Which tiers are viable in competitive play?

[Grim Tuesday]

If that was aimed at Wobbles and not Axe... lol

 

[Shroomed]

It was directed at everyone that believes if your play in friendlies is a greater indication of your skill than your tournament performance.

If you choke all your sets away under the pressure, that says something about you as a tournament player.

 

[Wobbles]

I guess I agree with that.

What I'm really trying to say is that none of you have seen his Fox lately. It's terrifying.

 

[Warhawk]

Why doesn't Axe make a tech skill video already? lol

 

[t3h Icy]

I guess I agree with that.

What I'm really trying to say is that none of you have seen his Fox lately. It's terrifying.

Yet you still beat him over and over.

Wobbles too good.

 

[Hax]

S: Falco, Fox (in no order; probably falco > fox though)
A: Jigglypuff
B: Sheik
C: Marth, Peach (in no order; undecided)

everyone else is terrible. marth and peach are hardly viable/have to outplay their opponents by a longshot to win. any character not on this list should never win a national unless someone obscenely talented comes along/something gamebreaking is discovered

 

[twizzlerj]

S: Falco, Fox (in no order; probably falco > fox though)
A: Jigglypuff
B: Sheik
C: Marth, Peach (in no order; undecided)

everyone else is terrible. marth and peach are hardly viable/have to outplay their opponents by a longshot to win. any character not on this list should never win a national unless someone obscenely talented comes along (armada)/something gamebreaking is discovered

I agree I don't know how people say puff is bad just blows my mind. sad to see the small list but hard to argue after seeing multiple tourny results.

 

[Wake]

S: Falco, Fox (in no order; probably falco > fox though)
A: Jigglypuff
B: Sheik
C: Marth, Peach (in no order; undecided)

everyone else is terrible. marth and peach are hardly viable/have to outplay their opponents by a longshot to win. any character not on this list should never win a national unless someone obscenely talented comes along/something gamebreaking is discovered

I agree with this list.

 

[Divinokage]

Hax, you think you'd be able to do as well as you do now with another character?

 

[Levingy]

I think it depends totally of the level of play. I mean how good your opponent is. Because tier-list is a list that tries to determine how good the characters are on top-level gameplay, then how much it matters decreases in terms of skill decreasing. So in the top-level it matters a lot more, if you're playing character from lower tiers. But you should remember, that not all people have experience in fighting against low-tier characters at all, let alone against go(o)d-playing low-tier characters. So the element of surprise and inexperience in the matchup can give low-tier-characters sometimes a better change.

 

[Massive]

Keep in mind that the tier list is designed as a comparison between players of relatively similar skill level based on tournament placing/showings.

The top slots are very firmly set in place by those characters who repeatedly place highly at tournaments, any references to character viability (by comparison) below ice climbers should not be considered set in stone. Most of those characters are underrepresented in tournament play and therefore not able to be as accurately ranked.

Players like Taj, Kage, and Axe are evidence of this, but one great smasher alone cannot move a character up by himself.

All characters are viable in competitive play, some of them just have an easier time winning than others.

 

[Hax]

kage, if i picked up falco i'd be better with him than i am with falcon in one month. melee is a terribly unbalanced game

 

[Divinokage]

kage, if i picked up falco i'd be better with him than i am with falcon in one month. melee is a terribly unbalanced game

Really? I honestly doubt that, I ****ed around with Falco for 4 months seriously and I'm still trash with him. I think it would take a lot more time, unless.. you are someone that can understand him very quickly.

 

[Dark Hart]

Obviously you're just bad, Kage

 

[Max?]

Aziz, your Falco is trash.

The only good characters in this game are Fox and Falco. Two people are good with Jigglypuff.

Most Sheiks are lazy.

 

[Levingy]

Keep in mind that the tier list is designed as a comparison between players of relatively similar skill level based on tournament placing/showings.

I have heard that formal description of tier list before and I disagree with it myself. The reason is that matchups are not the same on every skill level. If we take two players of relatively similar skill level that are both very low-level players, then the matchup can be totally different than what it is in high-level of play with equally skilled players. It can be so, that in a noob-level the matchup is much easier to the other character, and then vice versa or even in high-level play.

I think that what tier-list really tries to show is how good the characters do in the top-level play that has been certified by tournament results and matches.

 

[Strong Badam]

Similar skill level at top level play. That kind of goes without saying. No one wants a tier list that ignores L-Canceling, for example.

 

[Massive]

Similar skill level at top level play. That kind of goes without saying. No one wants a tier list that ignores L-Canceling, for example.

Link is still S tier in 2001 free-for-all Up-B battles.

 

[Merkuri]

Fun fact: Every tourney with over 100 entrants in the past year has had at least 1(going by the current tier list) c or lower tier character in it's top 5. That is

Wintergames Fest 2011 (Samus)
Pound V (Pikachu)
SMYM12 (Zelda)
GENESIS2 (Dr Mario)
The Big House (Samus)
ROM4 (Ganondorf)

So I think this concept that only the top 8 are truly viable at top play needs to change. And I hope this trend carries on into 2012.

 

[Hax]

that's because the melee community has a ton of character pride/people who couldn't care less about playing to win. plenty of said people are incredibly skilled at the game

 

[Varist]

hax's words are true but they are too cynical so i am going to ignore them goodbye hax

 

[MasterShake]

that's because the melee community has a ton of character pride/people who couldn't care less about playing to win.

Do you think this is a good or bad thing?

 

[Divinokage]

It's not really about pride but how you enjoy the game. Ganon feels right for me since the beginning of the road to become pro, doesn't mean I'm not playing to win, i want to kick everybody's ***.

 

[Merkuri]

I think an element to this people are forgetting are playstyles. So people play better with certain characters that play a certain way and therefore there will be more effective than another character who by consensus is ''better''. If Cosmo can get 2nd place using Zelda at a 100+ man tourney, then I don't see what's stopping other characters from accomplish amazing things.

The list I posted on the last page is proof of that imo.

 

[twizzlerj]

Fun fact: Every tourney with over 100 entrants in the past year has had at least 1(going by the current tier list) c or lower tier character in it's top 5. That is

Wintergames Fest 2011 (Samus)
Pound V (Pikachu)
SMYM12 (Zelda)
GENESIS2 (Dr Mario)
The Big House (Samus)
ROM4 (Ganondorf)

So I think this concept that only the top 8 are truly viable at top play needs to change. And I hope this trend carries on into 2012.

This certainly was a fun fact thanks.

 

[Cleod]

If you opponent is some dude who's a professional using Marth don't hesitate if your main is for example Roy or Donkey Kong or whoever, you could still kick his prancing Marth out of the competition as long as you're better than him. If you lose don't take it as an excuse.

 

[Spyro]

All of the charcters are viable you just have to be a lot better than your oppent in hard match-ups (like 75 - 25 match-ups).

 

[Hax]

Do you think this is a good or bad thing?

i think it's an awesome thing; Melee is roughly as balanced as MvC2 yet it hasn't boiled down to only 4-5 characters appearing in tournament matches unlike MvC2. this didn't happen to Melee for a couple of reasons. for one, Melee truly has an all-star cast that a lot of its players have been able to relate to since before Melee even came out. someone might feel inclined to main Mario just because Super Mario 64 was his favorite game as a kid. on the contrary, in the MvC community, almost no one cares about the X-men backstory or any of the minor characters that the game is ridden with. people pick characters almost solely based on their in-game ability so naturally tournament play is only going to consist of god tier characters.

Melee characters also have perhaps the most depth out of any characters in any fighting game in history. plenty of people main certain characters because they feel that their character has hidden potential that they want to unveil. i recall Armada telling me that he plays Peach so that he can prove to people how much hidden stuff she has; this is all made possible by Melee's engine, which makes for limitless possibilities. in other games, you can look at a low tier character's frame data and confidently say that that character is ***. in Melee, characters are constantly revolutionized because a character's full potential cannot even be gauged. this motivates people to stick with their non god tier characters

diversity is good

 

[Ken_Y`]

I agree with Hax on melee

and I agree with armada that peach is insanely good

next character to become awesome---- Me XD

 

[Strong Badam]

I use Donkey Kong because he's fast and his sound effects are hilarious.

 

[KirbyKaze]

Anything above Link can be played to win.

Link is the benchmark.

 

[DerfMidWest]

In what universe is DK fast?
maybe you made a typo? DK is pretty fat... but "s" is nowhere near "t," so i'll assume you did that on purpose.

I think people should just main who they are most comfortable using. A character's placement on the tier list should have nothing to do who you choose to main. Maybe your best character actually isn't Fox, maybe you're most comfortable with Doc or Pika or Link, you should play as fox just because he is placed higher than all of them. If you are more comfortable with a lower tier character than a higher tier, you are going to do better with the lower tier character.

but maybe I'm a little biased, being a low tier main and whatnot.

 

[The Star King]

^vast? V is right under F

 

[Merkuri]

Anything above Link can be played to win.

Link is the benchmark.

Zelda can be played to win. I think Cosmo has proved that.

 

[Wake]

Cosmo hasn't won a national... though Cosmo is awesome.

 

[t3h Icy]

Fun fact: Every tourney with over 100 entrants in the past year has had at least 1(going by the current tier list) c or lower tier character in it's top 5. That is

Wintergames Fest 2011 (Samus)
Pound V (Pikachu)
SMYM12 (Zelda)
GENESIS2 (Dr Mario)
The Big House (Samus)
ROM4 (Ganondorf)

So I think this concept that only the top 8 are truly viable at top play needs to change. And I hope this trend carries on into 2012.

Don't forget Beast 1 and 2 where Hack got 5th with some Kirby (though I'm not sure if he used him at Beast 2). And counting other large tournaments, Zenith had Pikachu and Ganondorf both place at the top area.

 

[SamusPoop]

How much is some kirby? in pools, matches lost or?

 

[Wake]

Don't forget Beast 1 and 2 where Hack got 5th with some Kirby (though I'm not sure if he used him at Beast 2). And counting other large tournaments, Zenith had Pikachu and Ganondorf both place at the top area.

I think it should be noted that he only used Kirby in a couple matches, but yeah still pretty cool.

 

[RaphaelRobo]

The point in tier lists is to help you brag about beating someone with Kirby.

 

[t3h Icy]

How much is some kirby? in pools, matches lost or?

Beast 1 Losers' Quarters and Losers' Eighths, maybe more.