• Welcome to Smashboards, the world's largest Super Smash Brothers community! Over 250,000 Smash Bros. fans from around the world have come to discuss these great games in over 19 million posts!

    You are currently viewing our boards as a visitor. Click here to sign up right now and start on your path in the Smash community!

Why Did You Decide to Main King K. Rool?

KingOfKazoos

Smash Cadet
Joined
Nov 24, 2018
Messages
39
Hi, I'm working on a project and I'd like to know why some of you guys ended up choosing K. Rool as your main.

Any reasons! Whether it's because you love him from DKC or even just because he's so... T H I C C

Anyone who responds is much appreciated!
 

Luigifan18

Smash Master
Joined
Feb 19, 2015
Messages
3,134
Switch FC
SW-5577-0969-0868
Out of all the characters on the roster, K. Rool has the best raw survivability, which is highly appealing to a cautious, sacrifice-averse player such as myself. Let me go over how well-suited K. Rool is to retaining his stock longer than anybody else.

First of all, K. Rool is the second-heaviest character in the game, only outweighed by Bowser, which means that K. Rool is by default the character with the second-greatest knockback resistance... but unlike Bowser, who's completely screwed if he ends up below the stage, K. Rool's up special covers a phenomenal vertical distance (along with a respectable horizontal distance), and it also has the sweet side benefit of all but completely negating attempts to attack him from above.

But that's not all! K. Rool also has respectable defensive options (outside of the shield and dodges given to every character)! He has not one, but two projectiles, allowing him to injure and badger his opponent from afar without exposing himself to much danger. If the opponent manages to get past the projectiles and close in, K. Rool has a couple of ways to force them to back off. His primary means of bracing for impact is the special "belly" super armor he has on several of his moves, including his forward tilt, neutral aerial, and down smash (and maybe his up smash as well; his side special and side taunt have conventional super armor). Normally, super armor negates all knockback taken while it's active, not only allowing the relevant move to be completed without interruption (and more likely than not hitting the user's assailant), but also saving the user from being blown off the stage, no matter the strength of the absorbed attack. The downside is that most super armor does not do anything to the damage of absorbed attacks, meaning that the next attack that lands outside of super armor is that much more likely to be decisive. While K. Rool's super armor cannot entirely eliminate damage, it does have a crucial advantage over any other form of super armor in the game; it cuts received damage in half. This means that even if K. Rool is faced with a situation where he can't avoid taking a hit, he can still make sure it stings as little as possible, and more likely than not hit his enemy substantially harder than they hit him. The downside is that if K. Rool utilizes his special super armor too much in too brief a span of time, it will actually break like a shield, leaving him stunned and completely wide open to the biggest, baddest attack his opponent can throw at him... so make sure the foe isn't too close for too long, and don't try using it to stuff out anything massive. Also, because it's tied to his belly, K. Rool's super armor only works from the front, so he can't afford to turn his back on his foe.

Super armor is fine and dandy for situations where there's no time to mount a more thorough defense and the best you can do is trade punches, but given a bit of time to optimally react to his foe's attack, K. Rool's down special, Gut Check, is a counterattack, allowing him to block any attack that the game considers blockable, including attacks that normally shouldn't be blocked (due to being devastating enough to shatter conventional shields in a single strike or shave them down enough where they are no longer able to provide protection), and sustain absolutely no damage to his shield, his damage percentage, or even his belly's special damage-absorbing super armor; not only that, but K. Rool will automatically retaliate with a blow proportionately powerful to the attack it blocked, so at the very least, the opponent will be blown back a yard or two, losing out on any advantage they could otherwise have pressed, and allow K. Rool to regain his footing. If Gut Check blocks a big enough attack, K. Rool is likely to outright KO his opponent. However, like any counterattack, Gut Check can’t just be thrown up like it's a shield and expected to provide protection; it requires several frames of startup after its input before it's actually active and able to block something. Furthermore, even after it’s activated, Gut Check only remains active for a few frames; if an attack does not hit K. Rool within that precise window of time, Gut Check shuts off and enters an endlag period where K. Rool can't do anything to react to his opponent, and this endlag period is, from what I've heard, among the longest of all counter moves, making Gut Check one of the easiest counters to punish if mistimed. As for the startup period, it's far too long to make Gut Check a viable reaction to most attacks once they've already started up; ensuring that Gut Check succeeds requires K. Rool to predict when his opponent will attack and initiate the move at precisely the correct moment. What makes Gut Check special compared to other counterattacks is that it is also a reflector; while any counterattack can block a projectile and protect the user, K. Rool's Gut Check is one of only two counterattacks that can send a projectile back the way it came as opposed to merely parrying it. However, it should be mentioned that like his super armor, Gut Check is only effective against attacks that strike from the front, so, uh, make sure you're facing the enemy!

This has been a long-winded post, so let's sum up everything that makes K. Rool the hardest character to KO in the game:
  • Very high weight
  • Great recovery distance
  • Two projectiles allowing him to deal damage from a safe distance and make sure his foe fights him on his terms
  • Super armor on several of his attacks that reduces the damage he takes while using it in addition to negating knockback
  • A counterattack
  • Oh, and this isn't really related to survival, but K. Rool hits like a train.
Long story short, if you're like me and want to be KO'd as infrequently as possible, K. Rool is the character you should be using; I know I'm going to be playing as him a lot (which is funny, because I usually don't like playing as one of the bad guys).

Now, I should mention that my primary mains are going to be Ness and Lucario as always, with Jigglypuff and Pac-Man being my primary secondaries (if that makes any sense), and I go over my reasoning for picking those characters in another thread entirely (which I can't find at the moment; believe me, I've been trying), but K. Rool will be joining the list of my favorite characters to use. When I finally get the game in five days, the first two things I'm going to do are clear Classic Mode with Kirby (to unlock Ness) and clear Classic Mode with Link (to unlock K. Rool). Then I'm going to try Ness and K. Rool out on the Spirit Board to give myself a nice head start for World of Light (where I will be making a beeline for Jigglypuff and Lucario).
Pity that K. Rool's in the World of Dark, so I won't be able to use him in Adventure Mode for a long time... but at least it's not quite as bad as Brawl's Subspace Emissary, where all my favorite characters were stuck in the final third of the game. I'll have Jigglypuff and Lucario in a hurry, at least...
 
Last edited:
Joined
Apr 4, 2015
Messages
515
Location
Rareware Winners Lounge
Us Kutthroats did not request him for 5, 10+ years to just fill a spot :)

Putting the competitive viability, tier list placement and ability to the side, he's very fun to use in general and a love letter to DKC fans with his portrayal. Using the Krown, Blunderbuss and Propellerpack moves, plus his facial expressions and mannerisms perfectly capture the character that is K.Rool, I use him cos I love the character, who just so happens to be a competent heavyweight and its a similar scenario to DK and Diddy for me.
 
Last edited:

Plague von Karma

The Resource Mogul
Joined
Jul 16, 2015
Messages
213
Location
In your wardrobe
NNID
chippy2000
3DS FC
1848-2511-8044
Switch FC
SW-0980-5769-9485
I wanted King K. Rool in since Melee, since I knew he'd be a heavy Sakurai can't screw over really. Plus, DKC as a whole has some of the most interesting, open and well-documented development history out of most games I've seen. It's truly something to behold.

Random facts about the croc from my time documenting the development history of DKC (I started when Gregg Mayles started talking about it, I have other stuff on me as well):
  • King K. Rool's design and boss battle was decided on one sheet of paper by Gregg Mayles, the writer for DKC. I believe the name took around 10 minutes to decide on, but I don't have the tweet on me.
  • He had two different names beforehand, those being Krudd and Kommander K. Rool. Sometimes, he's referred to as Kommander King K. Rool.
  • The K doesn't stand for anything. We could say his full name is Kommander King Krudd Rool, really.
I did do a YouTube video on this using my awful video making skills and stammer-y voice, but the script would probably do you better here.
 

StormC

Smash Hero
Joined
Oct 29, 2014
Messages
8,162
I voted for him in the Smash Ballot. The DK series is one of my all time favorite franchises and K. Rool had so much to offer as a Smash fighter that it just seemed like he had to be in, no matter how "irrelevant" he was. The chance to see a character like this, with so many classic boss battles, realized with all of the components from those battles rolled into one fighter, is incredible as a lifelong fan of the DK games.

Ever since Smash 4 I've really enjoyed playing as heavies and K. Rool ties into that. His combination of survivability + zoning + strong melee attacks makes him perfect for my sensibilities.
 
Last edited:

Raxxel

Hipster Heavyweight Champ
Joined
Jul 3, 2014
Messages
5,145
NNID
RaxxelAintHappy
3DS FC
2921-9637-8816
Voted for him in the ballot, and had resolved a long time ago that no matter how low he might find himself on the tier lists, I would main him day 1 as long as he was true to the king I knew. Fast forward to today, and not only is K. Rool in the game, but he has an extremely faithful moveset. Honestly, going into how much I love his gameplay would be pointless, because my parameters for this character were met the moment he was revealed.

That said, god I absolutely love playing this character.
 

Darkscyther

Smash Cadet
Joined
Dec 24, 2005
Messages
48
I played it and it was fun. I am a melee sheik main and used sheik in smash4 too (even though I never trained for that game). I found the lack of killing options very frustrating. Krool has very nice setups, high survivability, and even if it is slow and combo food it is still fun to play.
 

Kincaid1

Smash Cadet
Joined
Feb 23, 2013
Messages
36
K. Rool is the only character I've ever truly desired to be in Smash. That, and I've been yearning for his return to the mainstream for years now. He's also one of the most fun character to play, at least for me.
 

<WUT>grape

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jan 4, 2019
Messages
3
I got **** on by people in elite when I went DK so now I play K. Rool. Also he is fun as hell cause of his unique playstyle
 

$.A.F.

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Aug 13, 2018
Messages
426
Location
The Plant Gang HQ
I'd basically never heard of King K. Rool until the August direct. [I wasn't even Born when DKC came out] But then I saw that he had a lot of stuff that i liked. He was T H I C C, he looked fun, he was goofy, and best of all, he was actually able to recover! He is part of my main trio along with Incineroar, and Piranha Plant, [can you see a trend?] and by far one of the best characters to use. And there's super armor. So much super armor. I don't care if you can get around it, it just feels good to have.
 

ArkhamAnderson

Smash Rookie
Joined
Dec 28, 2018
Messages
4
Started playing video games seriously with my dad at a very young age when Donkey Kong Country released. We worked and worked to finish the game, and when we finally beat K Rool we put the controller down and were celebrating when he stood back up on his ship and the fight continued. We died, but couldn't believe that there was a twist to the fight. We were super happy when we finished, and played through DK 2 and 3. Some of the best moments I've had playing games.

When K Rool was announced I showed my dad and he was excited to see him in the roster. My dad is old now and doesn't play, but he had a blast watching me use K Rool the last few weeks.
 

KingOfKazoos

Smash Cadet
Joined
Nov 24, 2018
Messages
39
Started playing video games seriously with my dad at a very young age when Donkey Kong Country released. We worked and worked to finish the game, and when we finally beat K Rool we put the controller down and were celebrating when he stood back up on his ship and the fight continued. We died, but couldn't believe that there was a twist to the fight. We were super happy when we finished, and played through DK 2 and 3. Some of the best moments I've had playing games.

When K Rool was announced I showed my dad and he was excited to see him in the roster. My dad is old now and doesn't play, but he had a blast watching me use K Rool the last few weeks.
Bro this was way more wholesome than I could have ever expected
 

ArkhamAnderson

Smash Rookie
Joined
Dec 28, 2018
Messages
4
Bro this was way more wholesome than I could have ever expected
:) Thanks! I actually picked up DK Tropical Freeze the other day. We started playing it and we're missing the big Kroc. I love the crownarang since it has some sentimental value to me!

I haven't played Smash on console much at all since Melee, so I'm getting bodied online right now. Really soaking up all this good info on Rool.
 
Top Bottom