from this perspective. Fair was and still is by far the best move Sheik has, and Sheik will continue to get a very large amount of her overall damage from hitting with that move. That basically means Sheik plays the exact same way as before but just takes longer to win. Thus, if you are using a character who is reasonably good and could beat Sheik in the first place, your winning odds improve since you win at the same rate as before while she wins slower. I think the fair landing lag thing will probably matter some (Sheik's fair was possible to make safe even without the AC; that may not be true anymore which limits her fair pressure timing options at least slightly), but the damage thing I think will show itself to be a really big deal. I'm doubting it will remove Sheik from her perch as #1 in the game, but it very likely will change the situation of her needing to be in a tier by herself.

 

[Ikes]

Nah, Sheik fair damage nerf is really huge. Look at it from this perspective. Fair was and still is by far the best move Sheik has, and Sheik will continue to get a very large amount of her overall damage from hitting with that move. That basically means Sheik plays the exact same way as before but just takes longer to win. Thus, if you are using a character who is reasonably good and could beat Sheik in the first place, your winning odds improve since you win at the same rate as before while she wins slower. I think the fair landing lag thing will probably matter some (Sheik's fair was possible to make safe even without the AC; that may not be true anymore which limits her fair pressure timing options at least slightly), but the damage thing I think will show itself to be a really big deal. I'm doubting it will remove Sheik from her perch as #1 in the game, but it very likely will change the situation of her needing to be in a tier by herself.

not to mention 90% of the cast have super underdeveloped metas and have the potential to be better than their current consideration, further shortening the gaps between characters and tiers.

 

[AlMoStLeGeNdArY]

so do people just find it impossible to actually play somewhat aggro as luigi?

I dont buy the "he has no approach" BS, That's what fireball covers, it's not just a grab tool.

I just don't see how people find Luigi that terrible to fight, I dont see why anyone would let the timer run out ever, I don't even see how luigi can reliably manage that.

It's not Luigi running the time but the other player.

 

[bc1910]

I don't think the Fair change will make any real difference to Sheik but you made some good points, I don't disagree with anything you said. It just seems like yes, while Sheik will have to slap you around for longer, she can slap you around just as easily. I do concede, though, that this will have a large-ish impact on her 5:5s and maybe 55:45s.

Can someone explain to me what happened with Luigi's fireballs? Did they actually get nerfed?