What will it take to make the heavy characters more viable all around?

[meleebrawler]

Sorry to say, but I don't think you can "just" buff the heavies to make them more viable. The current top tiers have to be toned down too. Namely their damage output in the form of combos, which far outpace the damage per hit heavies do. Ultimate is taking strides to address this by nerfing throw combos across the board except for those who lacked noteworthy grab games. Now their damage output from grabs is far lower than heavies and their higher-damaging throws on average. And with standardized jumpsquats, their ability to start combos and juggles with normals should be closer to what the top tiers can achieve.

Plus there is the new airdodge to consider when recovering. While it's limited from afar, if you're only a bit offstage it's a good mixup for getting to ledge or just avoiding an attack. For heavyweights who don't get knocked far until very high percents, this means their claim to greater survivability is a bit more credible now as they don't have to rely on their vulnerable recoveries as much.

 

[C-G]

The funny thing about Super Heavyweights is that we completely skipped Smash 4 for adding new ones (unless you want to count giving Charizard Flare Blitz as being 'new'). Meaning Ridley and K Rool are the first newly designed Super HEavies we've gotten since Brawl.

So here are the +s most heavyweights have
+Good Range
+High % Damage
+Heavy
+High knockback potential

Heavies often sacrifice one or more of the following to achieve this goal
-A projectile game
-Combo potential
-Good recovery off stage
-Good recovery out of disadvantage
-Fast moves
-Good Frame Data
-Safe pokes
-Giant hitbox meaning combo food
-Slow movement

As Nintendo has gotten better at making Smashes, these weaknesses have become less severe, and in Ultimate even more so, to compensate. Ridley is combo food, has no real projectile capabilities (just the fire breath which ain't winning projectile wars), and isn't the fastest long distance runner in the world. But he's got combos, good hitboxes, good recovery off stage, and people can be confident about throwing out his buttons. Previous entries in the series have made heavies really bad at EVERYTHING above on that list at ALL TIMES, whereas this most recent entry seems to have picked up that it's ok to have character have some of these weaknesses some of the time. That's what I see when I look at K Rool, a heavy that has traditional weaknesses, but not all the time and not as crippling (so far, of course). He has moves he can use in a scramble, he has zoning capabilities, he has combo potential and he has decent disadvantage escape tools. Even movement doesn't seem as bad as you'd expect from a heavy, with a lot of things like air speed and good jump playing into it.

 

[J0eyboi]

So what you're saying is more recovery options, combo breakers, and landing tools = better heavies? Because in that case, I think this is actually pretty easy to work with.

Now again, I don't think everyone should have as good a way to get out of disadvantage as anyone else. A weakness of bad disadvantage is still fine. But at the same time, we shouldn't have characters completely devoid of ways to get out of it.

For example, take

I'm actually doing a full rundown of what a more balanced moveset for him could be, and the first thing I thought of was, despite me saying his chief weakness is having bad disadvantage, giving him more landing options. Right now his weight is high and fall speed low, making him easy to combo and juggle at the same time. I thought up a way to make DAir and Down-B, his currently lackluster landing tools, to be better in different ways. Firstly, DAir would actually have armor on the underside, making it useless to keep juggling from below. Secondly, it would have the armor come out really quick. Thirdly, more angular control and falling speed on it to move around faster. Finally, a slightly lower landing lag.

Granted, the main downside of this move would still be the landing lag, but the idea is that this is a landing lag that, because of it making Bowser armored towards jugglers below, they would be forced to either try to read out the DAir and fall back down and dodge his incoming fall, or continue to gamble on whether or not he will actually DAir, thus automatically getting himself out of a juggling position, if only for a bit. This would be a combo breaker style landing move.

Bowser Bomb would be more powerful and rigid. I think giving it a shockwave on landing to push away people as well as full intangibility is enough honestly, because the starting lag is high enough. This would be a more brute force method.

Note that neither of these ideas are perfect, but there are at least something to work with. And note that they should have exploitable weaknesses since Bowser is meant to be bad in disadvantage, at least according to my rundown of his moveset. The point is that he's not helpless, just bad relative to the normal characters.

I don't think that quite fixes the problem. Dair and Down-B being too easy to contest wasn't ever really the issue with them. The bigger problem is that they're reactable as ****. Both can be avoided and punished on reaction by just about anyone unless you're very close to the ground, in which case they're too slow to accomplish much, and while giving them armor that starts early could fix that, it could just as easily make them (dair in particular) too good, especially due to how much damage and kill power they have. And yes, you could make them less damaging or kill later, but you could also avoid this entire issue by making Dair a few frames faster, putting it in line with actual usable stall-then-falls like G&W or Corrin. Less landing lag is also a good idea, but they already did that.

 

[meleebrawler]

The funny thing about Super Heavyweights is that we completely skipped Smash 4 for adding new ones (unless you want to count giving Charizard Flare Blitz as being 'new'). Meaning Ridley and K Rool are the first newly designed Super HEavies we've gotten since Brawl.

So here are the +s most heavyweights have
+Good Range
+High % Damage
+Heavy
+High knockback potential

Heavies often sacrifice one or more of the following to achieve this goal
-A projectile game
-Combo potential
-Good recovery off stage
-Good recovery out of disadvantage
-Fast moves
-Good Frame Data
-Safe pokes
-Giant hitbox meaning combo food
-Slow movement

As Nintendo has gotten better at making Smashes, these weaknesses have become less severe, and in Ultimate even more so, to compensate. Ridley is combo food, has no real projectile capabilities (just the fire breath which ain't winning projectile wars), and isn't the fastest long distance runner in the world. But he's got combos, good hitboxes, good recovery off stage, and people can be confident about throwing out his buttons. Previous entries in the series have made heavies really bad at EVERYTHING above on that list at ALL TIMES, whereas this most recent entry seems to have picked up that it's ok to have character have some of these weaknesses some of the time. That's what I see when I look at K Rool, a heavy that has traditional weaknesses, but not all the time and not as crippling (so far, of course). He has moves he can use in a scramble, he has zoning capabilities, he has combo potential and he has decent disadvantage escape tools. Even movement doesn't seem as bad as you'd expect from a heavy, with a lot of things like air speed and good jump playing into it.

You have to consider exactly what kind of projectile Ridley is up against. If it's powerful like Samus's Charge Shot or very fast like Sheik needles then yeah it's gonna lose a lot, but otherwise as long as he gets it out fully no other projectile is gonna break through that thick stream. That leaves only the strategy of pressuring Ridley up close so he can't use it... which may just play into Ridley's hands if he acts smartly.

 

[C-G]

You have to consider exactly what kind of projectile Ridley is up against. If it's powerful like Samus's Charge Shot or very fast like Sheik needles then yeah it's gonna lose a lot, but otherwise as long as he gets it out fully no other projectile is gonna break through that thick stream. That leaves only the strategy of pressuring Ridley up close so he can't use it... which may just play into Ridley's hands if he acts smartly.

Anyone who will lose to Ridley in a projectile war probably isn't aiming to start one. Even if they have projectiles that'd lose straightup in endurance to Ridley's fire, they also can attack in angles Ridley cannot. Not to mention do so without the wind-up or the draw back of being hit while charging.

 

[Necro'lic]

I don't think that quite fixes the problem. Dair and Down-B being too easy to contest wasn't ever really the issue with them. The bigger problem is that they're reactable as ****. Both can be avoided and punished on reaction by just about anyone unless you're very close to the ground, in which case they're too slow to accomplish much, and while giving them armor that starts early could fix that, it could just as easily make them (dair in particular) too good, especially due to how much damage and kill power they have. And yes, you could make them less damaging or kill later, but you could also avoid this entire issue by making Dair a few frames faster, putting it in line with actual usable stall-then-falls like G&W or Corrin. Less landing lag is also a good idea, but they already did that.

Well I'm glad you're giving me good feedback. Again, I don't think they need to be good at anything but landing semi safely, and in terms of reaction, having Bowser Bomb have a long lasting shockwave would at least stuff out spotdodges a bit if you gave it that.

But the thing is I'm not asking for a flawless landing move, and honestly I don't think Bowser should have a completely flawless one, just one that doesn't the minimum required. This is why I'd rather not reduce the landing lag too much because it still needs to have some gaping hole in it for a weakness, else Bowser just becomes good at landing and that's it. Like I've said, it's more about the ability to do it than to do it super well. Since his landing moves right now are so terrible in most situations they should be good in, they need buffs, but if they are good at landing semi-safely but bad in other areas, I think that's fine too.

I don't know why I'm rambling on for so long, the point is we shouldn't look for perfection in our moves, just a minimum amount of whatever they need to do.

 

[Quillion]

Sorry to say, but I don't think you can "just" buff the heavies to make them more viable. The current top tiers have to be toned down too. Namely their damage output in the form of combos, which far outpace the damage per hit heavies do. Ultimate is taking strides to address this by nerfing throw combos across the board except for those who lacked noteworthy grab games. Now their damage output from grabs is far lower than heavies and their higher-damaging throws on average. And with standardized jumpsquats, their ability to start combos and juggles with normals should be closer to what the top tiers can achieve.

Plus there is the new airdodge to consider when recovering. While it's limited from afar, if you're only a bit offstage it's a good mixup for getting to ledge or just avoiding an attack. For heavyweights who don't get knocked far until very high percents, this means their claim to greater survivability is a bit more credible now as they don't have to rely on their vulnerable recoveries as much.

Aside from Bayonetta, I don't think any of the combo monsters need to have their combo ability nerfed just to prop up the heavies. That would just take us back to the Brawl days.

I still think there needs to be changes to the way that knockback and hitstun works, namely that hitstun isn't entirely determined by knockback.

 

[Necro'lic]

Aside from Bayonetta, I don't think any of the combo monsters need to have their combo ability nerfed just to prop up the heavies. That would just take us back to the Brawl days.

I still think there needs to be changes to the way that knockback and hitstun works, namely that hitstun isn't entirely determined by knockback.

I just want to piggyback on this, again. Because there is a way to have combos AND good heavies, and it involves more options to change up the statistics of the moves and fighters. Seriously, the more factors you can tweak, the better balanced and fine tuned you can make your game.

Quillion has already gone over hitstun and knockback being tied when they don't need to, but I will go further. Did you know that damage affects so many things about moves, it actually is ridiculous design imo. Not atrocious or objectively bad per se, just clunky when it doesn't need to be. Damage alone for a move affects the following:

1. Priority
2. Knockback
3. By extension of affecting knockback, also affects hitstun
4. Shieldstun
5. Shield Damage
6. Pushback on shielded opponents

Why all of these things tied to one attribute of a move? It makes buffing or nerfing the damage of a move FAR too impactful compared to literally everything else you can change.

In my ideal world, the one and only thing damage should directly affect is knockback, and even then, there should be an option of having the damage of a move be calculated AFTER the knockback, allowing for smoother high damage combo moves rather than relegating combo moves to only low damage. Everything else here would be completely separate factors.

In addition to all of that nonsense, I would posit a basic guideline that should be followed as a minimum for all characters in a fighting game like this, regardless of weight, archetype, or designed strengths and weaknesses. I will quote myself from my rebalancing thread for Bowser, which I doubt anyone will even look at despite me working so hard on all of them. T_T

Anyway...

META: ABOUT UNIVERSAL OPTIONS

So before I get to the moves proper, I need to share my philosophy on how to make a fighting game balanced with itself very well. Most of it stems from this really good article from David Sirlin, a fighting game director who worked on stuff like Street Fighter. It's called "Designing Defensively" and it involves a look at the Guilty Gear series and how they are able to create a sort of "self balancing" system.

While he goes through a bunch of special tools in detail, he glosses over the importance of having basic tools in the movesets of the characters. This is something I think Smash Bros does well, but only sometimes. However, in this series, I have made a point to have every character I talk about have basic tools that makes sure they can at least defend themselves thoroughly from everything the game could potential throw at them, at least adequately. Now you can make weaknesses in these universal tools, but the point is that they need to do what they should to work defensively for those situations. But what would these universal tools be in Smash Bros? Here's my general idea for these moves, regardless of character strengths and weaknesses:

1. At least three undeniably safe on shield options, at least one of them an aerial
2. At least two good anti-air options
3. At least two get-off-me tools, at least one of them an aerial
4. By extension, at least one solid landing option
5. By extension, at least two good OOS options
6. An approach option
7. An anti-approach option
8. At least three kill moves that kill at relatively standard percents
9. At least two kill moves that kill at higher percents but are safer
10. A combo throw
11. The ability to true combo at lower percents or at least start them
12. At least three forms of basic stage control/edgeguarding potential
13. At least one safe to land with aerial
14. At least two ways to deal with rolls
15. At least two ways to deal with spotdodge/airdodge

I'm sure I'm missing a few, and feel free to tell me what else a character might require, but those are my general guidelines for what every character needs at base. Now again, some can have more than this, but none can have less. Heck, some of these things can have caveats, like the approach option being a bit weaker in frame data or kill power, but the point is that it can be used as an approach option just fine. This is why I give all of the dash attacks projectile immunity in order to have a shortcut to this minimum standard, which is also what Guilty Gear does as shown in that article.

These are a lot of universal tools to give all characters, especially in such a compact design space as Smash Bros, but I think it can be done elegantly regardless, since you don't actually have to make all of these tools 1 to 1 equal across the cast, just have them do their jobs in the most minimal way possible at least.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

It should probably be noted that while damage dealt does affect an attack's knockback, you also have to take into account the BKB and KBG values. An attack that deals high damage isn't exactly going to KO things quickly if its knockback statistics are poor. But at least the high damage can put pressure on enemy shields.

 

[Quillion]

I just want to piggyback on this, again. Because there is a way to have combos AND good heavies, and it involves more options to change up the statistics of the moves and fighters. Seriously, the more factors you can tweak, the better balanced and fine tuned you can make your game.

Quillion has already gone over hitstun and knockback being tied when they don't need to, but I will go further. Did you know that damage affects so many things about moves, it actually is ridiculous design imo. Not atrocious or objectively bad per se, just clunky when it doesn't need to be. Damage alone for a move affects the following:

1. Priority
2. Knockback
3. By extension of affecting knockback, also affects hitstun
4. Shieldstun
5. Shield Damage
6. Pushback on shielded opponents

Why all of these things tied to one attribute of a move? It makes buffing or nerfing the damage of a move FAR too impactful compared to literally everything else you can change.

In my ideal world, the one and only thing damage should directly affect is knockback, and even then, there should be an option of having the damage of a move be calculated AFTER the knockback, allowing for smoother high damage combo moves rather than relegating combo moves to only low damage. Everything else here would be completely separate factors.

Completely agreed. On the other hand, we have to remember that adding so much more parameters might extend development by an unreasonable amount of time.

It should probably be noted that while damage dealt does affect an attack's knockback, you also have to take into account the BKB and KBG values. An attack that deals high damage isn't exactly going to KO things quickly if its knockback statistics are poor. But at least the high damage can put pressure on enemy shields.

For some reason Smash seems to have always been balanced around the view that more knockback in general is good. And it's been known for a long time that, in general, less BKB is good, and more KBG is good.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

For some reason Smash seems to have always been balanced around the view that more knockback in general is good. And it's been known for a long time that, in general, less BKB is good, and more KBG is good.

Even if that's true, you can still have some high BKB attacks, as they can potentially be safer to use at low damage percentages; fighters will enter a tumbling state if they take 80+ units of knockback. Also, attacks with high BKB values can easily KO things that take greater knockback than normal.

Of course, if an attack's damage output is high, a high BKB value would typically be offset by a low KBG value, which is likely done to keep such attacks from KOing fighters too quickly under normal circumstances. And as a result, those kinds of attacks are not very effective at making KOs against fighters who take less knockback than normal.

 

[J0eyboi]

I still think there needs to be changes to the way that knockback and hitstun works, namely that hitstun isn't entirely determined by knockback.

Hold on a second. Where did the idea that heavies don't have combo games come from? Because as far as I can tell, that has basically never been the case. Going as far back as 64, DK can effectively wobble you thanks to infinite throw trap, and his combo game outside of that is good too, though to be fair, so is everyone else's. In Melee, Bowser can infinite fastfallers with upair, DK has a very strong grab game and good combo game otherwise, and Ganon's chaingrabs and combo game is quite strong as well. Obviously combos in Brawl are few and far between, but even there you have things like crouch cancel jab with Ike. In Smash 4, you've got Ryu, Bowser, and DK with quite strong combo games, and Ike and Zard (arguably Ganon and DDD too) have at least passable ones. Sure, their combo games have historically been less strong than faster characters, but heavies' higher damage and knockback off stray hits gives them better damage and more opportunities to set up edgeguards past combo percents, not to mention their better kill power. As I've said before, Sm4sh Bowser and DK have top-tier advantage states, so combo game/advantage state clearly isn't the problem here.

 

[Necro'lic]

Completely agreed. On the other hand, we have to remember that adding so much more parameters might extend development by an unreasonable amount of time.

Eh, you do what you must when you are designing your fighters, considering that's how your players interact with the game. But note that my guidelines might be a little overboard in terms of number of specific tools minimum, but I definitely still think at least one of each is doable.

 

[C-G]

Hold on a second. Where did the idea that heavies don't have combo games come from? Because as far as I can tell, that has basically never been the case. Going as far back as 64, DK can effectively wobble you thanks to infinite throw trap, and his combo game outside of that is good too, though to be fair, so is everyone else's. In Melee, Bowser can infinite fastfallers with upair, DK has a very strong grab game and good combo game otherwise, and Ganon's chaingrabs and combo game is quite strong as well. Obviously combos in Brawl are few and far between, but even there you have things like crouch cancel jab with Ike. In Smash 4, you've got Ryu, Bowser, and DK with quite strong combo games, and Ike and Zard (arguably Ganon and DDD too) have at least passable ones. Sure, their combo games have historically been less strong than faster characters, but heavies' higher damage and knockback off stray hits gives them better damage and more opportunities to set up edgeguards past combo percents, not to mention their better kill power. As I've said before, Sm4sh Bowser and DK have top-tier advantage states, so combo game/advantage state clearly isn't the problem here.

The key here is 'grab'. They have historically had good combos from grabs. But because all their moves have high knockback while they have slow movement, the heavies's normals swat their opponents too far away to catch them. DK has eventually evolved into being 'the boxing heavy' with decent combo strings and moves combined with speed and hitboxes to allow a combo game, but very rarely do any of the others have anything past 'grab into something'.

 

[J0eyboi]

The key here is 'grab'. They have historically had good combos from grabs. But because all their moves have high knockback while they have slow movement, the heavies's normals swat their opponents too far away to catch them. DK has eventually evolved into being 'the boxing heavy' with decent combo strings and moves combined with speed and hitboxes to allow a combo game, but very rarely do any of the others have anything past 'grab into something'.

Except they don't. All of the heavies have non-grab starters, and do good damage per combo relative to the rest of the cast.

 

[Quillion]

Hold on a second. Where did the idea that heavies don't have combo games come from? Because as far as I can tell, that has basically never been the case. Going as far back as 64, DK can effectively wobble you thanks to infinite throw trap, and his combo game outside of that is good too, though to be fair, so is everyone else's. In Melee, Bowser can infinite fastfallers with upair, DK has a very strong grab game and good combo game otherwise, and Ganon's chaingrabs and combo game is quite strong as well. Obviously combos in Brawl are few and far between, but even there you have things like crouch cancel jab with Ike. In Smash 4, you've got Ryu, Bowser, and DK with quite strong combo games, and Ike and Zard (arguably Ganon and DDD too) have at least passable ones. Sure, their combo games have historically been less strong than faster characters, but heavies' higher damage and knockback off stray hits gives them better damage and more opportunities to set up edgeguards past combo percents, not to mention their better kill power. As I've said before, Sm4sh Bowser and DK have top-tier advantage states, so combo game/advantage state clearly isn't the problem here.

We've talked about how disadvantage states certainly are going to be improved for heavies, but since this will be a universal change regardless of weight or playstyle, it doesn't mean much.

Also, while heavies do have non-grab starters, they're always very situational at best. Having overpowered grab game isn't enough to save them, either way.

 

[J0eyboi]

Also, while heavies do have non-grab starters, they're always very situational at best.

TIL frame 7 disjointed buttons are situational.

Having overpowered grab game isn't enough to save them, either way.

That's the point I was trying to make. Giving Bowser and DK top-tier advantage states made them mid-tier counterpick characters. Why do you think they need improvements to their combo game?

 

[Quillion]

TIL frame 7 disjointed buttons are situational.

Okay then, name these non-grab starters to make your point. This is barely saying anything.

That's the point I was trying to make. Giving Bowser and DK top-tier advantage states made them mid-tier counterpicks. Why do you think they need improvements to their combo game?

Partly to make them better characters, yes, but partly so that if they're going to stack up with the combo monsters, they're going to have to be a bit more technical to compensate.

I'm not one to criticize Melee's balance, and it's undoubtedly somehow better than Smash 4's despite the former not having the benefit of balance patching. But I don't really want a situation where Marth and Jigglypuff are nowhere near as technical as Fox and Falco, yet the former two can comfortably stand up to the latter two.

It's just kinda dull when smarts fully trumps technicality, and the reverse is equally dull.

 

[J0eyboi]

Okay then, name these non-grab starters to make your point. This is barely saying anything.

Ike: jab,dtilt
DK: dtilt, bair, potentially jab
Bowser: jab, fair, the weird landing hit of upsmash
Zard: AC Nair, Fair, maybe jab
DDD: Technically gordo, maybe fair at some percents
Ganon: Dash attack, dtilt, AC Uair probably

Partly to make them better characters, yes, but partly so that if they're going to stack up with the combo monsters, they're going to have to be a bit more technical to compensate.

Why?

Also you seem to think combos are inherently difficult, which makes me think you haven't played against Mario in a while.

I'm not one to criticize Melee's balance, and it's undoubtedly somehow better than Smash 4's despite the former not having the benefit of balance patching.

Out of curiosity, what the **** are you smoking?

The worst characters in Smash 4 are only as bad as Melee's low-tiers. Melee's bottom-tier characters are hardly even functional. Based on matchup spread against relevant characters, Pikachu, the 9th best character on the current Melee tier list, is worse than Little Mac. Melee is a lot of things, but to call it more balanced than Smash 4 removes literally all of your credibility.

It's just kinda dull when smarts fully trumps technicality, and the reverse is equally dull.

Fun fact: Smarts always trump technicality. There's a reason no one stepdashes, and that none of the top 5 Melee players are particularly technically excellent. Being more technical doesn't actually make a character harder to play at the top level, just harder to pick up at lower levels.

 

[Necro'lic]

I'm not one to criticize Melee's balance, and it's undoubtedly somehow better than Smash 4's despite the former not having the benefit of balance patching. But I don't really want a situation where Marth and Jigglypuff are nowhere near as technical as Fox and Falco, yet the former two can comfortably stand up to the latter two.

It's just kinda dull when smarts fully trumps technicality, and the reverse is equally dull.

That in bold is a terrible way to think. Technically more difficult characters do not deserve to be better than less technical characters. If you are planning to go that route, you would have to balance among the lowest common denominator of players rather than the top. If two characters are equally viable in terms of winning a tournament, but one is more technical than the other, sure one will be used more, but the end result is the same if they are perfectly balanced, both having win rates that match, which is all that matters.

By caring about how technically difficult a character is, you would miss what balancing a competitive game is about in the first place.

I want a simple character like Mario to be as viable as a more complicated character like Ice Climbers. I don't want Ice Climbers to be balanced as intentionally better than Mario just because they have a higher skill floor. Skill floor doesn't matter in a high level competitive environment, so why bring it up when talking about how to make characters viable?

 

[Quillion]

That in bold is a terrible way to think. Technically more difficult characters do not deserve to be better than less technical characters. If you are planning to go that route, you would have to balance among the lowest common denominator of players rather than the top. If two characters are equally viable in terms of winning a tournament, but one is more technical than the other, sure one will be used more, but the end result is the same if they are perfectly balanced, both having win rates that match, which is all that matters.

By caring about how technically difficult a character is, you would miss what balancing a competitive game is about in the first place.

I want a simple character like Mario to be as viable as a more complicated character like Ice Climbers. I don't want Ice Climbers to be balanced as intentionally better than Mario just because they have a higher skill floor. Skill floor doesn't matter in a high level competitive environment, so why bring it up when talking about how to make characters viable?

I'm not saying that less technical characters should be made intentionally worse; I'm saying that better characters need to be made more technical.

This is the line of reasoning as to why I want heavies to have much more versatile combo games, yet want hitstun/knockback separation to help compensate for this. If they're going to buff up the heavies so that their powerful yet predictable grab games are powerful enough to match the more versatile combo-based characters pound-for-pound, that's no good to me.

I know we should be focusing on making the heavies viable, but viability in itself isn't my only issue with them. I also don't want heavies to have the linear, near-brainless playstyles that most of them have in Smash 4.

 

[J0eyboi]

I'm not saying that less technical characters should be made intentionally worse; I'm saying that better characters need to be made more technical.

The order in which you do it isn't the important part here.

I know we should be focusing on making the heavies viable, but viability in itself isn't my only issue with them. I also don't want heavies to have the linear, near-brainless playstyles that most of them have in Smash 4.

Then you're going about it in the wrong way. The reason DK and Bowser have such linear gameplay has literally nothing to do with their grab combos being easy. There are plenty of much less linear characters with combo games that aren't particularly technical, and 99% of technical execution is done off muscle memory, making it literally brainless. If you want to make the heavies less linear, you have to incentivise their players to use moves other than grab, which can be done in any number of ways, many of which have been done in Ultimate. Examples include giving them less terrible jumpsquats and less landing lag to incentivise use of their aerials, giving them less reward off grab, giving them more reward off other starters, making their grabs laggier, making their grabs less massive, making their grabs slower, and removing their ability to kill you at extremely early percents off a grab, forcing them to use other kill options.

Also, stop pretending all heavies are DK and Bowser.

 

[Quillion]

The order in which you do it isn't the important part here.

Then you're going about it in the wrong way. The reason DK and Bowser have such linear gameplay has literally nothing to do with their grab combos being easy. There are plenty of much less linear characters with combo games that aren't particularly technical, and 99% of technical execution is done off muscle memory, making it literally brainless. If you want to make the heavies less linear, you have to incentivise their players to use moves other than grab, which can be done in any number of ways, many of which have been done in Ultimate. Examples include giving them less terrible jumpsquats and less landing lag to incentivise use of their aerials, giving them less reward off grab, giving them more reward off other starters, making their grabs laggier, making their grabs less massive, making their grabs slower, and removing their ability to kill you at extremely early percents off a grab, forcing them to use other kill options.

Also, stop pretending all heavies are DK and Bowser.

I know technical execution and tactics are two different things. When I say "brainless", I mean that they use their grab setup in response to practically everything. You may have named non-grab starters for the heavies in one of your earlier posts, but you seem to be admitting now that those non-grab starters are rather situational. And the heavies with poor grabs simply can't stack up to the likes of DK and Bowser.

I admit I'm starting to sound incoherent here, but I do want all of them to have more versatile playstyles. Ones that can stack up to speedsters like Diddy Kong, but aren't broken (as in too much reward for too little skill, technical or mental).

 

[J0eyboi]

I know technical execution and tactics are two different things. When I say "brainless", I mean that they use their grab setup in response to practically everything.

Making them more technical wouldn't fix that.

You may have named non-grab starters for the heavies in one of your earlier posts, but you seem to be admitting now that those non-grab starters are rather situational.

No. It's just that the non-situational ones combo into grab.

And the heavies with poor grabs simply can't stack up to the likes of DK and Bowser.

That doesn't mean that DK and Bowser are the logical endpoint of all heavy characters.

 

[Necro'lic]

I know technical execution and tactics are two different things. When I say "brainless", I mean that they use their grab setup in response to practically everything. You may have named non-grab starters for the heavies in one of your earlier posts, but you seem to be admitting now that those non-grab starters are rather situational. And the heavies with poor grabs simply can't stack up to the likes of DK and Bowser.

I admit I'm starting to sound incoherent here, but I do want all of them to have more versatile playstyles. Ones that can stack up to speedsters like Diddy Kong, but aren't broken (as in too much reward for too little skill, technical or mental).

I now understand what you are saying. You want the heavies to have more viable options for their gameplan. I'm on board there, I just feel putting it in the veil of "brainless" combos or "less technical" just muddied the waters there. ;p

 

[Quillion]

I now understand what you are saying. You want the heavies to have more viable options for their gameplan. I'm on board there, I just feel putting it in the veil of "brainless" combos or "less technical" just muddied the waters there. ;p

Meh, I was tired and bored at the time. Made it hard for me to explain what I meant.

And to be fair, nearly every character in Smash 4 had very a linear playstyle. I failed to take that into account as well.

All of that said, I think Melee Ganondorf is the best-designed heavy in terms of not having playstyle linearity and being somewhat viable. He's slow, but not so much that everything is punishable on reaction.

So yeah, designing more heavies like Melee Ganondorf would satisfy J0eyboi 's insistence that the problem heavies face is mainly due to their horrible disadvantage states. I'm just reluctant about that because I'm not so keen on decreasing the speed gap between speedsters and heavies.

 

[C-G]

The change to air dodging could really help with the disadvantage state over the stage. Most heavies have little to no answers to being juggled and the last time directional airdodges were a thing it was rarely more than delaying the inevitable. New Directional Airdodge cancels pretty well when they land on the floor and the game isn't nearly as fast as Melee where you could dodge Fox's Uair and he'd still be on the ground having a fully charged Usmash by the time you recovered.

 

[Quillion]

So it appears we get Incineroar as another heavy. This time, it looks like he's trying to be the Zangief of the roster by being a bit more grapple focused.

Thing is, we already had Bowser. So it's a bit redundant IMO.

 

[J0eyboi]

So it appears we get Incineroar as another heavy. This time, it looks like he's trying to be the Zangief of the roster by being a bit more grapple focused.

Thing is, we already had Bowser. So it's a bit redundant IMO.

Bowser is not a grappler. Bowser is a glass cannon who happens to have a command grab and grabs a lot. I'm pretty sure we've been over this already.

Speaking of, Incineroar actually is a grappler, which makes me both very happy that the closest thing to a grappler in Smash is no longer Bayo and excited to see how he turns out.

 

[meleebrawler]

Bowser is not a grappler. Bowser is a glass cannon who happens to have a command grab and grabs a lot. I'm pretty sure we've been over this already.

Speaking of, Incineroar actually is a grappler, which makes me both very happy that the closest thing to a grappler in Smash is no longer Bayo and excited to see how he turns out.

I'd call him an attack grappler, his grabs are strong enough to make you respect them but it's his attacks that deal the real damage.

 

[J0eyboi]

I'd call him an attack grappler, his grabs are strong enough to make you respect them but it's his attacks that deal the real damage.

Again, not really. He's sort of like a grappler in a couple of ways, but he's disqualified from the position by his awful disadvantage state.

 

[meleebrawler]

Again, not really. He's sort of like a grappler in a couple of ways, but he's disqualified from the position by his awful disadvantage state.

Can't a lot of grapplers in traditional fighters get bullied in the corner (their closest analogue to disadvantage) as easily as they can do in return? So are they all kind of glass cannons with this in mind?

 

[C-G]

Bowser was a grappler in that his main goal was to get in close and grabbing was one of his most effective ways to net kills. That's pretty much it. His grabs weren't core to his gameplay, like how Luigi gets so much mileage out of them, nor as nuanced as DK/Incineroar, who have various ways to maximize their grab games.

Joeyboi.........I dunno what your definition of grappler is that Bayo is your main example. She's a pixie. Light, damaging, mobile, a touch of everything in her kit, and can't take a punch to save her life.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Bowser seems too heavy to even be classified as a glass cannon. Wouldn't that status be more suited for lightweight fighters?

 

[J0eyboi]

Can't a lot of grapplers in traditional fighters get bullied in the corner (their closest analogue to disadvantage) as easily as they can do in return?

Sure, but their high HP lets them survive for much longer than other characters, and the high range, speed, and damage of their throws makes their abare significantly scarier than most characters. They don't necessarily have the best disadvantage, but their disadvantage isn't really ever bad.

 

[C-G]

How to make heavy characters viable:

Step 1) Be King K Rool.

Thread's done, shut it down.

 

[J0eyboi]

Joeyboi.........I dunno what your definition of grappler is that Bayo is your main example. She's a pixie. Light, damaging, mobile, a touch of everything in her kit, and can't take a punch to save her life.

Oh boy, I love explaining this **** over and over.

First of all, I didn't say Bayo is a grappler. However, she is the closest thing to one in Smash 4. Second of all, pixie characters don't have high damage. Third, when I say grappler, I'm referring to the grappler archetype, defined by lackluster neutral, being extremely threatening even in disadvantage, and excelling at exploiting fear and conditioning. They're also traditionally defined by having strong command grabs, but I'm going to ignore this requirement because command grabs in Smash range from decent to terrible, and IMO it's possible to be a grappler without having a command grab, though these are basically nonexistent in traditional fighting games.

Anyway, Bayo fits into two of these categories. Her disadvantage is extremely scary thanks to Witch Time and her high damage and such. You know Bayo, I'm not bothering to go into detail. She's also very good at exploiting fear and conditioning. However, while her neutral is bad for a top-tier, it's pretty strong overall, and her high aerial mobility and ability to force an approach disqualify her from being a full grappler. She's something like half-grappler, half Melee Puff, and is still the closest character to an actual grappler in Smash 4.

Bowser seems too heavy to even be classified as a glass cannon. Wouldn't that status be more suited for lightweight fighters?

Simply put, that's not how Smash works. Being a heavyweight does allow you to live for longer, but it also makes you easier to combo, which means being heavy is generally a net neutral in terms of actual survivability. It changes based on matchup and such, but net neutral is pretty close. This means that heavies' survivability is decided by their ability to land, recover, get out of combos, and get off the ledge, all of which Bowser kinda sucks at. I'm pretty sure I've been through this before I this thread, like I said earlier, so if you want a more detailed explanation, go read all the pages starting from 5 and you'll find it eventually.

 

[C-G]

Oh boy, I love explaining this **** over and over.

First of all, I didn't say Bayo is a grappler. However, she is the closest thing to one in Smash 4. Second of all, pixie characters don't have high damage. Third, when I say grappler, I'm referring to the grappler archetype, defined by lackluster neutral, being extremely threatening even in disadvantage, and excelling at exploiting fear and conditioning. They're also traditionally defined by having strong command grabs, but I'm going to ignore this requirement because command grabs in Smash range from decent to terrible, and IMO it's possible to be a grappler without having a command grab, though these are basically nonexistent in traditional fighting games.

Anyway, Bayo fits into two of these categories. Her disadvantage is extremely scary thanks to Witch Time and her high damage and such. You know Bayo, I'm not bothering to go into detail. She's also very good at exploiting fear and conditioning. However, while her neutral is bad for a top-tier, it's pretty strong overall, and her high aerial mobility and ability to force an approach disqualify her from being a full grappler. She's something like half-grappler, half Melee Puff, and is still the closest character to an actual grappler in Smash 4.

Spoiler: On Pixies

Pixie characters wind up having that high damage because their mobility and tools lead to exploitation and breaking how the game works. Zero, Magneto, and Wolverine are all pixies, and have infinites in different games, with Zero in particular having ridiculously good scaling that makes him more damaging than the likes of Wesker or Nemesis (which I STILL don't get). You can argue that these are outliers, but more often than not pixies have absurd damage, just hidden in other areas (Storm's insane chip damage and Super combo potential, X-23's Unblockable combo starter), and it's a roll of the dice whether or not these wind up being useful or not (Rip MvC3 Jill). But because the major weakness of pixies (no damage) gets mitigated by these, their reputation is that they are damaging (again, Zero/Mags being the forefront of the archetype)

But that is neither here nor there. Grapplers are also notably immobile, which Bayo certainly is not. A fair amount of grapplers also have excessively good poking normals to compensate for this immobility, as well as convince the enemy to sit there and let you walk up and grab them. Bayo has neither of these that are core to the grappler archetype. The poking normals in this game would be the equivalent of a spamable wall that can basically kill on it's own and just taunts you to come into it. It'd be something like Marth Fair. Bayo obviously does not have them.

DK fills this role the closest, having a grab game, poking neutral tools (bair), using fear and intimidation from those poking normals to open the enemy up with grabs and shield breaks, and most importantly a large variety of ways to use his grab including combos, stage spiking, and different kill throws allowing for DI mixups,

 

[J0eyboi]

Spoiler: On Pixies

Pixie characters wind up having that high damage because their mobility and tools lead to exploitation and breaking how the game works. Zero, Magneto, and Wolverine are all pixies, and have infinites in different games, with Zero in particular having ridiculously good scaling that makes him more damaging than the likes of Wesker or Nemesis (which I STILL don't get). You can argue that these are outliers, but more often than not pixies have absurd damage, just hidden in other areas (Storm's insane chip damage and Super combo potential, X-23's Unblockable combo starter), and it's a roll of the dice whether or not these wind up being useful or not (Rip MvC3 Jill). But because the major weakness of pixies (no damage) gets mitigated by these, their reputation is that they are damaging (again, Zero/Mags being the forefront of the archetype)

That all of your examples are from one series is telling. Fun fact: Zero and Magneto are not actually the forefront of the pixie archetype. I have never heard them referred to as pixies before. And pixies really don't have a reputation for high damage in any of the fighting game circles I follow. When I think of pixies, I think of characters like Seth from UNIST, Chipp from Guilty Gear, or C-Aoko from Melty Blood, not anyone with an infinite.

Grapplers are also notably immobile, which Bayo certainly is not.

I know. I mentioned that in my post. It's one of the reasons why she's not full grappler.

A fair amount of grapplers also have excessively good poking normals to compensate for this immobility, as well as convince the enemy to sit there and let you walk up and grab them. Bayo has neither of these that are core to the grappler archetype.

Really? Because I'm pretty sure Dtilt and Bair count, especially if you're counting DK Bair.

DK fills this role the closest, having a grab game, poking neutral tools (bair), using fear and intimidation from those poking normals to open the enemy up with grabs and shield breaks,

Except that's not really how DK plays. His gameplan does center around the threat of his grab, yes, but he doesn't have good ways to punish people for avoiding his grab. Top players play him more defensively than anything, utilizing his shieldgrab and pokes to stuff approach attempts.

and most importantly a large variety of ways to use his grab including combos, stage spiking, and different kill throws allowing for DI mixups,

Why does any of this matter?

 

[Quillion]

Where the hell do you people define these archetypes?