Why is DK considered to be the worst?

[Stormfury12]

So I've been playing a lot of DK lately, and I've really enjoyed him. Why do people say he's the worst character in the game at the moment? He doesn't seem bad at all.

 

[CELTiiC]

A lot of skepticism to be honest. Also with him being heavy and combo food in a game where most characters have grab combos I feel a lot of people sleep on DK. He really isn't that bad at all, I haven't really had many matchups where I felt completely helpless, but he also doesn't have many matchups where it's clearly his favor. Being a 50/50 to 55/45 mostly character hurts him a little too. Also this game is so new people just haven't seen the true potential of all characters yet.

 

[HeavyLobster]

Only the EventHubs tier list says DK is the worst, and that list is complete garbage. Don't worry about DK, he's the same mid-to-low mid tier he's always been.

 

[DK-RULES]

I say with DK, nothing is for free. Considering he is a solid grabber, he doesn't have the follow up after cargo throws like he used to. He is my main and I do good with him overall. Although for the first time yesterday, I faced a Megaman that I just could not beat. He exploited the neutral B and used leaf shield around it. I had nonidea you could grab your own item and then turn on the shield at the same time. So he was protected by lead shield while still having an item in his hand to throw. Rough battle for sure.

 

[Ogopogo]

DK is def not the worst character in the game, but he's still too fat, too slow, and has too bad of a neutral game to be good.

 

[louie g]

He's the best character in the game!

 

[GSM_Dren]

So I've been playing a lot of DK lately, and I've really enjoyed him. Why do people say he's the worst character in the game at the moment? He doesn't seem bad at all.

Who said he's the worst character in the game? He has decent range and his customs are nothing to scoff at.

 

[Stormfury12]

I've just heard it from some ppl online. I was really surprised tho. He feels good if not better than he's ever been. Imo meta knight feels like the worst at the moment.

 

[Big O]

It's the product of being an unpopular character that has clear weaknesses which people just don't have the patience for. The noobs voting in the Eventhubs tier list just get juggled/comboed/camped for days and think he sucks.

That said, I don't think most good players place DK at the bottom and consider him to be a tourney viable character.

 

[IWinToLose]

There are definitely worse characters. I think Dr. Mario, Mii Swordfighter, Mii Gunner, and possibly even Lucina and Ganon are worse.

 

[Brickbox]

In many ways I am kinda happy that event scrubs is saying dk is the worst, it will cause a lot of average players to really sleep on him and think he is a free win.

There is a lot of winning to be had off of people who don't know match ups.

 

[Diddy Kong]

Only the EventHubs tier list says DK is the worst, and that list is complete garbage. Don't worry about DK, he's the same mid-to-low mid tier he's always been.

Am thinking it's exactly this. DK has gotten some nerfs, but also some nice buffs. I feel he lives a lot longer now for example. He doesn't exactly have the power, range and speed of , or the combo-ability of . That is a thing I'll admit at once. But he's heavier, has a better approach thanks to dash attack, and he can now break shields which gives him a huge advantage. Headbut is actually somewhat useful (on shields) for once.

I am hoping for the best for DK. It sucks to see being a whole better character overall in just about everything except him being destroyed by and his chaingrabs, but I still have hope for . He has never been exactly bad. So I will have faith in him.

 

[dahuterschuter]

Sm4sh mechanics in general as a game are particularly unkind to DK, let alone his own particulars, but if you're referring to that "tier list" on eventhubs that has had him at the bottom since release, it's just based on casual voting. DK is generally unpopular to use and so he's gonna be at the bottom both because people don't platy him so they don't know his potential, and because they rarely play against him as well.

 

[Xygonn]

I tried to main him early on but the mechanics of Smash 4 almost require a projectile to pressure shields. I got mercilessly punished on unsafe landings. Still go to him for fun but I gave up.

 

[Bobert]

isn't bad at all. He's not amazing but he's definitely not bad.

 

[Gedden]

Why is DK considered to be the worst?

He is only viable in the hands of a master (DKWiLL) but still really bad in some matchups. You have to make GREAT reads and have great technical skills to be competitive!
The majority of his moves have a lot of recovery. Make a beginner's mistake and you're going to recieve damage.

He's UP Special has WAY too much recovery in air, even when you land it correctly it can still punished.

Not enough attacks have low kill potential (78%-109%). I've seen Diddy and Sheik kill at 78%

Back throw should be just as strong as Ness' but isn't...

His hit box is so big it makes him very easy to combo

He has VERY little combo potential.

Has a very tough time against projectile fighters

His forward smash can whiff if the opponent is small and very close.

 

[GhllieShdeKnife]

Honestly I think DK is one of the hardest characters in the game from my experiences. With the number of opponents possessing projectiles and counters he has to be completely on point with movement and have hard read on the intents of his opponents to get kills. He does possess the ability to kill at early percent(70-100)but you must properly condition your opponent into recovering low for your fair spike to catch them. Approaching grounded UpB onstage is a good option vs projectile spammers as the invincibility will let you tank the hit then hit them. Make sure to only use this option as a mixup because if they catch you whiffing it you should be prepared to take some serious damage. I find an edge based play works well for DK. What I mean by this is sticking near ledges preferrably to abuse bthrow and offstage bair trains. Constantly going for the high recovery option with bairs means that conditioning your opponent into recovering low is not that difficult. One thing I dont see other DKs doing that Will does is taking the ledge from someone and after forcing them off falling off the ledge to hit them with a bair. This is probably the best thing DKs can be working on to get better results. As for the comment about fsmash they actually removed some of the hitboxes on the arms of DK, there is now just one hitbox covering the area of the palm slap. This makes sense but is a pretty large nerf to DK as he now needs really good spacing to kill with it meaning giant punch is now pretty much the only reliable kill option onstage.

 

[Diddy Kong]

D Smash has low kill potential. But yeah, am sad that DK seems to almost struggle with killing this time around. If he just had his Brawl F Air... That move, as well as F Smash and even F Tilt really got a bad range and power nerf.

I don't think he's the worst in the game, but he might just be worse than ever before still...

 

[AlextheTwin]

I do think DK is the worst character in for glory because of his lack of range, laggy moveset, below average recovery and no projectile. I'm a DDD main, and DK is always my favorite matchup.

He is the easiest character in the game to camp in my opinion because he is big, slow and has no projectile. His ending lag on his movset is just so easy to punish.

He can be competitive if you've mastered him and can avoid his laggyness. Still though, people can just camp you and punish his ending lag so easily.

I tried out DK for about 2 weeks and tried to work on him, I really wanted him as a secondary main because I love the character. But I gave up. The lag on some of his moves needs to be looked at if he ever hopes to get into the top half of characters. I think it would have made a lot of sense to give him the banana that Diddy has to help him be less one dimensional.

 

[Bobert]

I do think DK is the worst character in for glory because of his lack of range, laggy moveset, below average recovery and no projectile. I'm a DDD main, and DK is always my favorite matchup.

He is the easiest character in the game to camp in my opinion because he is big, slow and has no projectile. His ending lag on his movset is just so easy to punish.

He can be competitive if you've mastered him and can avoid his laggyness. Still though, people can just camp you and punish his ending lag so easily.

I tried out DK for about 2 weeks and tried to work on him, I really wanted him as a secondary main because I love the character. But I gave up. The lag on some of his moves needs to be looked at if he ever hopes to get into the top half of characters. I think it would have made a lot of sense to give him the banana that Diddy has to help him be less one dimensional.

Good DK players in for glory are almost non existent but let's be honest here for a second...you're not going to find many good players on for glory.

 

[DJDave189]

I have used DK for a little bit and he's really not that bad, it's just that the other heavyweight characters are both more stronger and popular compared to DK. Not saying that DK isn't popular but some people tend to pick the character they see as being more popular. I've seen plenty of Dedede, Gannon, Bowser, and others, but almost no DK. Seeing a really good DK player on For glory is really rare..well for me at least.

 

[crashbfan]

Out of the giants (Bowser, Dedede, Ganon, DK and Charizard) I'd say DK is the most underrated of the bunch (charizard coming in close second)

he kills so early with good reads and has a constant pressure game with super armor and good range on his tilts. i think DK is a solid mid-tier with his gimmick being killing very early, with super armor and heavy weight.

 

[toadster101]

He's underused, but that doesn't make him the worst character in the game. Far from it. In terms of why DK struggles against a lot of characters, it's because of his size, slow attacks, and underwhelming vertical recovery. None of these make him unusable.

 

[Tujex]

Because Nintendo said FXXK DK and didn't revamp him like they did a LOT of the OG 12. Heck, they rebuilt Bowser from head to toe to make him more viable but were like....eh DK'll be alright.

That being said, I doubt he's the worst but he requires a LOT more effort to win with than a lot of the cast.

 

[PCHU]

I do think DK is the worst character in for glory because of his lack of range, laggy moveset, below average recovery and no projectile. I'm a DDD main, and DK is always my favorite matchup.

He is the easiest character in the game to camp in my opinion because he is big, slow and has no projectile. His ending lag on his movset is just so easy to punish.

He can be competitive if you've mastered him and can avoid his laggyness. Still though, people can just camp you and punish his ending lag so easily.

I tried out DK for about 2 weeks and tried to work on him, I really wanted him as a secondary main because I love the character. But I gave up. The lag on some of his moves needs to be looked at if he ever hopes to get into the top half of characters. I think it would have made a lot of sense to give him the banana that Diddy has to help him be less one dimensional.

As a fellow Dedede main, I'd have to slightly disagree.
While I feel I can clutch out most matches with Dedede, DK's actually pretty solid...against other low/mid tiers and characters who don't rely so much on projectiles.
When people choose to approach you, he's wonderful, but he cannot cope well with people who run/camp most of the match because he has no real tools to counter that.
Still, I find that I do pretty well a lot of the time because my read game is generally decent; dtilt is a good "filler" attack and bair goes a LONG way, although I haven't had the pleasure of fighting many people particularly skilled at the game.

 

[Dre89]

DK is just a worse Bowser now. They're similar character but Bowser has better frame data and hitboxes. Only thing DK has over Bowser is a spammable aerial.

 

[Crome]

I wouldn't trust any tier lists for at least 6 months. Most tier lists right now are either biased or popularity contests.

 

[Bobert]

I have used DK for a little bit and he's really not that bad, it's just that the other heavyweight characters are both more stronger and popular compared to DK. Not saying that DK isn't popular but some people tend to pick the character they see as being more popular. I've seen plenty of Dedede, Gannon, Bowser, and others, but almost no DK. Seeing a really good DK player on For glory is really rare..well for me at least.

I feel that DK is better than Dedede and a bit better than Ganondorf IMO. (Ganondorf is REALLY underrated.) I don't know how he compares to Bowser. I thought he was better than Bowser but now I'm not sure.

 

[Ryu Myuutsu]

Because Nintendo said FXXK DK and didn't revamp him like they did a LOT of the OG 12. Heck, they rebuilt Bowser from head to toe to make him more viable but were like....eh DK'll be alright.

That being said, I doubt he's the worst but he requires a LOT more effort to win with than a lot of the cast.

Well, of the original cast only Yoshi was heavily revamped; everyone else has gotten updates here and there with DK being no exception, having received at least two new Smash attacks and one new aerial move from the transition from Smash64 to Melee. Anyways, moveset revamps aren't terribly neccesarry to make a character viable, just look at Link who except from his dash attack remains the same yet is better this time around.

 

[Ryusuta]

LOL eventhubs.

 

[RanserSSF4]

Donkey Kong, IMO, is like characters such as Ganondorf, Dr. Mario, and Kirby.

He's a decent character by himself, but compared to everyone else, including some of his nerfs, he's not very good.

CUSTOMS on the other hand, makes DK a much better character to stand up against most characters!

 

[SleuthMechanism]

eh, still better than standarddorf. he also has IMO the second best recovery out of the heavyweights because of that super armour. so at the very least he's not THAT bad.(though bowser clearly got a lot of favoritism out of all the returning big guys)

 

[CELTiiC]

eh, still better than standarddorf. he also has IMO the second best recovery out of the heavyweights because of that super armour. so at the very least he's not THAT bad.(though bowser clearly got a lot of favoritism out of all the returning big guys)

You would consider his recovery better than D3's as well?

 

[SleuthMechanism]

I said second best. Dedede has the best recovery out of the big guys for sure

 

[Diddy Kong]

I feel so sad that is so bad.

 

[Wintropy]

I don't agree with the notion that any character is necessarily "the worst". Sure, they can be universally agreed to be at the bottom of the tier list, and I respect that they're the worst in that respect; what I am hesitant to accept is the premise that this means a character is inherently worthless, which seems to be a logical progression from the thesis statement.

As somebody who plays Palutena, Lucina, Ganondorf and Mii Swordfighter, I am well aware that any character, in the right hands, can be played well. Doesn't mean it's easy to play with them, especially against high-tiers, but it's certainly possible to win.

And yeah customs alter the playing field significantly. You can do a lot with a few new moves. :3

 

[Man Li Gi]

Ok. I know why people are getting on the "worst" train: the nerf in power/damage output, increased end lag on some moves, slight range nerf, and horrible ledge options.

The nerf in power I'd most notable in his usmash and his dsmash. Both of which kill vertically, and if you anything about this game, they have needed almost everyone's vertical kill moves because of the now rectangular blast zones (making the top much more shallow compared to before). Dsmash was often used to finish stocks due to its range, speed, and power. With hitboxes coming out 1 frame later, a more tender sweetspot, and the same bad endlag, makes killing more tedious. His up B does half the damage and his fair, and uair do 1 less damage. His Fsmash still kills early, but with the universal buff to horizontal kill moves (thanks to longer horizontal walls), the power Fsmash offers doesn't compensate for the atrocious start up and endlag it has.

The increased endlag on his regular up B (30 frames for soft landing compared to 0 in the previous iteration) and his down b (14 extra frames of cooldown) makes the moves almost unusable for the strings it produced in Brawl. His pivot grab is way slower.

Overall, DK'S arms are shorter and hitboxes in front of him are finicky. His grab is booty too.

Dk in reality had just 2 ledge options: neutral getup or jump. Why 2? Well, his ledge attack is inconsistent and his roll goes so little distance and is so slow. This makes Dk really predictable on the ledge.

Also a lack of an aerial approach sucks for DK cuz he cannot really counter projectiles or be too aggressive when everything is pointing towards an offensive monster (poor defensive options).

To justify these nerfs, an overall buff in power is needed. Dsmash should be killing Pika 111 not 130.

Even with that being said, DK isn't even close to being the worst. He's probably the most viable heavy thanks to his overall mobility, still has high damage strings, great range on normals, and his customs are the trump card. I beat so many heavies in my tourney experience and for people to use FG to determine what is good/bad for DK is wrong as FD is DK'S worst stage.

 

[ProjectilePuff]

I'm probably wrong but some people prefer characters who have recovery that move straight upwards or diagonal instead of vertical and i can see many people messing up DK's recovery because they're so used to other character's recovery such as Captain Falcons or Zero Suit Samus. I can easily see people writing off Donkey Kong to be terrible because of this which is stupidly un-justified... hopefully i got that vocabulary write. Another reasoning is characters like Jigglypuff who can easily disrespect with multiple aerial attacks to knock DK to end of the stage and finish off with a Dair or something that spikes i guess, i saw a replay showing just this and it was gob-smacking for me... until i decided to pick-up DK and found out how reliable his recovery his vertically and how much spacing the down special does... and that neutral special... he has no style... he has no grace...

 

[blargh257]

I like Donkey. Seeing as I know very little about Smash 4's character pool in general I can't say much of anything about where he ranks, and I know he's not high tier, but I like him and he's my best character. I think down tilt is really good for poking because it takes almost no commitment and spiking is fun. But I'm a noob who plays mostly fellow noobs so I don't really know anything.
That being said I can definitely see why people hate him.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Am thinking it's exactly this. DK has gotten some nerfs, but also some nice buffs. I feel he lives a lot longer now for example. He doesn't exactly have the power, range and speed of , or the combo-ability of . That is a thing I'll admit at once. But he's heavier, has a better approach thanks to dash attack, and he can now break shields which gives him a huge advantage. Headbut is actually somewhat useful (on shields) for once.

I am hoping for the best for DK. It sucks to see being a whole better character overall in just about everything except him being destroyed by and his chaingrabs, but I still have hope for . He has never been exactly bad. So I will have faith in him.

Wait......... What about ?