Character Competitive Impressions

[HeoandReo]

Brolylegs's recent performance at KIT makes me wonder something about the whole Marth vs Lucina thing.

For those unfamiliar with Brolylegs, he's a fighting game player who is disabled, and as such plays games basically using his mouth. He's known for using Chun-li in SF4, and has experience in Melee too. He recently got top 16 using Lucina.

When we talk about Marth and Lucina, we generally aay that Marth is better because if you can just aim tippers comsistently enough, then Marth's killing power is just overwhelmingly better. However, what if that simply wasn't possible? What if you, for whatever reason, can just not rely on tippers? Is Lucina then a clearly better option than Marth? Or indeed, is she worth picking over other characters, given her overall properties?

This also brings up the question of the extent to which games should require physical dexterity, but that's a different topic for a different thread.

Even not touching on what Emblem Lord mentioned, on average, Lucina's attacks do maybe 1-2% more damage than untippered Marth with comparable knockback. Like for example, untippered uncharged Marth fsmash is 13, and tippered is 19 and hits like a truck. Lucina's is 14. Sometimes 15. And it doesn't kill on center stage until like 110-120 or so. Keep in mind that this is one of only two (arguably 3) somewhat reliable kill moves that she has.

Any benefits she gets from poor spacing is marginal at best, since she is literally Marth without a tipper.

 

[meleebrawler]

It's official: all of the clones are worse than the originals.
(Referring to Dr. Mario, Dark Pit and Lucina).

Though Doc plays drastically different from Mario which
IMO is enough to get people to play him instead, and
Dark Pit's differences are so few that anything Pit
can do, Dark Pit can do almost as well for the most part, so personal taste
wins out. Only Lucina fails to offer anything significant
compared to her counterpart other than being
"Marth for rookies and playing with rookies".

 

[DanGR]

How did that tournament with BrolyLegs end? It got to the end of Smash 4 pools and then they switched to Melee.

They're playing out Wii-U top16 following the conclusion of Melee Singles.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Lucina is actually super ultra hard mode Marth. You need to be perfect with her and you don't get rewarded.

 

[Nobie]

How many times will people bring this up? She is worse on block on EVERY MOVE they have.

She literally has NO SAFE BUTTONS. Marth at least has d-tilt, FH Fair and retreating Bair.

She has nothing besides perfect spaced d-tilt.

One button

Let that sink in.

Being a Street Fighter player I am well aware of who Broly is. Good **** to him. More of a testament to the games overall balance rather then Lucina being anything special.

I'm well aware of the fact that Lucina is worse on block and this wasn't a matter of "see?! Aha Lucina is just as good!" However from what I've learned, Brolylegs was a Marth player in previous games. Given his condition, do you think he was only making a mistake using Lucina over Marth? I'm not saying this to doubt your claims, nor claiming that Lucina is special, but if you are literally unable to control that character type in a way that is expected of players due to something beyond your control, would you say Marth is still undoubtedly the better choice due to the whole shield lag thing? Like, Brolylegs uses Chun-li because he simply cannot use other characters for physical reasons.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

Usmash in regards to what? Being safe?

You are on drugs. Also Lucinas moves only kill about 15% sooner than Marths non tippers. That is not significant at all.

yikes tries to avoid insults but whatever XD did not mean to come off crazy or intoxicated.

 

[YAYCONFORMITY]

Brolylegs's recent performance at KIT makes me wonder something about the whole Marth vs Lucina thing.

For those unfamiliar with Brolylegs, he's a fighting game player who is disabled, and as such plays games basically using his mouth. He's known for using Chun-li in SF4, and has experience in Melee too. He recently got top 16 using Lucina.

When we talk about Marth and Lucina, we generally aay that Marth is better because if you can just aim tippers comsistently enough, then Marth's killing power is just overwhelmingly better. However, what if that simply wasn't possible? What if you, for whatever reason, can just not rely on tippers? Is Lucina then a clearly better option than Marth? Or indeed, is she worth picking over other characters, given her overall properties?

This also brings up the question of the extent to which games should require physical dexterity, but that's a different topic for a different thread.

Generally when discussing tier lists of competitve potential, we assume players playing at the optimum. With no disrespect to Brolylegs, we should probably assume functioning arms when we discuss character potential. Of course, there will be people who, for whatever reason, will play better with a character that is lower on a tier list, but for 99% of the population, Marth seems like the better choice.

 

[_Magus_]

Let's not fall for labeling Mario a neutral or jack-of-all-trades character; he's decidedly not. He's a close range combo machine with an approach projectile and unusually potent KO options, saddled with a very reliable but poor range recovery.

Mario is a pretty specialized character in practice, and not as generic or "average" as people always are inclined to assume.

This so much. He's an easier character to learn than most, so that might contribute to people's perception of him as a jack-of-all-trades, but he really isn't. He's got his strengths and weaknesses, and is suited to a particular playstyle because of them.

 

[Conda]

In-advance TL;DR

Marth is better than Lucina on paper. But we haven't seen proof that tippers cause him to be super viable and scary in tournament play in this metagame. On-paper it does, and using past experience with melee/brawl it clearly does. But a lot has changed and it is possible that actually utilizing the tipper mechanic may not be as practical or safe as before.

He hasn't much in the way of representation so far, so we haven't really seen if tippers are actually as meaningful in-practice as they were in melee/brawl. If they are, then awesome - Marth will have a one-up over Lucina. But if not - if tippers cannot save Marth - then it is possible that NOT having tippers can be worked around and not factor into Lucina's viability much.

It all depends what the metagame is and if Marth's changes from melee/brawl (movement, speed, landing lag, etc) allow him to play the way he comfortably could in melee/brawl. It's possible the answer is 'yes', and it's possible the answer is 'no'. It's possible tippers could become a 'take it or leave it' mechanic that Lucina could care less about having.


Post:

Nobody would argue that Marth's tipper mechanic is so good that it makes him super viable and scary in tournaments. He clearly has shortcomings that are keeping him from being an obvious threat, which is the first time this has happened in Smash. So citing his tipper mechanic and safety on shield when landing the tipper as THE reason as to why he's better than Lucina may be limiting.

Currently we're seeing a dominance of brawler-types and speedsters, which is normal for Smash. But Marth isn't one of the speedy characters anymore. His windows for attacking (so he doesn't use something with huge endlag, ie fair when landing) are so tight now that attacking at ALL - never mind when 'spaced perfectly' - is super important. Lucina seems to do this better.

If the metagame changes and Marth finds himself more able to space perfectly and doesn't get pressured as often into bad situations position-wise, then he'll be able to utilize his tippers better. But until that happens, having a tipper mechanic may POSSIBLY not be a big deal. Tippers may possible not save Marth and make him scary in tournaments. Instead, it may be an impractical and low-practicality mechanic in this metagame.

He has the potential to be scary, for sure, but I think that depends on the metagame and where most pressure situations happen in the metagame.

Many of the attacks that Brolylegs got with Lucina would not have been as rewarding with Marth. If he had been using Marth, he wouldn't have gotten such large reward from his close-range punishes and close-range OOS fsmashes. He'd have to play like melee/brawl Marth, which Marth cannot really do nearly as well anymore. While Marth is better on paper because he has a mechanic Lucina doesn't have that lets him kill earlier if spaced perfectly, that's only an advantage if spacing perfectly is something that realistically happens often enough against who is played in this metagame and how players are able to space against Marth.

With how things are turning out, Lucina may not end up caring much about having tippers or not, as they don't seem to be doing Marth much help. Maybe it's possible that Lucina's small differences compared to Marth actually get utilized more often and help her win more often than Marth's tippers help him win.

Tippers are a mechanic, and every mechanic can be good or bad depending on what the metagame is. How useful and applicable the Tipper mechanic is is in the current metagame is yet to be determined.
It makes Marth's perfectly spaced hits safe on shield, which is great. But this game's meta is very different to what we are used to, and it definitely matters if perfect tipper spacing is something that can happen often enough to be helpful. Lucina does not have this option, and this may make Lucina worse in practice than Marth.

Marth has to start seeing good/decent tournament results; if his tipper mechanic is truly useful in this metagame, with how his moveset/movement/speed/etc gels with the metagame and his competition, then he'll start winning soon enough.

But if the tipper mechanic - with all of its awesome benefits - doesn't help make Marth a scary threat in tournament play, then that matters. It is possible that NOT having the tipper mechanic won't mean much to Lucina.

ANY character-dependant mechanic in the game can be a great attribute that makes a character very threatening. However, it can also be an attribute that doesn't really help much. Tippers may be as awesome and character-defining as ever, or it may be an ineffective mechanic this time around in this metagame. That is yet to be seen.

@ Shaya and others can vouch for me being a fighter for "Play marth instead of lucina! Get off the lucina bandwagon!" Marth is going to be way better than Lucina ifthe metagame ends up similar to either melee or brawl, where Marth excelled. But it's possible Smash 4's Marth may not be able to work as well as a tipper-focused fighter in Smash 4's metagame.

 

[Nidtendofreak]

Even if somehow tippered attacked don't end up as important, the much better safety of Marth's attacks on shield keeps him firmly, and noticeably, better than Lucina.

 

[Conda]

Even if somehow tippered attacked don't end up as important, the much better safety of Marth's attacks on shield keeps him firmly, and noticeably, better than Lucina.

Right, I acknowledged this (I understand if the post went unread). But many characters have good attributes that don't help them in tournament play, where a metagame is formed and certain good attributes don't end up providing an upper hand. It's possible Lucina may not need tippers, and it's possible Marth won't get to utilize them often enough to make up for his shortcomings.

Having a tipper mechanic is valuable on paper. But how valuable it is in this metagame has yet to be seen. Whether he see results or not will show us just how valuable Marth's tipper mechanic is. This is a normal and logical way to approach this topic, as it's how we've always determined how effective characters are in tournament play.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Deep Breathing makes WFT f-smash one of the game's strongest moves, at a modest f16.

The only stronger normal ground moves in the entire game are:
Dedede f-smash (f42)
Ganon u-tilt (f81)
Ganon f-smash (f21)
Ike f-smash (f31)
Bowser f-smash (f22)
Charizard f-smash (f22)
Marth tipper f-smash (around f13?)
Villager f-smash (f26)
Ness f-smash (f21)

That's it. Notice all the strong stuff not on that list, like DK or Falcon smashes? Yeah, WFT f-smash is stronger.

Yeah, the range sucks, but don't think of it like a Luigi f-smash. Think of it like a Villager f-smash, or a Bowser f-smash you have 6 frames of optional movement before.

Also, you can hit in "front" of you when doing it out of a pivot.



Deep Breathing also makes u-smash the second strongest u-smash in the entire game, second only to Ganon. Sure, it has dismal range, but it's also frame 14 and full-body invincible on release.

Finally, Deep Breathing makes her frame 6 f-tilt one of the strongest tilts in the game--stronger than Sheik f-smash! All comparable KO-potential f-tilts except Little Mac (Link/Zelda/Ganon/Ike) are significantly slower.

Is this in terms of damage or knockback? (Or both?) I'm unfamiliar with the details of how Deep Breathing buffs WFT's attacks.

 

[Lavani]

I think the more important question is "Is Lucina even notably better than tipperless Marth?" His hitlag modifiers still make him safer on shield, his sourspot damage is only decimals lower in most cases, he only kills ~10-15% later than Lucina, and the lower sourspot knockback is actually more conducive to combos and followups.

Honestly, I think even to a player with no sense of spacing, just the possibility of hitting a tipper at a percent where the extra power could matter makes Marth better by default. Lucina just doesn't have the type of reward compensation she needs for what she is.

 

[RascalTheCharizard]

Honestly, I think even to a player with no sense of spacing, just the possibility of hitting a tipper at a percent where the extra power could matter makes Marth better by default. Lucina just doesn't have the type of reward compensation she needs for what she is.

Anyone who wants to argue against my interpretation of Lucina, go right ahead, but this statement is what I believe her problem is.

Lucina is a character who I feel thrives on bait-and-punish tactics. The small sample of Brolylegs's gameplay I've seen suggests that, too. Her ability to punish is reliable as a result of her speed and range, but are her punishes actually any good? Probably not. Her best KO moves are decidedly average in KOing, her damage-per-hit is just bad outside of Smash and Special moves and her combo ability is almost non-existent (how often are you going to pull off landing Uair combos, really?). I think even Charizard does a better job. He hits so much harder and Flare Blitz allows him to punish from a much longer range than her. At least Lucina has more mobility than Zelda and Ganondorf... but even they have advantages over her, like significantly more kill power on their aerials as well as the ability to projectile camp in Zelda's case.

Lucina struggles to put up a threatening and reliable offense and even defending yields questionable results.

 

[HeoandReo]

I think the more important question is "Is Lucina even notably better than tipperless Marth?" His hitlag modifiers still make him safer on shield, his sourspot damage is only decimals lower in most cases, he only kills ~10-15% later than Lucina, and the lower sourspot knockback is actually more conducive to combos and followups.

Honestly, I think even to a player with no sense of spacing, just the possibility of hitting a tipper at a percent where the extra power could matter makes Marth better by default. Lucina just doesn't have the type of reward compensation she needs for what she is.

This is probably the most frustrating thing about using Lucina. You have to work with her general sluggishness compared to a lot of the cast in terms of attack commitment, play super carefully all the time, and when you do get a good read, you don't really get any real benefit out of it unless you're really close to the edge. It's really just the same results as getting all sourspots with Marth, only he'd still be better because of his greater functional range. (and tippers I guess, but even if the player doesn't care about them, just getting a tipper on a fluke is great)

She doesn't even need that much to actually be OK. (I mean all characters are OK in this game, but relative to most of the cast) Like, if she got a 1% damage buff on all her moves, she'd be decent. Not even great, just decent. Just to give her something that can make her useful over Marth. To be great she'd need a bit less endlag across the board for starters, but that's another story.

I'll still probably keep using her though, because I hate myself like Awakening and using low tiers in Smash Bros.

 

[HeavyLobster]

Lucina's problem is that she's Marth without tippers, and Marth without his stupidly strong tippered Fsmash is simply a mediocre character.

 

[YAYCONFORMITY]

Is this in terms of damage or knockback? (Or both?) I'm unfamiliar with the details of how Deep Breathing buffs WFT's attacks.

Knockback. Still, the problem is how she can actually hit with it in the limited timeframe that deep breathing lasts.

 

[Ffamran]

Lucina's problem is that she's Marth without tippers, and Marth without his stupidly strong tippered Fsmash is simply a mediocre character.

Since I didn't play Roy much in Melee, did his centered attacks do much for him? I know he was slower than Marth and that's pretty much it. Oh, and his voice was weird in-game, but epic for his victory quotes.

Marth has tippers, Ike has range, Roy has centered hits, Robin has projectiles, and... Lucina has consistent hits...

 

[Emblem Lord]

What the **** is the metagame garbage that keeps getting thrown around as if to make this game seem more complicated then it is?

This is the truth. Marth and Lucina have the same match-up ratios. They beat the same chars and lose to the same chars. There are maybe a handful of chars that Marth beats slightly worse, but thats it.

There is nothing about Lucina that makes her better. If she had hitlag modifiers it would be a different story.

@ Conda - Bro I have the utmost respect for you, but I legit ignored everything you said once I realized you were talking about the tipper mechanic. That is not even worth mentioning when comparing the two anymore.

They play...the SAME. They move..the SAME. Tipper is meaningless. That's an extra bonus with Marth for not sucking.

Hitlag modifier or naaaaaaaaaaaaah?

Also Marth is worse because Nintendo gutted his numbers. That's all it is...NUMBERS. Not metagame shift or wtf you guys want to pretend it is. Easiest way to make a character suck? Mess with their numbers.

 

[Conda]

Gonna write out a big fat post about the concept of the Metagame.

If Marth is great and comes together because of the extra bonus of tippered hits, then he'll have results soon enough and Lucina won't, as she lacks them. If her design requires Tippers to make her risk/reward balance out, then she'll be unsuccessful as the metagame develops (aka as player knowledge and matchup-based playstyle adjustments mature).

But if Marth DOESN'T end up having tournament results, then we cannot argue that Lucina is leagues worse than Marth for not having a mechanic that doesn't help Marth any. She does have her own unique subtle differences, and those could potentially be worth more in the metagame. They aren't worth more on paper, but the metagame doesn't care what's on paper - it cares how the game is played out over years and years of refined play.


The metagame is a thing.

When players fight certain characters, they play differently. They know what their opponent's character is capable of, and adjust their play accordingly. Certain options of their may be less effective, while others become more effective. This changes and a flux occurs throughout a match and set. Sometimes there is also a player-knowledge aspect to the metagame - some players may know how to fight other players based on rivalries or past experience. But of course, the meat of any multi-character game's metagame is in fact matchups and adjusting to matchups.

When diddy can toss a banana at you or monkey flip, you space differently and play differently as a whole. Certain characters can combat his options, as can certain player playstyles with certain characters. Diddy players react to their opponent's reactions-to-their-diddy. Their opponent adjusts accordingly. A metagame forms. When you face a Captain Falcon, you adjust differently. Certain characters can adjust to other characters better than others.

There are so many variables to what makes a matchup in a character's favour, and it changes as the metagame grows. We know how to face off against Diddy because he is popular and player at a high level by many players, and those Diddy players have to adjust as a result to not be too predictable. And as they do, we continue adjusting to their adjustments.

The metagame is a complex thing, but definitely real. Every competitive game has a metagame.

Marth has been able to do well in melee and brawl as their metagames developed because denying him his ability to space and hit tippers hasn't been realistic. He couldn't be denied the utilization of his prime mechanic, and he was able to succeed. He was designed as a solid character who can adjust to his opponent's adjustments.

One of these reasons is because he was fast - when a character is speedy (either attack speed/endlag, or movement speed), you allow a large window of your metagame-based adjustments to be based on your dexterity as a player. You may not be able to adjust to a fast & deadly character as well if you played a heavy, compared to if you played a speedster. This is why slow characters fall by the wayside as metagames develop - you're prey to your frame numbers and can't adjust to the metagame as well (with convincing mixups, feigns, baits, and such).


Mixups on their own are a product of the metagame. You can't mix up if your opponent didn't expect something specific in the first place. Performing a mixup means knowing what your opponent expects from you (ie dthrow uair + uair as Diddy) and performing something else that they may not be defending themselves against. A metagame develops, and the dthrow metagame with diddy will continue developing. How it develops, we can't foresee. It'll just 'happen', and some characters will be better at future Diddy dthrow situations than others, which will be one of the MANY elements that affect the matchup.

Tippers are like any other mechanic - it can remain meaningful as the metagame develops (shine in melee) or become predictable and barely reap results (PKT2 in melee/brawl). Some mechanics are harder to play around and counteract than others. Marth used to be the premier ranged disjoint character, but this is no longer the case. We're left wondering if the Tipper mechanic will save him and be as resilient a mechanic as it was in melee and brawl.

 

[thehard]

Just now- ESAM vs M2K anybody?

ESAM is proving you can play this game very offensively if you want to. What a great Pikachu. And Pikachu is just great anyway.

I wonder how much proof of good Diddys being beaten by other characters people need before they stop worshiping him?

 

[Vengeance_NS]

Anyone see Reflexes wario? He played so good. I felt he lacked sonic exp which is why he lost to manny. But he destroyed stingers who is my states best Diddy and top 2 player for free with wario and then beat his rosalina. The esam matches were interesting I felt he could have won those as well and esam even said the only character he feared at Kit was reflex and his wario. I felt this tourney was a good showing for wario and they said reflex is still doesn't know matchups that well yet.

 

[Shaya]

M2K needs to implement banana throw + dtilt.
He [almost?] didn't dtilt the entire set.

But as many people are already saying, Pikachu's match up with diddy kong is pretty good.

@ Conda I feel like you haven't necessarily grasped what made Marth as good as he was in Melee or Brawl, it wasn't the tipper mechanic (and they weren't for the same reasons either). It's the moves he has. Lucina has those moves too.
They're just all average/below average to the point it doesn't really matter which one you use. Neither are safe on shield (or in at lot of scenarios on hit), neither have combos, neither have solid grab games or kill set ups, neither have a good recovery, neither have mobility to write home about. You can look at numbers and see Marth is objectively better overall, but that doesn't mean anything if the base power level of their kits/numbers are already towards the lower ends of the cast.

Their punishes, however rarely they come (they don't have pressure in their kits to force things) will work out better for Lucina in some scenarios because punishes are to a certain extent outside of your control. The clincher is that the difference is minor, and the reward for the same rare scenario if Marth spaces is game winning in and of itself practically guaranteed (if you get it at the 50% or so earlier than Lucina would have to work just as hard/harder for that is). Seeing that optimal play from both characters involves spacing, the moment these characters become capable of forcing respect, player skill with the tipper will become more noticeable/actually start to matter.

If Lucina was in Brawl, with the same 'rules' but Brawl-Marth specs, she'd be noticeably worse. She'd get the chain grabs and grab releases, but wouldn't be killing characters out of them like Marth had guaranteed (dair on MK, Falco, tipppers on wario, etc). A lot of Marth's high tier match ups in that game were even or close to, even with the bull crap; he killed primarily with aerials or down smash, so the former being significantly easier to tipper with (than grounded normals usually are), would underline why Marth would be a lot better. Even with this in mind Lucina would still be 10th-15thish imo.

 

[TTTTTsd]

What made Marth good was the combination of speed + disjoint and a really good grab game (at least in Melee.) Tippers were a VERY good bonus to this and made his already commendable disjoint in Melee even scarier, and solidified his placing as an incredibly strong character. I have more experience with Melee Marth so I can say that it was not tippers that made him amazing, they just sorta contributed and were the icing on the cake.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

Just now- ESAM vs M2K anybody?

ESAM is proving you can play this game very offensively if you want to. What a great Pikachu. And Pikachu is just great anyway.

I wonder how much proof of good Diddys being beaten by other characters people need before they stop worshiping him?

All this tourney says to me is the timer is too ****ing long.

We saw M2k lose to Donkey kong but no ones boosting Donkey Kong.

 

[Karaoke Man]

It's official: all of the clones are worse than the originals.
(Referring to Dr. Mario, Dark Pit and Lucina).

Though Doc plays drastically different from Mario which
IMO is enough to get people to play him instead, and
Dark Pit's differences are so few that anything Pit
can do, Dark Pit can do almost as well for the most part, so personal taste
wins out. Only Lucina fails to offer anything significant
compared to her counterpart other than being
"Marth for rookies and playing with rookies".

"Worse" is a perception. So, in that right, yes. It is personal taste. People are taking too linear of an approach to this.

Dark Pit (much like Lucina) has his subtle difference, but that's what allows him to be his own character. His subtle differences doesn't mean that he's "worse". It just means he functions differently. Otherwise, he really would just be a recoloring of Pit.

How many times will people bring this up? She is worse on block on EVERY MOVE they have.

She literally has NO SAFE BUTTONS. Marth at least has d-tilt, FH Fair and retreating Bair.

She has nothing besides perfect spaced d-tilt.

One button

Let that sink in.

Being a Street Fighter player I am well aware of who Broly is. Good **** to him. More of a testament to the games overall balance rather then Lucina being anything special.

Much like I said to meleebrawler up there. It's those subtle differences that make all the difference.

In Lucina's case, she simply plays a different role than Marth. Her style still requires spacing; you just don't have to be quite as percise with it. Her lack of a tipper makes her a bit less zoning oriented, but a bit more rushdown oriented.

Oh course, you can't forget that her Dair still has a tip/sweet spot just like Marth's. Her sword may not have the range/tipper like Marth's, but that is what allows her to have easier strings setups than Marth.

So, overall Lucina is not about be being "safe"; She's more about being bold.

 

[TTTTTsd]

All this tourney says to me is the timer is too ****ing long.

We saw M2k lose to Donkey kong but no ones boosting Donkey Kong.

That's all Sonic's telling me, honestly. Dear lord I feel sick. We're at game five now and I'm fading

 

[ChronoPenguin]

Wtf. Karaoke you keep saying the most fortune cookie ****.
Her not having a tipper would all be valid if her hits did more damage. We're talking a 1% difference on Reward against Marth not tipping. Brother please. Stahp

That's all Sonic's telling me, honestly. Dear lord I feel sick. We're at game five now and I'm fading

It hasn't even been this tourney it's been a lot of observation and play. We don't need these super long timers.
Im damn fine with a game being lost due to Clock...if the clock doesn't take a year to come.

 

[Vengeance_NS]

That's all Sonic's telling me, honestly. Dear lord I feel sick. We're at game five now and I'm fading

This is why game needs to be 2 stocks. This 3 stock is to long. 2 stocks 5 mins.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

This is why game needs to be 2 stocks. This 3 stock is to long. 2 stocks 5 mins.

2 Vs 3 stock is negligible, frankly I dont think its a qualm between the game being "too long" at all. Though I like 2 stocks. It's the timer.

We're having 3 stock games end in less then 4 minutes and 3 stock games going maybe 5 minutes but then we have an 8 stock timer for it? We don't need that excess amount of time. You could make the timer 5 to 7 minutes in all seriousness.

 

[RascalTheCharizard]

Her lack of a tipper makes her a bit less zoning oriented, but a bit more rushdown oriented.

I thought we tossed this misconception to the wayside ages ago.

 

[san.]

I enjoyed playing in 3 stock tourneys far more.

I understand how Lucina may be less safe on shield, but how are followups? Are chained or landing aerials for Lucina vs. non-tippered Marth that different?

 

[HeoandReo]

In Lucina's case, she simply plays a different role than Marth. Her style still requires spacing; you just don't have to be quite as percise with it. Her lack of a tipper makes her a bit less zoning oriented, but a bit more rushdown oriented.

Oh course, you can't forget that her Dair still has a tip/sweet spot just like Marth's. Her sword may not have the range/tipper like Marth's, but that is what allows her to have easier strings setups than Marth.

So, overall Lucina is not about be being "safe"; She's more about being bold.

I'm not sure about this. Lucina could do rushdown if she really wants to, it's just that it'd mean that she would get wrecked because of her air and ground endlag. She can pressure, but she has to space really precisely if she doesn't want the opponent to get in and punish. She and Marth just don't have the overall attack speed to match most of the cast - their attacks come out fast, but they have to make bigger commitments than everyone else except I dunno Ganondorf or Bowser or something.

That, and Lucina's sword isn't much different knockback-wise than Marth's sourspot. If you wanted, you could do a lot of the things you could do with Lucina with Marth instead if you were willing to space differently with Marth. Marth getting a tipper is just a nice bonus because in this game he wants to keep people away so that he's actually safe when he attacks.

I enjoyed playing in 3 stock tourneys far more.

I understand how Lucina may be less safe on shield, but how are followups? Are chained or landing aerials for Lucina vs. non-tippered Marth that different?

As far as I know most followups are the same between them, and there's not many of them like dthrow -> uair or bair is somewhat reliable at early percents. Their throws send opponents pretty far this game, so you can't reliably follow up with them.

 

[Trifroze]

The characters used in a match seem to affect the pace of this Smash much more than any other. Combined with the fact that a lot of characters seem viable, it's possibly proof that this iteration has found some sort of a balance between defense and offense.

 

[Antonykun]

Tonight i just played a lot of battles against a friend of mine. I was using Swordfighter and man when I won it was because i was trying oh so hard. Anyways you guys remember Swordfighter's U-air? That really powerful attack that they have? Turns out it also has relatively low landing lag so you can go for mixups and frame traps. Seriously I feel that Swordfighter's meta is going to revolve around that move.

 

[HeroMystic]

I completely missed whatever tourney you guys are talking about, but camping and running the timer has nothing to do with stocks. It never has.

 

[Karaoke Man]

Wtf. Karaoke you keep saying the most fortune cookie ****.
Her not having a tipper would all be valid if her hits did more damage. We're talking a 1% difference on Reward against Marth not tipping. Brother please. Stahp


It hasn't even been this tourney it's been a lot of observation and play. We don't need these super long timers.
Im damn fine with a game being lost due to Clock...if the clock doesn't take a year to come.

Let me tell you that I can, will, and am going to say whatever it is that I feel like saying. Whether you like it or not, is not my problem. Calm yo' *** down

Where do you think those differences (like the 1% on reward) come from? From the fact that one has a tipper and the other doesn't. You can't bring up differences of the character without mentioning the key factor that diffrentiates the two. It's because of that difference is why I'm saying Lucina is more about being bold. If you're literally trying to play Lucina exactly the same as Marth, then I can see where people are having the problem and am elaborating on solutions to handle it....Really?

Just because everyone else wants to keep trying to judge things with subjective terms as if they're objective, means that I'm apparently not allowed to have a different perspective on it...? LOL

You're the one who needs to stahp. Don't come at me with that ignorant bull****

 

[Makorel]

I feel like these matches are going so long more because of Sonic than because they're 3 stock. They way Sonic plays he basically has to do hit and run pokes or get punished, and playing against Sonic you have to play defensive and do little more than pokes or else get punished, and that continues until one player gets killed at high percent from a poke.

 

[Quickhero]

@ Karaoke Man Having an opinion is fine, but you could probably work on making your posts sound less...dramatic. Your last post really sounds like he is trying to take away your freedom of speech or something and you're trying to "fight back", it's just a discussion lol. It's ok to have a different opinion than others but please don't talk like people are insulting you as a person or even your claims just because you have a different opinion lol.

Anyways. I think Marth is fine as a "mid tier" character. He struggles vs a lot of higher tiers, but it's not impossible for him to win. He wants more speed and a better grab game, but I still think people are exaggerating Marth's weaknesses too much when stating things like "Marth sucks" because he still has combos and his speed and aerial game is still enough for him to stand a chance against top tiers and land a good hit if you are good.

As for Marth vs Lucina. Well, yeah I think Marth is, for the most part, better. Less shield stun and having a tipper provides much more needed safety for Marth and kill potential. You don't lose THAT much when you miss your tipper compared to Lucina landing a hit anyways and I've done plenty sour spot neutral/side air combos before so it can actually benefit Marth. That being said, I still think Lucina isn't bad or anything, but I don't think Lucina has much going for her compared to Marth.

 

[Shaya]

You will have a hard time explaining in any way shape or form how or why Lucina can play in such a way more effectively than Marth would doing the exact same thing.

I've done this argument numerous times before though ;\
So let's just consider these scenarios
Marth and Lucina hit a shield -> Marth comes out on top all the time in terms of safety.
Marth and Lucina hit someone with a non-ko move -> They both have the same move properties for knockback and angles. The same things will happen on both characters with the same hits except with different percentages. As in, tipper fair will hit someone just as far as Lucina does some 10-20% later, untipper fair will hit someone almost as far as Lucina does. Neither really having practical moves for combos means this difference doesn't tend to matter as every hit you get you require thought/reaction to get continued hits.
Marth and Lucina hit someone with the intention to kill -> For Lucina, it doesn't matter much except with forward smash, which hers does kill pretty well.