Official Viability Ratings v2 | Competitive Impressions

[Ffamran]

So... walking... Which characters do you think benefit the most from walking? ... This sounds like a stupid question... Seriously though, I remember - maybe incorrectly - people saying walking for Meta Knight is really good. You have other characters like Little Mac, Marth, Lucina, Fox, etc. who don't have to commit and have more options by walking. Then there's characters like Falco where running's not really that great otherwise for chasing or Captain Falcon where running's pretty much better since his walk is really, really slow. At the same time, Trela walked most of the time with Ryu and Ryu's walk speed is considered slow.

This question comes from watching AC's match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7njcy7cYdI. The way AC moved with Falco makes me feel like he's playing Street Fighter, but with air combos. And his Sheik was like Rain's where he's more conservative and patient. Also, more evidence for if you're fighting Falco, never get behind him. Eating metal boots isn't exactly healthy...

Paragon's top 32 had a Falco because of AC who is a Meta Knight main? with a pocket Sheik. Challonge: http://paragon.challonge.com/la_2015_smash4_singles. If I had an image of what that would look like, it would be Falco hanging onto Meta Knight's feet as Meta Knight struggles to fly or glide and Sheik's just chillin' somewhere waiting for a Sheikah symbol to save Meta Knight's *** from Falco's idiocy.

 

[Iron Kraken]

Dabuz has been saying that he doesn't think will be viable once people catch onto her tricks. Although I think that's a bit too gloom and doom, I do agree that when it comes to Rosa in particular, people struggle with her because they're not experienced in the match up. Even pros often won't realize when exactly Luma can do Luma things and when it can't.

As a Rosa player, I have a much easier time fighting Dabuz in the ditto than I do against his Olimar. Also, I play other good Rosa players all the time, and don't find the character all that difficult to deal with even when I use secondaries I'm not particularly good with like Dark Pit. In general, I find Rosalina just about the easiest character for me to deal with of all the perceived "top tiers."

Here's a tweet from @AceStarThe3rd I can fully endorse: https://twitter.com/AceStarThe3rd/status/640723082974527488

So yeah, as time goes on and people become more experienced in the match up, I see her place on the tier list falling. At worst she'll be high tier, but she's not going to be able to keep up with some of Smash 4's good speedy characters.



These match ups are clearly bad for her IMO (I know Dabuz beat Tyrant, it's still a bad match up). Olimar has always been one of the characters I've believed to be tough for Rosa, and at Paragon he lost in winners bracket to Rich Brown, another Olimar player.

also deserves a mention for being tough for Rosa, if for no other reason than Fatality beat Dabuz's Rosa something like 9 out of 10 in friendlies from what I heard. (This is why Dabuz went strictly Olimar against him at Super Smash Con).

holds his own against Rosa when played in the more campy (Static Manny) fashion.

Electroshock is amazing in the match up. He can take Luma off the field at will.

does surprisingly well against Rosa. Her anti-Luma game is really strong. I feel like this match up is close to a 50/50 but I thought I'd bring it up because I know most people wouldn't expect that.

There's several other characters who I believe have roughly even-ish to only slightly losing match ups against Rosa.
But she does have some great match ups against some top characters, including . The only other character with positive match ups against all five of them is Sheik.

 

[TurboLink]

So... walking... Which characters do you think benefit the most from walking? ... This sounds like a stupid question... Seriously though, I remember - maybe incorrectly - people saying walking for Meta Knight is really good. You have other characters like Little Mac, Marth, Lucina, Fox, etc. who don't have to commit and have more options by walking. Then there's characters like Falco where running's not really that great otherwise for chasing or Captain Falcon where running's pretty much better since his walk is really, really slow. At the same time, Trela walked most of the time with Ryu and Ryu's walk speed is considered slow.

This question comes from watching AC's match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7njcy7cYdI. The way AC moved with Falco makes me feel like he's playing Street Fighter, but with air combos. And his Sheik was like Rain's where he's more conservative and patient. Also, more evidence of if you're fighting Falco, never get behind him. Eating metal boots isn't exactly healthy...

Paragon's top 32 had a Falco because of AC who is a Meta Knight main? with a pocket Sheik. Challonge: http://paragon.challonge.com/la_2015_smash4_singles. If I had an image of what that would look like, it would be Falco hanging onto Meta Knight's feet as Meta Knight struggles to fly or glide and Sheik's just chillin' somewhere waiting for a Sheikah symbol to save Meta Knight's *** from Falco's idiocy.

Link and Toon Link.

 

[migul]

Ergo, we should remove all characters but two. This would ensure maximum balance, "in percentage terms."


But seriously, this weekend we had 7 characters in Melee top 12 and 13 in Smash 4--which didn't include well-regarded threats like Pikachu, Luigi, or Wario, much less threats just outside that fringe like Lucario, Marth, Pit, DK, ect.

Melee had 11 in top 32. Smash 4 had 20.

Sorry mate, but your math is worse than Larry's.

Melee had 42% of its cast in top 32, 4 had 38%. Mathematically Melee still has more variety.

 

[Ffamran]

Link and Toon Link.

These two also benefit from foxtrots and pivots heavily. Either of them can bait you into eating a Ftilt and their Ftilts are ridiculous; Link's is really strong and covers well while Toon Link just moves fast, so it's kind of wacky for him to run, stop, and then slap you with a Ftilt. Then you remember Link's Jump Attack and if he baits you with that, it's like an easier version of a stutter Side Smash.

 

[Thinkaman]

Melee had 42% of its cast in top 32, 4 had 38%. Mathematically Melee still has more variety.

Ergo, we should remove all characters but two. This would ensure maximum balance, "in percentage terms."

 

[Trifroze]

So... walking... Which characters do you think benefit the most from walking? ... This sounds like a stupid question... Seriously though, I remember - maybe incorrectly - people saying walking for Meta Knight is really good. You have other characters like Little Mac, Marth, Lucina, Fox, etc. who don't have to commit and have more options by walking. Then there's characters like Falco where running's not really that great otherwise for chasing or Captain Falcon where running's pretty much better since his walk is really, really slow. At the same time, Trela walked most of the time with Ryu and Ryu's walk speed is considered slow.

I find that initial walk speed is far more important than top walk speed. Characters like Samus and Ryu have below average top walk speeds but their initial walk speeds are amazing, letting them quickly cover short distances between shielding/stopping which is what walk is mostly used for. Good tilts definitely make walking more useful as well, can't help but think of Snake in Brawl. On the other hand, ZSS for example has a walk speed that's close to Fox and Marth, but her initial speed and acceleration are average so she reaches her max speed slowly. Combine that with high traction and shielding + walking short distances becomes almost useless.

Melee had 42% of its cast in top 32, 4 had 38%. Mathematically Melee still has more variety.

To be fair ~40% out of 55 is much more impressive than ~40% out of 26. That and it's mathematically harder to fit 55 into 32 than it is to fit 26 into 32.

 

[Gawain]

Ergo, we should remove all characters but two. This would ensure maximum balance, "in percentage terms."


But seriously, this weekend we had 7 characters in Melee top 12 and 13 in Smash 4--which didn't include well-regarded threats like Pikachu, Luigi, or Wario, much less threats just outside that fringe like Lucario, Marth, Pit, DK, ect.

Melee had 11 in top 32. Smash 4 had 20.

Sorry mate, but your math is worse than Larry's.

Looking like you've got a nice strawman there. Way to take what I've said and totally change the meaning.

Yeah, one tournament's representation really dictates how every past event has gone. Spare me your little quips buddy. What a ****ty post. Why am I even responding to it.

Nerfs are a better idea when some characters have tools that are so powerful or polarizing that other characters would need to get over the top buffs to compete with them, resulting in massive random imbalances among each other.

I think this sentence is important. I am, for the most part, against nerfing the really good characters too much, but especially for a lot of matchups, it's usually one or two moves that are blatantly causing major issues for the losing character. While they probably wouldn't start winning the matchup just by changing these moves, it would make the matches a whole lot closer. Needles take a dump on a large part of the cast, it's just one example though. I'm not too sure what kind of fix would really help much without hurting Sheik a lot. I think it would be unfair to just increase the startup and take away Sheik's neat needle combos. Maybe increase the ground startup but leave the aerial version's startup unchanged? Not sure.

 

[FullMoon]

So... walking... Which characters do you think benefit the most from walking? ... This sounds like a stupid question... Seriously though, I remember - maybe incorrectly - people saying walking for Meta Knight is really good. You have other characters like Little Mac, Marth, Lucina, Fox, etc. who don't have to commit and have more options by walking. Then there's characters like Falco where running's not really that great otherwise for chasing or Captain Falcon where running's pretty much better since his walk is really, really slow. At the same time, Trela walked most of the time with Ryu and Ryu's walk speed is considered slow.

This question comes from watching AC's match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7njcy7cYdI. The way AC moved with Falco makes me feel like he's playing Street Fighter, but with air combos. And his Sheik was like Rain's where he's more conservative and patient. Also, more evidence for if you're fighting Falco, never get behind him. Eating metal boots isn't exactly healthy...

Paragon's top 32 had a Falco because of AC who is a Meta Knight main? with a pocket Sheik. Challonge: http://paragon.challonge.com/la_2015_smash4_singles. If I had an image of what that would look like, it would be Falco hanging onto Meta Knight's feet as Meta Knight struggles to fly or glide and Sheik's just chillin' somewhere waiting for a Sheikah symbol to save Meta Knight's *** from Falco's idiocy.

Well Greninja has a fast walk and if he uses D-Tilt while walking he slides and if he hits someone with it he gets a guaranteed Up-Smash kill out of it.

That's about all he has from walking I think.

 

[Ffamran]

I find that initial walk speed is far more important than top walk speed. Characters like Samus and Ryu have below average top walk speeds but their initial walk speeds are amazing, letting them quickly cover short distances between shielding/stopping which is what walk is mostly used for. Good tilts definitely make walking more useful as well, can't help but think of Snake in Brawl. On the other hand, ZSS for example has a walk speed that's close to Fox and Marth, but her initial speed and acceleration are average so she reaches her max speed slowly. Combine that with high traction and shielding + walking short distances becomes almost useless.

Main issue is we don't have data for initial walk speeds as far as I'm aware of. Aside from Roy, most walk speeds kind of look average - it's mostly based on feels and in most cases, people run more than walk. I think Palutena has a high initial walk speed - she struts in those heels - and Little Mac's is kind of weird. His fast walk kind of starts out slow while his mid-speed walk, the skipping, feels average to fast. Still, like I said, I don't know what everyone's initial walk speed are.

Anyway, main thing was walking in general and the options available from it. Falco's tilts are all fast, safe, have good range, and work wonders for spacing and playing footsies. Having a fast walk speed just adds onto it. Similarly Fox's tilts are all fast and safe and he walks quickly. His Ftilt actually moves him slightly forward meaning he could walk, leave a bit of space, and then Ftilt moving him forward to cover that empty space or run in to do a pivot Ftilt. Little Mac going from fast to even faster means he gets a lot of control by walking versus committing to a run. A Marth walking and hitting tipper Ftilt is scary. He has total control and his frame 8 Ftilt is pretty strong and not as expected as his Side Smash. And then there's Mega Man, the only character who can jab/tilt while walking without stopping and he can do a Nair out of that too without stopping.

 

[Gawain]

So... walking... Which characters do you think benefit the most from walking? ... This sounds like a stupid question... Seriously though, I remember - maybe incorrectly - people saying walking for Meta Knight is really good. You have other characters like Little Mac, Marth, Lucina, Fox, etc. who don't have to commit and have more options by walking. Then there's characters like Falco where running's not really that great otherwise for chasing or Captain Falcon where running's pretty much better since his walk is really, really slow. At the same time, Trela walked most of the time with Ryu and Ryu's walk speed is considered slow.

This question comes from watching AC's match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7njcy7cYdI. The way AC moved with Falco makes me feel like he's playing Street Fighter, but with air combos. And his Sheik was like Rain's where he's more conservative and patient. Also, more evidence for if you're fighting Falco, never get behind him. Eating metal boots isn't exactly healthy...

Paragon's top 32 had a Falco because of AC who is a Meta Knight main? with a pocket Sheik. Challonge: http://paragon.challonge.com/la_2015_smash4_singles. If I had an image of what that would look like, it would be Falco hanging onto Meta Knight's feet as Meta Knight struggles to fly or glide and Sheik's just chillin' somewhere waiting for a Sheikah symbol to save Meta Knight's *** from Falco's idiocy.

Well, about Trela, walking is REALLY good for Ryu, especially if your opponent is in srk death percentages. If you're at like 90, and Ryu is walking towards you, at any moment he could convert into an uptilt or dtilt which is probably the end of your stock. And he takes very little risk to do it too. He can basically go from an easy link into a kill move or into a shield from the same type of advance. So Ryu definitely benefits a ton from walking, regardless of speed. It's actually probably more threatening then him dashing at you most of the time.

 

[TurboLink]

These two also benefit from foxtrots and pivots heavily. Either of them can bait you into eating a Ftilt and their Ftilts are ridiculous; Link's is really strong and covers well while Toon Link just moves fast, so it's kind of wacky for him to run, stop, and then slap you with a Ftilt. Then you remember Link's Jump Attack and if he baits you with that, it's like an easier version of a stutter Side Smash.

And they both are the only characters in the game who can block projectiles while walking.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

Are... people saying there isnt enough character variety in top level Smash 4? And they're blaming it on... balance?

I'm starting to think that we aren't playing the same game at this point.

 

[Thinkaman]

Looking like you've got a nice strawman there. Way to take what I've said and totally change the meaning.

Yeah, one tournament's representation really dictates how every past event has gone. Spare me your little quips buddy. What a ****ty post. Why am I even responding to it.

I am completely beside myself and have no idea how to respond to the idea that balance is measured as a percentage of roster size. This is literally the most inane concept I've ever read on smashboards.

There were X characters who placed in Melee, and Y characters who placed in Smash 4. The roster size of either is completely and utterly irrelevant.

By this logic, if every player in the top 32 played three totally unique characters each, but the game had 1000 characters, its balance would be poop--yet a game with only 1 character has 100% representation and is perfect.

But apparently having to state such an obvious flaw in this inane definition of "mathematical balance" is a "strawman."


As far as Paragon goes, it was very much in line of other major tourneys within the past year. Melee had 12 characters used in the top 64 at EVO--the same as Paragon plus a certain red Yoshi. Smash 4 had 21 in the top 32, with some slight variations from Paragon.

 

[Trifroze]

Main issue is we don't have data for initial walk speeds as far as I'm aware of. Aside from Roy, most walk speeds kind of look average - it's mostly based on feels and in most cases, people run more than walk. I think Palutena has a high initial walk speed - she struts in those heels - and Little Mac's is kind of weird. His fast walk kind of starts out slow while his mid-speed walk, the skipping, feels average to fast. Still, like I said, I don't know what everyone's initial walk speed are.

http://smashboards.com/threads/smash-4-running-walking-speed-rankings.371564/page-2#post-18647333

Not sure whether min walk equals initial walk, but based on the tests I've done the characters with higher min walk speeds start out much faster when compared to ones with lower values.

 

[Ghostbone]

But seriously, this weekend we had 7 characters in Melee top 12 and 13 in Smash 4--which didn't include well-regarded threats like Pikachu, Luigi, or Wario, much less threats just outside that fringe like Lucario, Marth, Pit, DK, ect.

Melee had 11 in top 32. Smash 4 had 20.

Yea but, two characters are a threat to actually win nationals in smash 4 (Sheik and ZSS), while melee has 5 (Fox, Falco, Marth, Sheik, Jigglypuff). People will disagree with this opinion but that's expected because this is the smash 4 boards.

I'd rather characters in smash 4 all be Sheik/ZSS level rather than be nerfed down to Pit level or something.

 

[Ffamran]

http://smashboards.com/threads/smash-4-running-walking-speed-rankings.371564/page-2#post-18647333

Not sure whether min walk equals initial walk, but based on the tests I've done the characters with higher min walk speeds start out much faster when compared to ones with lower values.

Wouldn't min walk be the slowest walking speed they can do?

 

[Thinkaman]

Yea but, two characters are a threat to actually win nationals in smash 4 (Sheik and ZSS), while melee has 5 (Fox, Falco, Marth, Sheik, Jigglypuff). People will disagree with this opinion but that's expected because this is the smash 4 boards.

I'd rather characters in smash 4 all be Sheik/ZSS level rather than be nerfed down to Pit level or something.

Two players are a threat to win nationals in Smash 4, while Melee has 5.

From a results-only standpoint, there's no disputing that Sheik performed worse at "winning nationals" than 6 other characters this weekend. (5 placed higher, and Mr. R wisely resorted to Ryu in his final hours.)

I'm not arguing that Sheik isn't the best character, but if the hard results of nationals are the only data that matter to you...

 

[Steelballray]

What are the chances that ZeRo is the main reason Sheik is regarded so highly and is in her own tier list relative to the rest of the characters? Is it a flat out 0% ?

I, in my very inexperienced opinion, think that even though she is the best, there isn't all that much of a gigantic gap between her and the rest of the top 10. That no matter how good she is wewe still overestimated her a lot because of Zero. @ Ffamran made a very lovely post a while ago regarding memes and low tiers. I think it's the same issue here but in reverse.

(Please do not murder me I just have been wondering about this for a while and wanted to get your input)

Edit: its not my point that it's only ZeRo making her look good. I know she got more reps but yeah him being the best made me type his name in)

 

[Raijinken]

What are the chances that ZeRo is the main reason Sheik is regarded so highly and is in her own tier list relative to the rest of the characters? Is it a flat out 0% ?

I, in my very inexperienced opinion, think that even though she is the best, there isn't all that much of a gigantic gap between her and the rest of the top 10. That no matter how good she is wewe still overestimated her a lot because of Zero. @ Ffamran made a very lovely post a while ago regarding memes and low tiers. I think it's the same issue here but in reverse.

(Please do not murder me I just have been wondering about this for a while and wanted to get your input)

Zero swapped to Sheik relatively late compared to a lot of other players, if I recall. To say nothing of him still going back to Diddy for EVO grand finals.

I wouldn't put the chance at 0%, but I don't think he's the cause for her dominance. Even back in the 3DS days players like Denti were experimenting with her and finding her to be extremely versatile and powerful. It just wasn't until Diddy was taken down a notch that her dominant (if less simplistic than pre-nerf Diddy) kit became widespread. A bit like how most people overlook the other good non-Metaknight characters in Brawl (bar the obvious lack of official patching in Brawl).

I'd agree that the gap between her and other good Smash4 characters isn't that huge, maybe Melee Fox vs its other choices or even less, but it's still hard to call her anything short of top when she has few, if any, relevant drawbacks.

 

[Djent]

Sheik has maybe 1 even/bad MU, and everyone else has at least 3 or 4. I do think she's in a league of her own, but more in the way of Melee Fox and less like Brawl MK/ICs.

Though her most Brawl-MKish feature is how overrated her alleged "weakness" is. Killing safely >> killing early, even with rage.

 

[Raijinken]

Sheik has maybe 1 even/bad MU, and everyone else has at least 3 or 4. I do think she's in a league of her own, but more in the way of Melee Fox and less like Brawl MK/ICs.

Though her most Brawl-MKish feature is how overrated her alleged "weakness" is. Killing safely >> killing early, even with rage.

Killing late matters so little when racking damage is easy and you have as many kill setups as uair and Bouncing Fish give. It's a weakness, but hardly a relevant one in most cases.

 

[DunnoBro]

Sounds like poor theory to be honest.
Upsmash beats any non-disjointed move head-on. The art is to play arround upsmash. You shouldn't get hit by upsmash at top level play except for hard reads.
Why does Luigi gimp Diddy better than other characters? I don't even think Diddy is really gimpable. His recovery is insane.
I don't even think Luigi can really catch Diddy. This might be a 100:0 MU on Duck Hunt after getting a stock lead.
Most probably the Diddys just need to adjust their playstyle against Luigi.
People already said in Brawl that the Luigi MU is so bad for Diddy, I just can't believe that this really is the case.

No dude.

First, diddy's banana follow-ups don't work too well on luigi due to his traction. Not to mention losing to fireballs, this means diddy's neutral and keepaway game is severely hindered.

Second, luigi gets WAY more reward on grab. If diddy is forced to fight luigi at close range, he will lose. Luigi's damage output and kill confirms off grabs are just far superior. His jab and fireball also give him an edge in the footsies game.

Thirdly, luigi has a one-sided edgeguarding game on diddy. Diddy can do very little to edgeguard luigi while luigi's cyclone covers a LOT of diddy's options. (Monkey flip sweetspot and upspecial)

Yea, diddy can play keepaway with a lead. But the thing is he has to go in eventually and he'll need to beat luigi about 2-3 times as much in the neutral as luigi needs to beat him.

Yeah, one tournament's representation really dictates how every past event has gone. Spare me your little quips buddy. What a ****ty post. Why am I even responding to it.

Not a single national has had more character variety in melee than it has for smash 4 :/

Also your "in percentage terms" is a desperate attempt to try fudging the numbers. A larger percentage of characters are viable in smash 4, and even beyond having more characters, there's more variety overall.

You're trying to use a miniscule sample size like top 8s and 32s to try making the gap between viable casts view melee more favorably due to a smaller cast and the inability to actually have too many different characters in top placings. But the end result smash 4 still always has more variety, and when we use larger sample sizes like 64 and 128 we see smash 4 has a far greater level of variety even "in percentage terms"

 

[Dre89]

I don't get the logic behind 'this character only has one good player, so they shouldn't be considered viable because it's an outlier' how does the number of players performing with the character at a high level affect how good their kit is?

Even if it's only one player performing, that shows that the characters kit is good enough to do well at the highest level if you're a good enough player. It proves that there is an achievable skill level that allows someone to overcome the character's flaws.

If people are going to confuse how far you can take a character in tourneys with how much skill they require then you might as well say that no one is viable because 99% of the playerbase isn't good enough to place in money. Might as well say all the top players are just 'outliers', seeing as they're only a fraction of the player-base of their respective characters.

 

[Steelballray]

Sheik has maybe 1 even/bad MU, and everyone else has at least 3 or 4. I do think she's in a league of her own, but more in the way of Melee Fox and less like Brawl MK/ICs.

That's my point though. I think if people people broke out of the mentality that all matchups are on her favor they will find some that she loses. I understand thats very hard to do though. When you believe something for so long it becomes almost impossible to think something else.. Unless a nerf hits her. And then people would be all like "She ain't viable now!!!" No matter what the real outcome is. Aka what happened to Diddy.

 

[RedBeefBaron]

No dude.

First, diddy's banana follow-ups don't work too well on luigi due to his traction. Not to mention losing to fireballs, this means diddy's neutral and keepaway game is severely hindered.

Second, luigi gets WAY more reward on grab. If diddy is forced to fight luigi at close range, he will lose. Luigi's damage output and kill confirms off grabs are just far superior. His jab and fireball also give him an edge in the footsies game.

Thirdly, luigi has a one-sided edgeguarding game on diddy. Diddy can do very little to edgeguard luigi while luigi's cyclone covers a LOT of diddy's options. (Monkey flip sweetspot and upspecial)

Yea, diddy can play keepaway with a lead. But the thing is he has to go in eventually and he'll need to beat luigi about 2-3 times as much in the neutral as luigi needs to beat him.

Diddy's peels actually work fine if you get used to the way he falls but yeah. Diddy still loses because of how Luigi can easily beat diddy's attacks and cause trades which he wins really hard, and he doesn't have to win nuetral nearly as much.

Fireballs beating peels can be a problem but Diddy can actually punish the clash with proper spacing since the fireball nerf. But good Luigis won't use fireballs against Diddy at this range when he has a peel in hand.

 

[Shaya]

Whoosh, big catch up.
Hmm.

A lot of meta posts, I should've kept a tab on them all and quoted them here. But for the most part people's "this is what the thread should be about" have been mostly accurate while overlapping. I veer thematically away from us being a social although I know it's a refuge (in contrast to the norm) for mixed smash conversation at a competitive level for many people (including myself).
I "think" in terms of personal/impersonal in most things, and the focus of any conversation here should always be impersonal (it's also how I moderate/work/etc). Personal anecdotes or reflections are fine framed as such, but still the topic should never/rarely be personal. I don't really mind any instance of a one off post of any sort; joke, story or even a bad tier list, but due to how they distract and derail if one person slips up the usually silent 'ignore bad post' rule (also the acknowledge and move on rule), the avalanche starts (it's like people speeding on a highway behind someone else speeding because only the guy in front would get pulled over). People have probably picked up by now that's how we operate ideally, mostly self-regulated and within bounds of respect.

Certain topics are going to be more likely to happen here due to who people play and who gets the most exposure. Sheik nerfs, tsundere sword mains and cool sword (Marth~) mains, etc, are topics most feel they can put in their two cents for but they do become regurgitated stuff. However there's nothing wrong or stopping another topic being brought up that is a bit "fresher". Some do make earnest attempts that often fall to the wayside, the aforementioned conditions wash out the good, but the good could be 'better'; an argument augmented with referential information of any sort (videos / etc) gets peoples juices flowing a lot easier and helps diminish the confusion that's involved in talking in depth about a character very few people have seen.
We're at this stage of the game where being a low ranked character is either due to an abundant amount of information that equates to a consistent showing of poor ability (pre-patch Robin, Little Mac, Duck Hunt, etc are good examples) or don't have enough data/exposure to justify them being above anyone else in a similar state (the reverse conditions at the top also hold true). Rather than this being a reason for frustration, it should just be a reflection of the difficulty involved in understanding (and playing) them, hence in expression as well. The viability ratings project at it's foremost is about helping to declutter the paradigm of competitive viability and is [hopefully] an easy thing to reference and base discussions on (i.e. how official tier lists of the past have worked).

In general the other issue I feel I need to stamp out is pure aggression of any sort. In talking about something we all have a passion for, the likelihood of emotion twangs are high (I'm not infallible either), using an iron fist to deal with it is complicated. The amount of "these people something something negative" is getting a bit much. If semantic arguments were the anti-meta we easily "see" and now obliterate, a similar demon in misconstruing people's words and pettiness has flourished a bit (we kill this off and something else will sprout up I'm sure). Calling someone out is fine and has usually been a positive response when done appropriately here, but the rest has no place.

I know that I can often fail to articulate certain notions, maybe I could request a third-party perspective on what the standards are for here that are easier to understand, especially for newer contributors. I suppose it should probably mention that getting infractions are good for everyone (PM me if you want to discuss any of this btw).

 

[Minordeth]

Catch up notes:

- Ike was more notable than Peach because he had a couple reps beating national level players (Ally, Static Manny, etc.) consistently.

- Peach is more notable now because SlayerZ is starting to take names as well. To be fair though, SlayerZ has been taking names for a while. I mean, a Peach over (probably) the best solo Sheik main? And now ESAM and whoever else? Impressive stuff.

- Which leads me to the delicate line between player skill and character potential. SlayerZ may be in the ESAM bracket, where a stellar player muddles the actual potential of a character. To be absolutely fair to both, however, there is no way they would be placing, or had been placing, as well as they did without their respective characters being good. You don't have consecutive wins at different events over national level players if your character is balls tier.

- I don't know where Peach should be. I think she is turning into a viable character though, along with Ike and Ryu. I'm also basing this on Dark Peach doing some leg work early on with some dedicated Peach meta stuff. Too bad he doesn't seem to play any more.

- It's telling that Mr. R went Ryu with money on the line and to be fair, in that set, his Ryu was 2-1 over Ally's Mario. Trela also made quite the showing, as did 6WX. Ryu's meta is just beginning so we shall see if his meta growth is X or X^2.

- How far above the rest of the cast Sheik is still debatable. We still see top level players switch out from her. It may be for reasons, but a switch is a switch.

- Melee vs Sm4sh is dumb.

 

[Evello]

Zero swapped to Sheik relatively late compared to a lot of other players, if I recall. To say nothing of him still going back to Diddy for EVO grand finals.

I wouldn't put the chance at 0%, but I don't think he's the cause for her dominance. Even back in the 3DS days players like Denti were experimenting with her and finding her to be extremely versatile and powerful. It just wasn't until Diddy was taken down a notch that her dominant (if less simplistic than pre-nerf Diddy) kit became widespread. A bit like how most people overlook the other good non-Metaknight characters in Brawl (bar the obvious lack of official patching in Brawl).

I'd agree that the gap between her and other good Smash4 characters isn't that huge, maybe Melee Fox vs its other choices or even less, but it's still hard to call her anything short of top when she has few, if any, relevant drawbacks.

From what I saw, Sheik was pretty much the unanimous #2 in the game prior to Diddy's nerfs, so ZeRo definitely wasn't the reason Sheik rose to prominence. A few people were even arguing that Sheik was better than pre-nerf Diddy. She was almost immediately recognized as a great character.

That said, I feel like Sheik's recent results have actually been slightly underwhelming for how much talk there is of her defining the metagame. There were only 2 Sheik mains in the Top 16 at Smash Con, 4 at PAX, and 3 at Paragon. Ignoring ZeRo, the best Sheik players seem pretty evenly matched with the best players using the other so-called top tiers. Mr R, who is arguably the 2nd best Sheik in the world, has even switched characters a bit during important recent games, like his Ryu switch at Paragon. This makes me think the gap between her and the current #2 may be even smaller than with Melee Fox (who had at least 4, 4, and 5 mains in the Top 16 of those same tourneys, depending on how you define it). In fairness, matchup knowledge might be one alternative explanation of this trend. Depite the meta still being so new and volatile, Sheik is common enough that every pro player has loads of experience against her, which puts Sheik mains at an obvious disadvantage compared to players using Rosa, Pika, or other lesser-understood threats.

 

[LancerStaff]

Electroshock is amazing in the match up. He can take Luma off the field at will.

Mind if I bend an ear for a moment? What do you use against Electroshock as a punish? And do you think the matchup is bad, or is it just awkward for Rosalina?

 

[Iron Kraken]

Mind if I bend an ear for a moment? What do you use against Electroshock as a punish? And do you think the matchup is bad, or is it just awkward for Rosalina?

The match up isn't bad for Rosalina, I'd say it's even-ish. But if the Dark Pit player has a good understanding of Rosalina's tendencies, then Dark Pit has the tools to take advantage of them.

If you're asking how I choose to punish Electroshock as Rosa, it really just depends. But the good thing for Dark Pit is that as long as Electroshock kills Luma, there isn't really too much Rosa can do as far as a punish is concerned. Without Luma her up-smash won't start KOing Dark Pit until over 130%, and she has few good damage output options without Luma.

 

[BSP]

Pac Mains, being completely honest, how much do you think you benefit from matchup inexperience?

It depends on the MU. For example, lots of the faster characters like Sonic, Falcon, Little Mac, ZSS, Fox, etc. can run right through Pac-Man's fire hydrant when it's on the ground. When the opponent knows this, hydrant becomes a bit weaker as a distraction because they'll run through it instead of jumping / rolling. Smart people also ignore the hydrant in general.

For the fruits, it becomes a lot harder to land them when the opponent knows all of their trajectories + pays attention to the sound cues. A lot of people also don't realize how easy it is to clank with or catch them. They're not unusable or anything, but Pac-Man has to be smarter to land them if you're familiar with them.

So he definitely benefits from MU inexperience, but I can't really quantify it. He doesn't benefit enough to make him win majors or anything though.

Basically, how many of your (admittedly strong) gimmicks go unpunished even though they are punishable?

Do you have an MUs that require a secondary?

It depends. Some characters just aren't fast enough to consistently punish whiffed trampolines. For the characters that can, it doesn't take long to catch on. Outside of that, I can't think of any gimmicks he has that appear safe but are punishable...I already mentioned running through hydrants. I guess his side B might still be deceiving. Hitting the pellet should be common knowledge now. Oh, and his lower bonus fruits on shield. If cherry, strawberry, orange, apple, or melon hit your shield, it's very easy to take them afterwards. Don't make it too obvious because Pac-Man can punish you for theft if you attempt it the same way every time.

I think Zage would say Lucario might require a secondary. I can't say for certain. I don't think he has any unwinnables, but he's got some uphill battles for sure.

 

[Minordeth]

Rosa for top 5, still. I know Dabuz is all about that Rosapocalypse but for reals, she straight up wins quite a few of the MUs that matter. For Ness it's just an uphill battle. I don't see another character vying for the 3 spot even. Maybe Diddy.

Maybe I just like watching Dabuz. Dude has become waaaay more aggressive. With that amount of aggro and his new slick tricks, I don't get the continued haterade.

 

[Gawain]

I am completely beside myself and have no idea how to respond to the idea that balance is measured as a percentage of roster size. This is literally the most inane concept I've ever read on smashboards.

There were X characters who placed in Melee, and Y characters who placed in Smash 4. The roster size of either is completely and utterly irrelevant.

By this logic, if every player in the top 32 played three totally unique characters each, but the game had 1000 characters, its balance would be poop--yet a game with only 1 character has 100% representation and is perfect.

But apparently having to state such an obvious flaw in this inane definition of "mathematical balance" is a "strawman."


As far as Paragon goes, it was very much in line of other major tourneys within the past year. Melee had 12 characters used in the top 64 at EVO--the same as Paragon plus a certain red Yoshi. Smash 4 had 21 in the top 32, with some slight variations from Paragon.

Can't go one postwithout the little quips huh? Fine. You took an aside comment from my post and made that the primary point of my post, drawing it out as far as you could.

Melee came out in a different time. They had less development time and other resources etc, so there are less characters in that game. Still, a good number of the characters place well in finals, even over a decade later. Its a fairly well balanced game despite the fact that balance probably wasn't really a primary goal in development. Just because a game comes out later with over 2x as many characters and has a couple more characters that place decently doesn't make Melee a less balanced game. Yes, percentages DO matter in the point I was making. The absolutely false notion that "hurr Melee is boring because it's the same 3 characters" is the inane thing argued. Different time. Different roster size. What is so hard for you to understand about that? Haha, it's like you're saying that if melee had 19/26 balanced characters it would still be less balanced than a game with 55 characters and 20 viable ones, just because the number of viable characters is higher, and even though the game with less characters is much older. That's quite the stretch of the imagination you've got there. A game with 3 total characters that are all balanced is 100% balanced, yes. Why do you think that roster size is such a consistent debate on other sites like SRK? It is easier to balance fewer characters, so a lot of people would rather have less characters but have more balance than a massive roster with less. Primarily because it means its less likely that your character of choice will be bad. AKA the game is balanced. I can't believe i have to explain this to you.

A bigger game had better have more viable characters, but I'm not seeing 20 characters placing in top 16s consistently like you seem to be claiming. And this is early in Smash 4s life, you think the number of viable characters is going to increase?

Well congratulations, you totally took a post and made it go in a direction completely unintended. Lord have mercy. I'm not replying to this line of thought again.

 

[Shaya]

A dabuz wrecking crew on so many top-character mains and we flip up quite a lot; Dabuz having two poor tournaments in a row was enough to push our thoughts on her towards double digits. Dabuz goes on a not-too-uncommon rampage and we all flip back to top three~
I suppose this latest tournament did go to show that the Diddy match up is by no means a heavy advantage for diddy any longer; Rosa's wall specs completely counter all of his specials, without the destructive fair or up air (huge reward poke and huge reward set up move) it's a lot harder for him to compete, it's quite fair to call it a poor match up for Diddy from what we've seen and can theorise over. However we can try to look at personal factors a little, MVD was likely very distraught over the Nairo loss, we've seen he can kinda throw things away if he is off kilter (those monkey flips...).

So perhaps, just with that caveat in mind, Rosa fairly claim reign over other characters we aren't too certain over. But I am worried we take each tournament as the current perfect reflection of the meta way too often.
Either way, for argument's sake we could say Rosa > Mario, Luigi, Diddy, Ness AND Fox*. The same day we saw all this destruction was the same day MK got obliterated as well; I've never really understood this being a 200% MK advantage (Rosa being one of the characters I always felt MK would dislike tbqh). Rosa is floaty, big and has a hard time landing, we get it; you may even have a good way to end luma's life as well but apparently not in a way that doesn't stop a Rosa player like Dabuz still using luma extremely effectively against these characters. But yeah, if we're so open to top 3 Rosa then can we be open to MK not having a free ticket either (you guys should be like us/Marth "uhh, we probably win at most levels of play, because we one shot Luma and can beat lumaless Rosa in neutral!").

* This is a similar spread to what Luigi has with the exception of himself while also being a [the most?] solid check to Pikachu. Possibly being a difficulty for Sonic too.

Also yet again, we wasted 10 (upgraded from 5) minutes of our life with Dabuz playing a Ness main. BAAHHUMBUG.

 

[Minordeth]

I've always enjoyed Dabuz's play even when people were ragging on him at Apex. I also was hoping Paragon would demonstrate (again) that Rosa is a beast. She hasn't ever fallen out of top 5 for me, personally. I should have posted my thoughts way back when instead of being a wuss, so now I look like a fair weather fan, but I digress.

Honestly, we are all going to flip back on forth on character placement or strength (Sheik is not excluded, here) because we have a handful of nationals and the game has been out less than a year. With patches and DLC turning characters new and old into threats.

This game is just getting started, and it's awesome.

 

[Charoite]

Can't go one postwithout the little quips huh? Fine. You took an aside comment from my post and made that the primary point of my post, drawing it out as far as you could.

Melee came out in a different time. They had less development time and other resources etc, so there are less characters in that game. Still, a good number of the characters place well in finals, even over a decade later. Its a fairly well balanced game despite the fact that balance probably wasn't really a primary goal in development. Just because a game comes out later with over 2x as many characters and has a couple more characters that place decently doesn't make Melee a less balanced game. Yes, percentages DO matter in the point I was making. The absolutely false notion that "hurr Melee is boring because it's the same 3 characters" is the inane thing argued. Different time. Different roster size. What is so hard for you to understand about that? Haha, it's like you're saying that if melee had 19/26 balanced characters it would still be less balanced than a game with 55 characters and 20 viable ones, just because the number of viable characters is higher, and even though the game with less characters is much older. That's quite the stretch of the imagination you've got there. A game with 3 total characters that are all balanced is 100% balanced, yes. Why do you think that roster size is such a consistent debate on other sites like SRK? It is easier to balance fewer characters, so a lot of people would rather have less characters but have more balance than a massive roster with less. Primarily because it means its less likely that your character of choice will be bad. AKA the game is balanced. I can't believe i have to explain this to you.

A bigger game had better have more viable characters, but I'm not seeing 20 characters placing in top 16s consistently like you seem to be claiming. And this is early in Smash 4s life, you think the number of viable characters is going to increase?

Well congratulations, you totally took a post and made it go in a direction completely unintended. Lord have mercy. I'm not replying to this line of thought again.

You are saying that in smash 4 there will have less character, but then the balance patches are proving you wrong, there is not need to be rude, and yes melee is less balanced, being old has nothing to do with that, if you thing the variety cast is the primary reason why people watch melee then you are wrong, there a problem with the balance of melee if the majority of the top players who use high tier character need to switch to fox to win tournament.

 

[Rashyboy05]

You are

Uhh... He's what?

 

[TTTTTsd]

Uhh... He's what?

The answer lies deep within your heart and soul.

To go on topic, the fact that we've had large events CONSISTENTLY swaying opinions in very valid and constructive ways bodes well. Yeah it kind of revolves around the Top 10 a lot but, welcome to a competitive game.

The fact that our Top 10 keeps shifting around though (outside of a few specific outliers) is pretty silky smooth~. I mean, we also have those outliers/barely not top tier chars that do really well too. Not gonna speak on the game balance (I find it to be wonky sometimes) but it's at least interesting!

 

[DanGR]

It's hard for me to look at the MVD/Dabuz Paragon matches and think the set is even remotely representative of the matchup. I think at one point I counted 5 monkey flips in a row straight towards the center of the stage? I saw very little monkey flip away from vertical pressure. He barely managed to knocked Luma away half the time after sending Rosalina offstage. It's clear he doesn't know what attacks work and what don't. Does he not know that Luma can't attack until a split second before Rosalina can airdodge following hitstun? He didn't kill Luma every time he threw/knocked Rosalina away at high percents. The Diddy edgeguards looked rushed and inaccurate as well. I could go on, but it's pointless.

And I'm still learning the MK matchup better, myself, but I don't know of any MK/Rosalina players that think the matchup is anything but bad for Rosalina.