UserShadow7989
Smash Journeyman
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2007
- Messages
- 307
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Make Your Move 26: Top 50 Is In! MYM27 starts on January 31st
- Thread starter Katapultar
- Start date
Katapultar
Smash Lord
Yes, more Yu-Gi-Oh! movesets! This one’s a different take on the Hugo genre that inevitably reminds me of Midori Gang, where the extra characters are called with different inputs so you don’t always have to keep track of multiple characters. A good way to design the set. The fact that Don can move while his allies are attacking and during their cooldown makes me think that most of the Dark Scorpions’ attacks deal less hitstun and shieldstun than the average fighter, which would have to be the case for balance’s sake.
It is weirdly refreshing to get a simple melee attack on the Side Special, one that is actually welcome in this set to give the Don some melee given his Standards are given to Cliff and they can be lost if the latter is KO’ed. Down-angled is the nice tried-and-true “pop them behind you to knock into your other hitboxes” type move. I also like the flavour behind all of the Dark Scorpions having the same comical recovery, especially to keep this Jamcon set simple. Gorg’s Smashes are less flashy and more modest than your usual fare, but they work for this type of set, and most people would be hard-pressed to think of more interesting moves for this type of character.
Chick might be the most interesting of the Dark Scorpions: I like his cowardly behavior where he hangs back behind another Scorpion, giving him anti-cross-up utility and some fun combo-extending with his D-air from your down-angled Side Special. I like how up-angled Side Special can pop foes into late N-air - I wonder if it would be feasible to make N-air more rewarding in some way the later it hits? Like a bit more damage or something. B-air’s turnaround nature also works well with Chick’s AI behavior and in tandem with the other Scorpions. U-air is also a fun take on movement aerials - it’s tied to an entity that is disjointed from the main character you’re controlling, so you can do multiple hops with buffered U-airs.
I also like how Meanae’s Z-air interacts with Chick! Meanae’s throws work well with the set overall, essentially giving you free follow-ups from pre-emptive Scorpions if you already had them out. Down Throw’s tech chase set-up with Gorg might be my favourite among the bunch. I also like how Meanae doesn’t (appear to) have any real KO throws: that’s good set design, as it means her grab isn’t too overpowering and very much relies on the other members to get anything meaningful from it. If anything, I do think Meanae’s slow grab start-up should be more elaborated-upon though: the fact that Don can act while other Scorpions are attacking or in end lag means that he can threaten shielding foes with a grab more easily than other fighters with slow grabs could. Maybe not that big of a deal to add, though.
Though outclassed by other solid entries with more enticing concepts or individuals moves, in my opinion, the Dark Scorpions are still a neat set! They are pretty close to Caligo for my nomination this Jamcon, assuming another set doesn’t pop out in the 11th hour.
On a final note not directed at the set’s concepts or execution, I think you handled the Dark Scorpions’ characterization well for the time and how many characters you had to work with. One bit of characterization opportunity you could add: maybe have Meanae blush if she uses her tether recovery to pull herself and Don Zaloog back to the stage together, as a references to Meanae’s character of being in love with him as was established in their Yu-Gi-Oh! GX episode. Or you could just ignore it if you don’t like it. In any case, there are more opportunities for characterization in the extras, which I would actually like to see if you were willing to go back and edit in Final Smashes and extras after the Jamcon - it would be fun to see interactions between these quirky villains.
It is weirdly refreshing to get a simple melee attack on the Side Special, one that is actually welcome in this set to give the Don some melee given his Standards are given to Cliff and they can be lost if the latter is KO’ed. Down-angled is the nice tried-and-true “pop them behind you to knock into your other hitboxes” type move. I also like the flavour behind all of the Dark Scorpions having the same comical recovery, especially to keep this Jamcon set simple. Gorg’s Smashes are less flashy and more modest than your usual fare, but they work for this type of set, and most people would be hard-pressed to think of more interesting moves for this type of character.
Chick might be the most interesting of the Dark Scorpions: I like his cowardly behavior where he hangs back behind another Scorpion, giving him anti-cross-up utility and some fun combo-extending with his D-air from your down-angled Side Special. I like how up-angled Side Special can pop foes into late N-air - I wonder if it would be feasible to make N-air more rewarding in some way the later it hits? Like a bit more damage or something. B-air’s turnaround nature also works well with Chick’s AI behavior and in tandem with the other Scorpions. U-air is also a fun take on movement aerials - it’s tied to an entity that is disjointed from the main character you’re controlling, so you can do multiple hops with buffered U-airs.
I also like how Meanae’s Z-air interacts with Chick! Meanae’s throws work well with the set overall, essentially giving you free follow-ups from pre-emptive Scorpions if you already had them out. Down Throw’s tech chase set-up with Gorg might be my favourite among the bunch. I also like how Meanae doesn’t (appear to) have any real KO throws: that’s good set design, as it means her grab isn’t too overpowering and very much relies on the other members to get anything meaningful from it. If anything, I do think Meanae’s slow grab start-up should be more elaborated-upon though: the fact that Don can act while other Scorpions are attacking or in end lag means that he can threaten shielding foes with a grab more easily than other fighters with slow grabs could. Maybe not that big of a deal to add, though.
Though outclassed by other solid entries with more enticing concepts or individuals moves, in my opinion, the Dark Scorpions are still a neat set! They are pretty close to Caligo for my nomination this Jamcon, assuming another set doesn’t pop out in the 11th hour.
On a final note not directed at the set’s concepts or execution, I think you handled the Dark Scorpions’ characterization well for the time and how many characters you had to work with. One bit of characterization opportunity you could add: maybe have Meanae blush if she uses her tether recovery to pull herself and Don Zaloog back to the stage together, as a references to Meanae’s character of being in love with him as was established in their Yu-Gi-Oh! GX episode. Or you could just ignore it if you don’t like it. In any case, there are more opportunities for characterization in the extras, which I would actually like to see if you were willing to go back and edit in Final Smashes and extras after the Jamcon - it would be fun to see interactions between these quirky villains.
Daehypeels
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2022
- Messages
- 14
Perhaps I'm treading too close to the Han-flavored sun here, but what better time to throw a new gal into the scene with this Jamcon?
Let's see how far your patience can take you, when taken to your absolute limit.
Let's see how far your patience can take you, when taken to your absolute limit.
FrozenRoy
Smash Lord
Katapultar
Smash Lord
Saving Bandit Gal for tomorrow due to time constraints tonight.
Memes aside, Trol is a fascinating read for being a super experimental set where he only has a mere 4 attack inputs. You did want people to engage in actual moveset crimes this Jamcon, after all, so it’s good to see that you’re practicing what you preached.
The main appeal behind this set is how it explores the balance and implications behind only having 4 attacks, to what is pretty much the best way you could for a melee fighter made for a Jamcon. Trol has tricks like R.O.B flight, a power meter, omnidirectional attacking, the ability to move while attacking and even funky crouching intangability with full power meter to compensate for his lack of options and stuff like general super armour or intangibility. It’s also fun to see how some of his moves are over-tuned compared to the average fighter. Back Throw probably doesn’t add -that- much to the set, but it is fun flavour-wise, just to infect the opponent with the terrible-ness that is Heavy-Nova-itis.
Trol would actually be a fascinating fighter to see implemented in Smash (or Rivals of Aether?), just to see how effective he would be in practice. Heck, I would actually be interested in seeing this Trol’s conTrol scheme on a more MYM’ian character like a projectile or trap user - maybe they have a Neutral Special that lets them fire out their projectile in any direction and freely manipulate it.
Trol is naturally limited by his limited move count, but not as badly as you might think. He feels comparable to Firebar in that he’s basically a semi-jokeset, but I actually prefer Trol to Firebar because his concepts are a bit more interesting, and he’d be a lot more practical for Smash in the grand scheme of things, not just factoring in 1v1 gameplay.
The main appeal behind this set is how it explores the balance and implications behind only having 4 attacks, to what is pretty much the best way you could for a melee fighter made for a Jamcon. Trol has tricks like R.O.B flight, a power meter, omnidirectional attacking, the ability to move while attacking and even funky crouching intangability with full power meter to compensate for his lack of options and stuff like general super armour or intangibility. It’s also fun to see how some of his moves are over-tuned compared to the average fighter. Back Throw probably doesn’t add -that- much to the set, but it is fun flavour-wise, just to infect the opponent with the terrible-ness that is Heavy-Nova-itis.
Trol would actually be a fascinating fighter to see implemented in Smash (or Rivals of Aether?), just to see how effective he would be in practice. Heck, I would actually be interested in seeing this Trol’s conTrol scheme on a more MYM’ian character like a projectile or trap user - maybe they have a Neutral Special that lets them fire out their projectile in any direction and freely manipulate it.
Trol is naturally limited by his limited move count, but not as badly as you might think. He feels comparable to Firebar in that he’s basically a semi-jokeset, but I actually prefer Trol to Firebar because his concepts are a bit more interesting, and he’d be a lot more practical for Smash in the grand scheme of things, not just factoring in 1v1 gameplay.
FrozenRoy
Smash Lord
Slightly late to the Jamcon closing party, BUT, the second Jamcon has ended! Thanks to everyone for participating (and even those who didn't but tried their best), so here's the crimes we have to solve this Jamcon detectives!
The Judicious Judgement of Junkrat, as presided over by Judge Tunz!
The Boisterous Bandit Brought to Justice by Majora_787!
The Curious Case of Dog Witch Caligo, who worked with Arctic Tern to bring these criminals to court!
The Disastrious Dark Scorpion Gang, whose thieving plots were reported by UserShadow7989!
Some crimes, however, come from themselves, and given Daehypeels turning themselves in for Bandit Gal that is perhaps something we should keep in mind!
heavy nova. frozenroy.
Anyway, comment on every set and vote for your favorite by the end of Jamcon voting! We have until the end of Thursday, June 8th to do so, so get on it!
The Judicious Judgement of Junkrat, as presided over by Judge Tunz!
The Boisterous Bandit Brought to Justice by Majora_787!
The Curious Case of Dog Witch Caligo, who worked with Arctic Tern to bring these criminals to court!
The Disastrious Dark Scorpion Gang, whose thieving plots were reported by UserShadow7989!
Some crimes, however, come from themselves, and given Daehypeels turning themselves in for Bandit Gal that is perhaps something we should keep in mind!
heavy nova. frozenroy.
Anyway, comment on every set and vote for your favorite by the end of Jamcon voting! We have until the end of Thursday, June 8th to do so, so get on it!
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tunz
Smash Cadet
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2022
- Messages
- 25
Now that Jamcon's over and I've been alerted that the next set posted will be MYM26 set #69, I had to post this one that I've been sitting on for a few days. Another OC from me, The Empress.
With a surprise appearance at the end! No spoilers, though!
With a surprise appearance at the end! No spoilers, though!
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tunz
Smash Cadet
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2022
- Messages
- 25
JAMCON COMMENT
Dark Scorpions by UserShadow
-It would probably be nice to know definitively which character is which, as the name list and picture of them have no particular correlation in terms of order, meaning I was lost for a bit on which name was supposed to go with which character. Though, it is pretty easy to figure out quite fast, but for someone like me who doesn’t know anything about Yu-Gi-Oh, it might be a nice quality of life change.
-This seems like a very ‘feast or famine’ type character, where you can literally be robbed of nearly all your moves for the rest of the stock, or set up down right devilish tricks that steal the opponent’s stock in ridiculous ways. It seems like big powerful hits would be best to deal with the AI members, like it is with Nana, so heavies would be mostly good at dealing with them. This is amplified tenfold by shared damage across all 5 teammates.
-I sort of worry that the matchup against the Dark Scorpions would be dictated by the opponent’s character’s ability to combo Gorg since he’s the biggest body of the five. The shared damage means a Pichu for example could endlessly combo the poor superheavy and deal intense damage with little risk. The AI being able to dodge and shield does somewhat remedy this, though. You also do show awareness of this, especially by giving him Tough Guy, which would help fix this problem a little bit too. I’m really just worried about whether playing Dark Scorpions would turn into “Saving Private Gorg/Protect President Gorg”, even with the precautions you took, you know? Combined with my last concern, if they’re both true, the Dark Scorpions wouldn’t have many good matchups theoretically. But that would probably pan out differently than I’m imagining.
-I find the idea of using different characters for each input segment to gain the best of all worlds (just requiring more skill to utilize) really interesting and cool.
-”It’s still fairly read-based, but unlike his more cumbersome Forward Smash, Gorg does have the potential of comboing into his Forward Smash thanks to Don Zaloog’s attacks-” I think you meant Down Smash on the second one? Or am I misunderstanding something?
-I really like Gorg’s inputs. It may be known that I’m a big fan of big heavy powerful hits and Gorg’s moves really deliver. I especially liked the Down Smash scraping along the ground, imagining that in my head was incredible.
-”comically large mallet” got a good chuckle out of me
-In case you didn't know, Meanae’s name in the big red title at the start of her section reads “Meane” instead of what I assume is meant to be “Meanae”. Not a knock against the set since it’s probably just a typo but I thought I’d let you know in case you didn’t already.
-What did Brawl do to you
-Extras and playstyle segments being absent for now is unfortunate, but understandable. I don’t fault you for that.
Overall, this was a mind-bogglingly inventive and unique set. Thinking about how it would be to play as the Dark Scorpions, it really would feel like playing five characters at once. And playing against them would feel like when you’re on three stocks in a free for all and everyone else is on one. My personal score for this incredibly creative and well thought out moveset for a multiple-characters fighter done very well is going to be 8.5/10. Good work!
Dark Scorpions by UserShadow
-It would probably be nice to know definitively which character is which, as the name list and picture of them have no particular correlation in terms of order, meaning I was lost for a bit on which name was supposed to go with which character. Though, it is pretty easy to figure out quite fast, but for someone like me who doesn’t know anything about Yu-Gi-Oh, it might be a nice quality of life change.
-This seems like a very ‘feast or famine’ type character, where you can literally be robbed of nearly all your moves for the rest of the stock, or set up down right devilish tricks that steal the opponent’s stock in ridiculous ways. It seems like big powerful hits would be best to deal with the AI members, like it is with Nana, so heavies would be mostly good at dealing with them. This is amplified tenfold by shared damage across all 5 teammates.
-I sort of worry that the matchup against the Dark Scorpions would be dictated by the opponent’s character’s ability to combo Gorg since he’s the biggest body of the five. The shared damage means a Pichu for example could endlessly combo the poor superheavy and deal intense damage with little risk. The AI being able to dodge and shield does somewhat remedy this, though. You also do show awareness of this, especially by giving him Tough Guy, which would help fix this problem a little bit too. I’m really just worried about whether playing Dark Scorpions would turn into “Saving Private Gorg/Protect President Gorg”, even with the precautions you took, you know? Combined with my last concern, if they’re both true, the Dark Scorpions wouldn’t have many good matchups theoretically. But that would probably pan out differently than I’m imagining.
-I find the idea of using different characters for each input segment to gain the best of all worlds (just requiring more skill to utilize) really interesting and cool.
-”It’s still fairly read-based, but unlike his more cumbersome Forward Smash, Gorg does have the potential of comboing into his Forward Smash thanks to Don Zaloog’s attacks-” I think you meant Down Smash on the second one? Or am I misunderstanding something?
-I really like Gorg’s inputs. It may be known that I’m a big fan of big heavy powerful hits and Gorg’s moves really deliver. I especially liked the Down Smash scraping along the ground, imagining that in my head was incredible.
-”comically large mallet” got a good chuckle out of me
-In case you didn't know, Meanae’s name in the big red title at the start of her section reads “Meane” instead of what I assume is meant to be “Meanae”. Not a knock against the set since it’s probably just a typo but I thought I’d let you know in case you didn’t already.
-What did Brawl do to you
-Extras and playstyle segments being absent for now is unfortunate, but understandable. I don’t fault you for that.
Overall, this was a mind-bogglingly inventive and unique set. Thinking about how it would be to play as the Dark Scorpions, it really would feel like playing five characters at once. And playing against them would feel like when you’re on three stocks in a free for all and everyone else is on one. My personal score for this incredibly creative and well thought out moveset for a multiple-characters fighter done very well is going to be 8.5/10. Good work!
tunz
Smash Cadet
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2022
- Messages
- 25
JAMCON COMMENT
Trol by FrozenRoy
-”Four attacks is technically a lie because it also has standard floor and ledge attacks. I wll not be describing them.” and “IDK he probably has a Final Smash too?” got me good, as did a lot of the other things in the primer section.
-If X and Y are attack inputs, what is the jump button that you use for the floating mechanic?? Do you need a separate tag with a different control scheme attached to play Trol than you need for every other character????
-The crouching intangibility thing is so crazy i don't even know anymore man what am i even supposed to say to this. Even down to using the whole power meter, it's perfect.
-Honestly I think the Power Meter buffing the ledge and floor get-up attacks by 1.2x is wayyyy too much and should be toned down if not outright scrapped. This feature alone makes Trol a fighter that should and is going to get banned in every tournament everywhere. Think before you write, Froy, this is too much.
-Jokes aside, the whole intangibility crouching thing is actually a good workaround for not being able to shield. I like that aspect of the mechanic.
-”This attack refuses to KO until ___%” is now my favorite way of saying that a move doesn’t kill, thank you.
-i hope to god that you meant to say corpus colosseum and not the right name being corpus callosum because if thats intentional it is hilarious and i am going to assume that it is
-”This might seem useless, and it is, but-”. I dont even know what to say man this is bat**** insane
-that upper cut joke was so out of left field and it seems like an obvious joke to make but god damn did it get me good
-i cant keep adding things i laughed at because this comment will get too long what the ****
-X attack being faster than any grab is allowed to be in smash ultimate somehow feels par for the course with Trol at this point
-Down Throw is a legitimately interesting and proper move in comparison to a lot of the other bull**** on here that was a needed breather. I also like a good spike so that is welcome
-i dont even know what to say about the final smash i have been sitting here with my jaw on the floor for minutes
i have never laughed more or harder at a moveset ever. this humor and style of writing just clicked with me instantly and it was an absolute blast to read through. More objectively, you actually did manage to make a compelling and interesting character concept that fits the theme of the brokenness of the game you got it from. genuinely good work, im just completely dumbfounded by this. 9.7/10 for me personally. absolutely amazing.
Trol by FrozenRoy
-”Four attacks is technically a lie because it also has standard floor and ledge attacks. I wll not be describing them.” and “IDK he probably has a Final Smash too?” got me good, as did a lot of the other things in the primer section.
-If X and Y are attack inputs, what is the jump button that you use for the floating mechanic?? Do you need a separate tag with a different control scheme attached to play Trol than you need for every other character????
-The crouching intangibility thing is so crazy i don't even know anymore man what am i even supposed to say to this. Even down to using the whole power meter, it's perfect.
-Honestly I think the Power Meter buffing the ledge and floor get-up attacks by 1.2x is wayyyy too much and should be toned down if not outright scrapped. This feature alone makes Trol a fighter that should and is going to get banned in every tournament everywhere. Think before you write, Froy, this is too much.
-Jokes aside, the whole intangibility crouching thing is actually a good workaround for not being able to shield. I like that aspect of the mechanic.
-”This attack refuses to KO until ___%” is now my favorite way of saying that a move doesn’t kill, thank you.
-i hope to god that you meant to say corpus colosseum and not the right name being corpus callosum because if thats intentional it is hilarious and i am going to assume that it is
-”This might seem useless, and it is, but-”. I dont even know what to say man this is bat**** insane
-that upper cut joke was so out of left field and it seems like an obvious joke to make but god damn did it get me good
-i cant keep adding things i laughed at because this comment will get too long what the ****
-X attack being faster than any grab is allowed to be in smash ultimate somehow feels par for the course with Trol at this point
-Down Throw is a legitimately interesting and proper move in comparison to a lot of the other bull**** on here that was a needed breather. I also like a good spike so that is welcome
-i dont even know what to say about the final smash i have been sitting here with my jaw on the floor for minutes
i have never laughed more or harder at a moveset ever. this humor and style of writing just clicked with me instantly and it was an absolute blast to read through. More objectively, you actually did manage to make a compelling and interesting character concept that fits the theme of the brokenness of the game you got it from. genuinely good work, im just completely dumbfounded by this. 9.7/10 for me personally. absolutely amazing.
Arctic Tern
Smash Apprentice
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2022
- Messages
- 133
All Jamcon sets commented!
And it appears that my nomination has been stolen by the Dark Scorpions! I won't call the cops on them, though: they deserve it!
And it appears that my nomination has been stolen by the Dark Scorpions! I won't call the cops on them, though: they deserve it!
Katapultar
Smash Lord
Bandit has an interesting approach to her design, in that she prioritizes being as annoying to play against as reasonably possible - I never thought about how that would constitute an actual moveset crime until I got to the B-throw. This primarily comes down to having a lot of moves that are safe on block, with Jab’s flip mix-up being a fun one, and F-tilt, B-air and N-air being other notable options. U-tilt hits in a big area above you, U-air juggles opponents for a while while D-tilt creates a trap that can trip opponents - though I’m a bit unsure about it lasting for 5 seconds, even if the trap doesn’t trip opponents who are walking or shielding. Making her grab slow to compensate for having all those safe options is a good design choice.
The Specials are good in general, and the moves work together well under the theme of shield pressure. If anything, it would be a good idea to mention Specials first in future sets, as they would give some of your more basic moves something to play off of - for instance, the spacing from your side throws could lead into your Neutral or Side Specials, or U-throw leading into obvious stuff like U-air or Up Special. I did like how Down Special played off of something that the entire set had been establishing throughout its run, though. Other than that, the set feels solid enough as-is - a big improvement from Barbara in my opinion, and very close to /v/-tan in quality.
- Thought: what if landing your item-stealing Dash Attack (or grab) on an opponent without an item refilled one of your expended uses of Neutral Special? Would give Bandit an incentive to play offensively and live up to her thieving namesake. I suggest Dash Attack and grab because those moves aren’t entirely free to land.
- Other than that, I think Neutral Special is a cool move. What sells it for me is the stance’s baiting aspect, via how fast Bandit throws her items and that she can cancel throwing. It also works neatly with the RNG: like Hero’s Command Menu, you can repeat the move over and over until you’ve got an item that you want, so having limited throws that are RNG-dependent isn’t as bad as it sounds. Having limited throws also balances out how fast the move is as a projectile in general.
- Neutral Special feels like the one move that would synergize with D-Smash’s smoke, as you can obscure what angle you throw your items at and which item you got.
- I also like Side Special as a concept - a move that can 50/50 as a burst option or throwing the cutout forward as a disjointed counter. Some of Bandit’s options from her movement seem a little glossed-over for how meticulously you talk about what attacks have to offer in general: mainly the uppercut and shield, perhaps how these and throwing the cardboard cutout could work as mix-ups? That would be a lot to talk about in an already involved move, though.
- Down Special is a simple but cool way to close off the set, being a slow but strong command grab that serves as a threat from all of Bandit’s shield poking and plays off of F-Smash’s follow-up properties (not explicitly mentioned, but obvious enough to readers). A solid move for something that was rushed out!
The Specials are good in general, and the moves work together well under the theme of shield pressure. If anything, it would be a good idea to mention Specials first in future sets, as they would give some of your more basic moves something to play off of - for instance, the spacing from your side throws could lead into your Neutral or Side Specials, or U-throw leading into obvious stuff like U-air or Up Special. I did like how Down Special played off of something that the entire set had been establishing throughout its run, though. Other than that, the set feels solid enough as-is - a big improvement from Barbara in my opinion, and very close to /v/-tan in quality.
Nomination goes to Dog Witch Caligo this time around. Caligo and the Dark Scorpions were practically tied in quality: I liked some of the latter's execution more with their aerial shenanigans, but Caligo had a slight edge in the more interesting concepts found in her Specials. I am also admittedly biased towards setmakers who have yet to win a Jamcon. Other than those two sets, all the entries were pretty solid, as the less experienced setmakers threw out sets that could be considered among their best.
This set’s Google doc title “The Empress & Dry Bowser” is funny in the context of knowing that the Empress is an OC from the set’s Smashboards post, as it implies that the set is a tag-team between an OC and an existing character. The only real weird tag team set we’ve had in the past is a set for Bill Cosby & Squirtle from MYM1. Echo fighters are certainly fine in MYM, especially as an extra to an existing set, but you might want to put Dry Bowser in his own Google doc if he’s not directly tied to Empress. Other than that, Empress is a refreshingly interesting character choice from you when we’re mostly used to Overwatch and real/fake Pokemon.
Honestly, Empress’s Down Special is by far and away the coolest move in any of your sets. MYM loves minions. You do a fine job with mentioning minion synergies and are smart not to talk about them for too long. If the entire set focused on the minions and they had their balance tweaked, I could see Empress being a legitimately great set and a solid contender this contest. It’s fair that such a hugely ambitious move would be tricky for you to work with at your current skill level, though.
Empress admittedly feels barebones for the most part. Most of her Specials feel weak as hooks conceptually, and her non-Specials feel very basic and don’t acknowledge or play off of other moves outside of a few token mentions (D-tilt tech chase to Dash Attack, a few moves mentioning that they can knock foes into minions, and N-air’s benefit from NSpec buff). But she does have a -lot- of potential, and ended up being your most fascinating read so far nonetheless.
As a side note, it might be good to mention the Empress's collection and 3 bodyguards in the Extras section of the moveset, as their write-ups aren’t important to know for understanding Empress’s character for the moveset. Getting information about the 3 bodyguards made me think that they were actually going to be in the main set, but they were instead on the Final Smash. Perhaps they could be Assist Trophies?
- Neutral Special is a simple enough “buff button” that gives you some minor buffs, but passive damage and a small damage boost + damage cut don’t feel as exciting as the effect could be if you know what I mean. Since the move is directly tied to rage flavour-wise, what if the effects were improved further at higher percents? Would tie in perfectly with Smash’s rage mechanic, and the fact that Empress is a super heavyweight. It would also force you to be more careful about when you activate the buff: if you throw it out too soon into the stock, the cooldown could mean missing out getting the buff at higher percents. As Empress is a heavyweight, she would naturally be easy to combo and thus easy to bring up to a high percent in a short amount of time.
- It would be cool if Side Special’s javelin stayed out on the stage when it landed, instead of disappearing and needing to wait 8 seconds for it to return. Like, you could run up to the javelin while it’s embedded in the stage and use Side Special to throw it again. I suspect that the javelin is meant to be a powerful projectile since it has a long cooldown: if that’s the case, it would be neat if the writing sold that aspect of the move (Empress is described as “throwing the javelin with immense strength”), or even if its kill percent was brought up to something like 130%.
- Oooh, Down Special is a massive and ambitious Special coming from you (might be better to list all the 15 monsters in bullet points, so it’s easier on readers - I kind of glossed over the sentence where all the monsters are mentioned in one go). Do you have pictures for these summons? I imagine there should be something for them from DnD.
- What if Air Elemental’s winds blew fighters upwards instead of downwards if it was offstage? Feels very powerful as a gimping tool offstage, even if you mention that Empress can’t set it up offstage too easily without SD’ing.
- Might be good to drop Fire Elemental’s trapping down to 1 second - 2 seconds feels a bit long to lock opponents in place, especially when Empress can attack them.
- The T. Rex is one of the cooler summon ideas, requiring opponents to wake it up over its duration but being crazy powerful if it does wake up. T. Rex’s rampage is very vaguely-defined though: no specific damage and KO percents are mentioned, and it doesn’t even mention whether the T. Rex can move while it’s rampaging. The T. Rex also feels very overpowered for how long it can stay out - might be better for it to stay out for like, 3 seconds? Means Empress only has a limited time to make foes wake up the T. Rex, and foes have a chance to keep away from the T. Rex when it does wake. Also, can the T. Rex be damaged while it’s rampaging?
Honestly, Empress’s Down Special is by far and away the coolest move in any of your sets. MYM loves minions. You do a fine job with mentioning minion synergies and are smart not to talk about them for too long. If the entire set focused on the minions and they had their balance tweaked, I could see Empress being a legitimately great set and a solid contender this contest. It’s fair that such a hugely ambitious move would be tricky for you to work with at your current skill level, though.
Empress admittedly feels barebones for the most part. Most of her Specials feel weak as hooks conceptually, and her non-Specials feel very basic and don’t acknowledge or play off of other moves outside of a few token mentions (D-tilt tech chase to Dash Attack, a few moves mentioning that they can knock foes into minions, and N-air’s benefit from NSpec buff). But she does have a -lot- of potential, and ended up being your most fascinating read so far nonetheless.
As a side note, it might be good to mention the Empress's collection and 3 bodyguards in the Extras section of the moveset, as their write-ups aren’t important to know for understanding Empress’s character for the moveset. Getting information about the 3 bodyguards made me think that they were actually going to be in the main set, but they were instead on the Final Smash. Perhaps they could be Assist Trophies?
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n88
Smash Lord
- Joined
- Oct 10, 2008
- Messages
- 1,534
Trol by
FrozenRoy
I remember you mentioning the “design Trol with only his canon attacks” idea a while ago, cool to see it finally pay off. It absolutely is a crime, and (at least based on my skimming) the biggest one in the jamcon by a country mile, so congrats on being the jamcon theme interpretation you want to see in the world.
The set does a good job trying to make him as functional as possible given the “four attacks” constraint, and I appreciate the funny jank like how c-sticking works in the set and his plethora of weird defensive options. I also like that he feels like a miniature set in the sense of having… one Normal, one Special, one Smash, one Grab.
This is a funny place for a slightly harder “he actually does just get intangibility on jumps and crouches” take than what Idar did - if anyone needs extra options like that, it’s for sure Mister Four Attacks. I like the choice to give him kind of a souped-up Melee-style crouch cancel too; that’s something I’ve thought about in a few places but never quite gone for yet. It's a unique defensive option for him that isn’t quite as insane as just bringing in the Heavy Nova style invincibility.
I wish the Y Attack was chargeable. Maybe silly to levy a real mechanical complaint at something like this, but… smash attacks and charging them is such a huge staple Smash Bros mechanic! It’d play up Y as your “Smash” a lot harder. And I think it’d be funny in the context of him being able to move during attacks.
Daisy by Z Zakawer2
The set is very heavy on references to Ultimate characters. There are times when this is great! It's particularly helpful for attack animations and little tidbits like the Byleth-style animation tweaks for alts.
There are also a lot of times (particularly in the playstyle section) where the writing gets carried away with the references, and invokes too many examples of things in a way that's tangential to the main point. As an example of these... examples, there's a list of 5-6 characters that have counters after just mentioning counters as a concept in the playstyle section. Your audience understands what a counter is and could rattle off a list like that themselves. The real reason to bring up an example is for a little color and to ground what you're doing in Smash. Serving that end, I'd really recommend sticking to like... one example character tops for a situation like that. Especially for a parenthetical in the middle of a sentence!
Design-wise I think the coolest thing this set has going for it is the Flower status effect consistently getting applied by her big kill moves - it keeps those attacks perpetually relevant for the chip damage and encourages her to go for them early, which squares with the take on the character as more aggressive than Peach.
I think the moveset may sell Daisy as a bit too strong at points? I'm no Balance McGee, but the majority of her normals are safe on shield on top of her speed. Layer on her own really strong out of shield game and the stage control/projectile play she gets from her Specials and she looks pretty good on defense too. I know that the strong shield pressure is a very intentional feature, but I don't feel like she's actually bad at anything to compensate. You mention "limited KO power outside of <list of 9 different attacks>" as a weakness but that looks like a pretty healthy spread of kill moves to me.
One or two of them sound like late or situational killers, admittedly, but not all of 'em. It's hard to gauge exactly how strong some of them are meant to be without damage percentages or some indication of when they KO. I was surprised to see frame data here, but no damage percentages! Typically the latter is a bit less spooky for people to start figuring out, and I think it'd be a good addition here for helping assess some of her attacks.
Overall I'd say this feels like a pretty good pitch for a Daisy with a more distinct identity from Peach. I suspect she's a little over-tuned, but it's hard to be sure with some key details missing, and a couple of her Specials could feed more directly into the aggressive vibe.
FrozenRoy
I remember you mentioning the “design Trol with only his canon attacks” idea a while ago, cool to see it finally pay off. It absolutely is a crime, and (at least based on my skimming) the biggest one in the jamcon by a country mile, so congrats on being the jamcon theme interpretation you want to see in the world.
The set does a good job trying to make him as functional as possible given the “four attacks” constraint, and I appreciate the funny jank like how c-sticking works in the set and his plethora of weird defensive options. I also like that he feels like a miniature set in the sense of having… one Normal, one Special, one Smash, one Grab.
This is a funny place for a slightly harder “he actually does just get intangibility on jumps and crouches” take than what Idar did - if anyone needs extra options like that, it’s for sure Mister Four Attacks. I like the choice to give him kind of a souped-up Melee-style crouch cancel too; that’s something I’ve thought about in a few places but never quite gone for yet. It's a unique defensive option for him that isn’t quite as insane as just bringing in the Heavy Nova style invincibility.
I wish the Y Attack was chargeable. Maybe silly to levy a real mechanical complaint at something like this, but… smash attacks and charging them is such a huge staple Smash Bros mechanic! It’d play up Y as your “Smash” a lot harder. And I think it’d be funny in the context of him being able to move during attacks.
- “I GUESS his “primary” one?” - look if he’s got a secondary, he’s got a primary. It stands to reason.
- Write a Moveset Without Dunking on Little Mac Challenge (impossible).
- “one of Trol’s rare aerial launchers” - idk, seems kinda common, I’m halfway through the set and half the attacks I’ve read do it.
- “sadly there are not throws for every single possible direction combination on a control stick v_v” - new moveset crime idea, grab game with 360 throws.
- Making the opponent endure any amount of Heavy Nova mechanics is an unimaginable cruelty.
Daisy by Z Zakawer2
The set is very heavy on references to Ultimate characters. There are times when this is great! It's particularly helpful for attack animations and little tidbits like the Byleth-style animation tweaks for alts.
There are also a lot of times (particularly in the playstyle section) where the writing gets carried away with the references, and invokes too many examples of things in a way that's tangential to the main point. As an example of these... examples, there's a list of 5-6 characters that have counters after just mentioning counters as a concept in the playstyle section. Your audience understands what a counter is and could rattle off a list like that themselves. The real reason to bring up an example is for a little color and to ground what you're doing in Smash. Serving that end, I'd really recommend sticking to like... one example character tops for a situation like that. Especially for a parenthetical in the middle of a sentence!
Design-wise I think the coolest thing this set has going for it is the Flower status effect consistently getting applied by her big kill moves - it keeps those attacks perpetually relevant for the chip damage and encourages her to go for them early, which squares with the take on the character as more aggressive than Peach.
I think the moveset may sell Daisy as a bit too strong at points? I'm no Balance McGee, but the majority of her normals are safe on shield on top of her speed. Layer on her own really strong out of shield game and the stage control/projectile play she gets from her Specials and she looks pretty good on defense too. I know that the strong shield pressure is a very intentional feature, but I don't feel like she's actually bad at anything to compensate. You mention "limited KO power outside of <list of 9 different attacks>" as a weakness but that looks like a pretty healthy spread of kill moves to me.
One or two of them sound like late or situational killers, admittedly, but not all of 'em. It's hard to gauge exactly how strong some of them are meant to be without damage percentages or some indication of when they KO. I was surprised to see frame data here, but no damage percentages! Typically the latter is a bit less spooky for people to start figuring out, and I think it'd be a good addition here for helping assess some of her attacks.
Overall I'd say this feels like a pretty good pitch for a Daisy with a more distinct identity from Peach. I suspect she's a little over-tuned, but it's hard to be sure with some key details missing, and a couple of her Specials could feed more directly into the aggressive vibe.
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tunz
Smash Cadet
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2022
- Messages
- 25
JAMCON COMMENT
Bandit Gal by Daehypeels
-Reading Jab was fun, especially your semi-deep dive into the immense amount of mix-ups and options she has with the move, since it has 4 hits, more than any other regular old Jab in smash.
-The marbles serve as a good trap and seem like fun to use!
-In the smash attack stat blocks, the damage listed says for example “20-29%”. I’m assuming the second number is the fully charged version, but this would be strange due to fully charged smash attacks being exactly 1.4x the base power, meaning it would be 28% instead of 29%. This also applies to all other Smash Attack damages listed in the set. Very small nitpick, but thought I should point it out since you may not know that little detail.
-Dash Attack stealing items is, as you said, very niche, but more impactful in matchups like Pac-Man, Diddy Kong, R.O.B. and sometimes other characters like Robin and Mega Man that sometimes hold items in regular gameplay. Cool mechanic that doesn’t completely ruin certain matchups, but impacts them nonetheless.
-I think you did a good job in connecting all these infuriatingly safe options and moves and weaving them into a solid game-plan and mix-up chart for Bandit Gal. It feels realistic and feasible to pull off and to counter by keeping a cool head like you said.
-Unfinished paragraphs here and there are unfortunate, but I usually know what you wanted to convey with them.
-I agree with the thought process behind Side Special mix-ups. The human brain is indeed not perfect, and I do think this move would catch people more often than most may think.
-Giving her a killing command grab like that really does tie together the whole thing in my mind.
As a whole, Bandit Gal was a long but not overly dragged out, fun set to get through. The very concepts behind things like the outrageous safety, mind games and mix-ups she has down to the very character pick itself fits the crime theme perfectly well in multiple ways. 8,7/10 from me.
And with all crime jamcon sets being read, my vote goes to Trol by Froy for the simple fact that it was the most I’ve enjoyed a reading experience of any kind for years. The humor and ridiculousness of it all was just perfect for me. Good job, Froy and good job Dae, majora, Tern and UserShadow, as well as myself too for getting a Jamcon set out!
Bandit Gal by Daehypeels
-Reading Jab was fun, especially your semi-deep dive into the immense amount of mix-ups and options she has with the move, since it has 4 hits, more than any other regular old Jab in smash.
-The marbles serve as a good trap and seem like fun to use!
-In the smash attack stat blocks, the damage listed says for example “20-29%”. I’m assuming the second number is the fully charged version, but this would be strange due to fully charged smash attacks being exactly 1.4x the base power, meaning it would be 28% instead of 29%. This also applies to all other Smash Attack damages listed in the set. Very small nitpick, but thought I should point it out since you may not know that little detail.
-Dash Attack stealing items is, as you said, very niche, but more impactful in matchups like Pac-Man, Diddy Kong, R.O.B. and sometimes other characters like Robin and Mega Man that sometimes hold items in regular gameplay. Cool mechanic that doesn’t completely ruin certain matchups, but impacts them nonetheless.
-I think you did a good job in connecting all these infuriatingly safe options and moves and weaving them into a solid game-plan and mix-up chart for Bandit Gal. It feels realistic and feasible to pull off and to counter by keeping a cool head like you said.
-Unfinished paragraphs here and there are unfortunate, but I usually know what you wanted to convey with them.
-I agree with the thought process behind Side Special mix-ups. The human brain is indeed not perfect, and I do think this move would catch people more often than most may think.
-Giving her a killing command grab like that really does tie together the whole thing in my mind.
As a whole, Bandit Gal was a long but not overly dragged out, fun set to get through. The very concepts behind things like the outrageous safety, mind games and mix-ups she has down to the very character pick itself fits the crime theme perfectly well in multiple ways. 8,7/10 from me.
And with all crime jamcon sets being read, my vote goes to Trol by Froy for the simple fact that it was the most I’ve enjoyed a reading experience of any kind for years. The humor and ridiculousness of it all was just perfect for me. Good job, Froy and good job Dae, majora, Tern and UserShadow, as well as myself too for getting a Jamcon set out!
GolisoPower
Smash Master
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2017
- Messages
- 4,358
I Called The Cops, But They Didn't Take It Seriously So I Called Overwatch Instead
Junkrat by
tunz
So lemme preface the entirety of the JamCon catalogue I'm going to comment on today by saying...thank goodness it wasn't as nutso as the last JamCon. I could've picked any one of those sets for this one if I was attending because the number of sets there was a crime in and of itself.
That being said, Junkrat was a very refreshing set to start this off with. He's a very simple and quick set that takes Snake's explosive-heavy arsenal and reapplies it to a completely different context and playstyle here. While both are about setting traps and having control of the stage, Snake's a lot more tactical while Junkrat's a lot more aggressive, having at least one explosion in his Specials. Not much to say here about this set, but you certainly are showing signs of improvement from last contest, which are still decent and humble starting sets. It also seems to build on Junkrat being this eccentric mad bomber, is generally faithful to the source material, and above all else is very informative even to those who aren't interested in Overwatch as a franchise.
Junkrat by
tunz
So lemme preface the entirety of the JamCon catalogue I'm going to comment on today by saying...thank goodness it wasn't as nutso as the last JamCon. I could've picked any one of those sets for this one if I was attending because the number of sets there was a crime in and of itself.
That being said, Junkrat was a very refreshing set to start this off with. He's a very simple and quick set that takes Snake's explosive-heavy arsenal and reapplies it to a completely different context and playstyle here. While both are about setting traps and having control of the stage, Snake's a lot more tactical while Junkrat's a lot more aggressive, having at least one explosion in his Specials. Not much to say here about this set, but you certainly are showing signs of improvement from last contest, which are still decent and humble starting sets. It also seems to build on Junkrat being this eccentric mad bomber, is generally faithful to the source material, and above all else is very informative even to those who aren't interested in Overwatch as a franchise.
n88
Smash Lord
- Joined
- Oct 10, 2008
- Messages
- 1,534
Junkrat by
tunz
Creating the bombs on respawn is a really unique mechanic! I do wonder about the practicality of it - typically you’re kinda stuck respecting the space of someone who’s just respawned anyway, since they’re invincible. Plus a lot of kills don’t happen center stage where respawn platforms tend to show up, so the opponent might well be set-up completely clear of the splash zone to begin with. It’s a fun concept though.
Some of the frame data in the Specials sounds pretty fast. Mario’s Fireball, Samus’ Missile, and Yoshi’s Egg Toss all have FAFs in the 50s. Falco’s laser is at 42. Junkrat seems to be able to toss grenades or bring out his big setpiece payload trap and free up before frame 30. Even including the breaks to reload he can outpace Mario’s NSpec by a lot. It’s a bit odd because by and large the frame numbers in the normals feel pretty tame.
“Fast projectiles” is, y’know, fine territory to wade into! But seeing those kinds of numbers in a set without some acknowledgement that they’re very strong numbers usually makes me think they’re not quite in line with the author’s intent. And “author intent” is mainly the reason I’m bringing this up; if you’re talking about frame data I figure it’s probably important to you. This kind of thing doesn’t really weigh down the set; it’s generally very easy to just futz with the numbers to get em into reasonable ranges. (And I think he still scans as working the way you intended, just maybe a bit over-tuned for it)
Down Smash is a funny animation but it’s always a shame to see a move relegated to uselessness - the attack admits that it’s not particularly useful, but I think competing with Up Special as the “hit all around” kill move really just puts it entirely out of a job. I think it’d be fun if the attack had higher pay-off in some way? Maybe instead of raw kill power (since USpec has that covered), it could keep foes relatively in close and cancel him out of the huge endlag on hit (he’s not a K. Rool that’s just gonna be unfazed by connecting with the foe, after all). Then it turns into kind of a big set-up move that lets him stay in close, whereas USpec sends him out of the area to go into his zoning. Then there’s still an impracticality to DSmash when it’s as slow to come out as it is and USpec exists, but there’s also a reward for landing it that gives the attack a situational, high-risk niche in the kit.
I’m not saying to do that, mind you. Maybe it’s ill-fitting or you don’t really want a ton of heat on this animation or… whatever. I don’t know Junkrat from Adam, but the input kind of sparked a tangent. I guess my point is that implementing pay-offs on difficult-to-use attacks can make for super memorable inputs that really let character shine through, while still allowing them to be impractical and create “holes” in the kit where more generally useful moves could be. I’d point to Ganondorf UTilt as the poster child for that dynamic. Sure, it’s borderline unusable, but there’s always a very violent part of your brain going “what if though”.
Generally the kit sounds fun and there are some neat animations mixed in - I’m a big fan of the Dash Attack. I’m not sure I’ve read one of yours since Roadhog and there’s impressive growth here in terms of how you’re describing and working out the functions of moves. For me I think the main thing holding him back is that the normals, while functional, miss opportunities to tie into his big ideas and sell those a bit more. Still, can't disrespect a lil' simple one to kick the jamcon off.
Bandit by
majora_787
The Hit List/Desperado mechanic is fun - cool to see a take on roguelike mechanics like this that’s built around the idea of unchecked growth. I’m sure it gets silly if you play 99 stock matches or whatever, but that’s silly to begin with, so what the hey. I do think Desperado could use a little more clarification about what it does in terms of knockback. Does it start killing at some point or just become an increasingly-deranged damage racker?
If its function changed a little bit then I think that could potentially level him out a bit for games where he fails to get his damage growth going early. Like if having it as a casual combo-starter is a cornerstone of his gameplan but then it starts dealing 20% damage and sending foes too far away for follow-ups, then at least retaining the combo-starter version is a consolation prize for not having the lightning-fast funny damage button, y’know?
Attacks here are stylish and fun to visualize - I feel like that’s a strength of yours, there’s always something fun going on in the animations. Neutral Aerial is a particularly cool input. Feels pretty strong too; got a good combination of speed/coverage/damage and he can get something off of it. It’s a bit understated in the set but I imagine that’d be a key button for him.
There are some little oddities here and there. USpec feels a little clunky to use in the air, with the recovery/aerial use-case feeling like it was given secondary consideration to the (very cool) grounded version. A lot of moves here have little mechanical quirks - not a bad thing at all, I also tend to write sets that way, especially when I’m writing under a time constraint - but some of them don’t feel like they don’t derive naturally from the move’s animation or intended function. I’d point to not being able to hold FSmash charge as a twiddle that doesn’t feel super meaningful in the context of the set.
Up Aerial I’m kinda mixed on - it feels like kind of a pushed input as a fast projectile. I’m not sure how practical it is for him to shoot it down either, since he doesn’t have quick upward-shooting moves I don’t think. I guess he can drift out to the side and shoot it as it falls in front of him. Galaxy-brain but possible. Or try to catch it with Dash Attack but that feels tough control wise.
Flipping back to positive notes, Dash Attack, BAir, and FTilt are quirky in a really cool way that I dig - I think they really sell the kind of character this is. Generally the core vision of “weird tricksy guy whose tricksiness is offset by really wanting to do specific things at specific times” works well though, and the set feels mostly pretty clean.
Oh, as one last parting thing I do like the Hit List mechanic acknowledging FFA. He’s a fun character to think about in that context - gets much harder for him to get his Hit List targets (compensated by the time extension), but also he gets a lot more backstab opportunities, which he doesn’t have a lot of tools for forcing in 1v1.
tunz
Creating the bombs on respawn is a really unique mechanic! I do wonder about the practicality of it - typically you’re kinda stuck respecting the space of someone who’s just respawned anyway, since they’re invincible. Plus a lot of kills don’t happen center stage where respawn platforms tend to show up, so the opponent might well be set-up completely clear of the splash zone to begin with. It’s a fun concept though.
Some of the frame data in the Specials sounds pretty fast. Mario’s Fireball, Samus’ Missile, and Yoshi’s Egg Toss all have FAFs in the 50s. Falco’s laser is at 42. Junkrat seems to be able to toss grenades or bring out his big setpiece payload trap and free up before frame 30. Even including the breaks to reload he can outpace Mario’s NSpec by a lot. It’s a bit odd because by and large the frame numbers in the normals feel pretty tame.
“Fast projectiles” is, y’know, fine territory to wade into! But seeing those kinds of numbers in a set without some acknowledgement that they’re very strong numbers usually makes me think they’re not quite in line with the author’s intent. And “author intent” is mainly the reason I’m bringing this up; if you’re talking about frame data I figure it’s probably important to you. This kind of thing doesn’t really weigh down the set; it’s generally very easy to just futz with the numbers to get em into reasonable ranges. (And I think he still scans as working the way you intended, just maybe a bit over-tuned for it)
Down Smash is a funny animation but it’s always a shame to see a move relegated to uselessness - the attack admits that it’s not particularly useful, but I think competing with Up Special as the “hit all around” kill move really just puts it entirely out of a job. I think it’d be fun if the attack had higher pay-off in some way? Maybe instead of raw kill power (since USpec has that covered), it could keep foes relatively in close and cancel him out of the huge endlag on hit (he’s not a K. Rool that’s just gonna be unfazed by connecting with the foe, after all). Then it turns into kind of a big set-up move that lets him stay in close, whereas USpec sends him out of the area to go into his zoning. Then there’s still an impracticality to DSmash when it’s as slow to come out as it is and USpec exists, but there’s also a reward for landing it that gives the attack a situational, high-risk niche in the kit.
I’m not saying to do that, mind you. Maybe it’s ill-fitting or you don’t really want a ton of heat on this animation or… whatever. I don’t know Junkrat from Adam, but the input kind of sparked a tangent. I guess my point is that implementing pay-offs on difficult-to-use attacks can make for super memorable inputs that really let character shine through, while still allowing them to be impractical and create “holes” in the kit where more generally useful moves could be. I’d point to Ganondorf UTilt as the poster child for that dynamic. Sure, it’s borderline unusable, but there’s always a very violent part of your brain going “what if though”.
Generally the kit sounds fun and there are some neat animations mixed in - I’m a big fan of the Dash Attack. I’m not sure I’ve read one of yours since Roadhog and there’s impressive growth here in terms of how you’re describing and working out the functions of moves. For me I think the main thing holding him back is that the normals, while functional, miss opportunities to tie into his big ideas and sell those a bit more. Still, can't disrespect a lil' simple one to kick the jamcon off.
Bandit by
majora_787
The Hit List/Desperado mechanic is fun - cool to see a take on roguelike mechanics like this that’s built around the idea of unchecked growth. I’m sure it gets silly if you play 99 stock matches or whatever, but that’s silly to begin with, so what the hey. I do think Desperado could use a little more clarification about what it does in terms of knockback. Does it start killing at some point or just become an increasingly-deranged damage racker?
If its function changed a little bit then I think that could potentially level him out a bit for games where he fails to get his damage growth going early. Like if having it as a casual combo-starter is a cornerstone of his gameplan but then it starts dealing 20% damage and sending foes too far away for follow-ups, then at least retaining the combo-starter version is a consolation prize for not having the lightning-fast funny damage button, y’know?
Attacks here are stylish and fun to visualize - I feel like that’s a strength of yours, there’s always something fun going on in the animations. Neutral Aerial is a particularly cool input. Feels pretty strong too; got a good combination of speed/coverage/damage and he can get something off of it. It’s a bit understated in the set but I imagine that’d be a key button for him.
There are some little oddities here and there. USpec feels a little clunky to use in the air, with the recovery/aerial use-case feeling like it was given secondary consideration to the (very cool) grounded version. A lot of moves here have little mechanical quirks - not a bad thing at all, I also tend to write sets that way, especially when I’m writing under a time constraint - but some of them don’t feel like they don’t derive naturally from the move’s animation or intended function. I’d point to not being able to hold FSmash charge as a twiddle that doesn’t feel super meaningful in the context of the set.
Up Aerial I’m kinda mixed on - it feels like kind of a pushed input as a fast projectile. I’m not sure how practical it is for him to shoot it down either, since he doesn’t have quick upward-shooting moves I don’t think. I guess he can drift out to the side and shoot it as it falls in front of him. Galaxy-brain but possible. Or try to catch it with Dash Attack but that feels tough control wise.
Flipping back to positive notes, Dash Attack, BAir, and FTilt are quirky in a really cool way that I dig - I think they really sell the kind of character this is. Generally the core vision of “weird tricksy guy whose tricksiness is offset by really wanting to do specific things at specific times” works well though, and the set feels mostly pretty clean.
Oh, as one last parting thing I do like the Hit List mechanic acknowledging FFA. He’s a fun character to think about in that context - gets much harder for him to get his Hit List targets (compensated by the time extension), but also he gets a lot more backstab opportunities, which he doesn’t have a lot of tools for forcing in 1v1.
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GolisoPower
Smash Master
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2017
- Messages
- 4,358
Worth This Risk Of Rain
Bandit by
majora_787
Funny. Usually, Make Your Move is usually the place where I gain interest in new franchises, from Fate to Gundam, but this is a franchise that I've already had an interest in before a set was made.
Anyways, with our first Risk Of Rain set in MYM, Bandit is a really fun read, with a mechanic that encourages you to play dirty and attack when there's a better window of opportunity with the Hit List gimmick, which gives you a damage buff with your gun, which is a mighty strong projectile for the conditions and speed it has. I mean, I'd certainly feel satisfied with shooting somebody in the back with a 20% damage projectile after working to build enough stacks. I like how you can choose between an up-close attack and a projectile for Side Special, it really stands out among the options for getting Hit List stacks. And that's not even getting into the damage multiplier from coming to retrieve your knife from throwing it. That brings the Desperado bullet damage up to 31%, which also counts the damage over time. Then, you have the smoke bomb from Up Special to make it easier to close in on your foe for an easy backstab, then make your escape. And last but certainly not least is a stun drone that can help you get that same backstab in with a much riskier attack. It all comes together as a combination of Joker and Snake, catching the foe off-guard and improvising in between these moments to strike.
All the attacks here seem to strike a good balance between hand-to-hand, knife stabs, and gunshots that play up the insanity of Risk of Rain without using any RNG, a staple of the roguelike genre. In a way, the usage of guns here reminds me of Noel Vermillion from BlazBlue in terms of their execution. I especially love the dynamite moves and the whip grab, it really gives off a sort of space-western style to this guy. Overall, a really fun contender for the nomination. Good work, my man!
Bandit by
majora_787
Funny. Usually, Make Your Move is usually the place where I gain interest in new franchises, from Fate to Gundam, but this is a franchise that I've already had an interest in before a set was made.
Anyways, with our first Risk Of Rain set in MYM, Bandit is a really fun read, with a mechanic that encourages you to play dirty and attack when there's a better window of opportunity with the Hit List gimmick, which gives you a damage buff with your gun, which is a mighty strong projectile for the conditions and speed it has. I mean, I'd certainly feel satisfied with shooting somebody in the back with a 20% damage projectile after working to build enough stacks. I like how you can choose between an up-close attack and a projectile for Side Special, it really stands out among the options for getting Hit List stacks. And that's not even getting into the damage multiplier from coming to retrieve your knife from throwing it. That brings the Desperado bullet damage up to 31%, which also counts the damage over time. Then, you have the smoke bomb from Up Special to make it easier to close in on your foe for an easy backstab, then make your escape. And last but certainly not least is a stun drone that can help you get that same backstab in with a much riskier attack. It all comes together as a combination of Joker and Snake, catching the foe off-guard and improvising in between these moments to strike.
All the attacks here seem to strike a good balance between hand-to-hand, knife stabs, and gunshots that play up the insanity of Risk of Rain without using any RNG, a staple of the roguelike genre. In a way, the usage of guns here reminds me of Noel Vermillion from BlazBlue in terms of their execution. I especially love the dynamite moves and the whip grab, it really gives off a sort of space-western style to this guy. Overall, a really fun contender for the nomination. Good work, my man!
wizfoot
Smash Apprentice
"Huh. For me?"
"Yeah, that's what they said." The older man, portly and 500-or-so pounds, scratched his beard. "Still, I didn't think anyone knew we were out here. How's a courier service work in a wasteland, anyways?"
"That doesn't matter. Let's see..." She opened the letter, irreverently ripping the wax seal. She scanned it. Scanned it again. Scanned it thrice, for good measure. Oh. Oh! This was it! This was her big break!
"Huh?!" The older man scratched his head as the young girl began jumping around. "What's got you so excited?"
"Mr. Dickinson! Read this!" She pushed the envelope into his hands, barely giving him time to read it as she grabbed his hands and nearly took the giant of a man compared to her off balance.
"Get that bounty for me! I've gotta make it to Smash!"
(And yes, I'm making comments. Give me a minute, sometimes I forget this thread exists!)
"Yeah, that's what they said." The older man, portly and 500-or-so pounds, scratched his beard. "Still, I didn't think anyone knew we were out here. How's a courier service work in a wasteland, anyways?"
"That doesn't matter. Let's see..." She opened the letter, irreverently ripping the wax seal. She scanned it. Scanned it again. Scanned it thrice, for good measure. Oh. Oh! This was it! This was her big break!
"Huh?!" The older man scratched his head as the young girl began jumping around. "What's got you so excited?"
"Mr. Dickinson! Read this!" She pushed the envelope into his hands, barely giving him time to read it as she grabbed his hands and nearly took the giant of a man compared to her off balance.
"Get that bounty for me! I've gotta make it to Smash!"
(And yes, I'm making comments. Give me a minute, sometimes I forget this thread exists!)
BRIDGET SWINGS INTO BATTLE!
(hey, just in time for Pride Month, too!)
5/31:
First posted
Added Rolling Movement being able to be interrupted by any Aerial attack
Changed Neutral Special from "Revenge of the Killing Machine" to "Kickstart My Heart/Brake/Shoot", formerly Down Special
Changed Down Special from "Kickstart My Heart/Brake/Shoot" to "Roger Rush": a minion move coming from either Bridget or a set-up Stop and Dash that travels along the stage and deals damage to any fighter it comes across
Added a new section, "Side Special and You": Side Special being a key part of Bridget's kit is now further elaborated on
6/1 (Happy Pride!):
Edited Bridget's Aerials to further elaborate on Rolling Movement's capabilities
Edited Up Special (Starship)'s frame data to accurately reflect its out-of-shield potential
Removed input buffs on Bridget's Specials
(hey, just in time for Pride Month, too!)
5/31:
First posted
Added Rolling Movement being able to be interrupted by any Aerial attack
Changed Neutral Special from "Revenge of the Killing Machine" to "Kickstart My Heart/Brake/Shoot", formerly Down Special
Changed Down Special from "Kickstart My Heart/Brake/Shoot" to "Roger Rush": a minion move coming from either Bridget or a set-up Stop and Dash that travels along the stage and deals damage to any fighter it comes across
Added a new section, "Side Special and You": Side Special being a key part of Bridget's kit is now further elaborated on
6/1 (Happy Pride!):
Edited Bridget's Aerials to further elaborate on Rolling Movement's capabilities
Edited Up Special (Starship)'s frame data to accurately reflect its out-of-shield potential
Removed input buffs on Bridget's Specials
Last edited:
Arctic Tern
Smash Apprentice
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2022
- Messages
- 133
THE EMPRESS (tunz)
The Empress’ most notable move is easily the DSpec, which allows her to summon a whopping 15 minions from a random selection provided. These minions are largely meant to supplement her normally lacking combo game or lead into her big hits, such as the Animated Armor and Knife and the Gibbering Mouther. Some of them are meant to be big hits themselves, however, such as the T-rex, which initially doesn’t attack foes until it’s hit by an attack. There’s a good amount of synergy with the different minion types, such as using a minion that forces the opponent to move with the massive T-rex to corral their options. Some of the minions do come off as a bit too strong, like the Air Elemental and the utterly massive Treant, but considering the selection is random it isn’t as big of an issue as it would be otherwise.
Aside from that Special, the Empress’ other moves are fine. NSpec is easily the second most interesting of her Specials, a simple but effective offense/defense buff, though it doesn’t really get mentioned all that often. FSmash is a great move in this context, a big heavyweight move that the Empress’ minions can set up for that has incredible endlag if it whiffs. Lastly, I did like the awareness of moves that can set up for minion hits such as FTilt and DTilt, and awareness that a character like this needs a strong prone game. While certainly not as good as it could be, the sheer ambition at play with the DSpec makes it easily my favorite set of yours thus far.
BRIDGET (wiz)
While I’m somewhat miffed that I wasn’t the one to make the second Bridget set, I do still like this one! The set is fairly accurate to her playstyle in STRIVE, a ranged mixup character, and takes some cues from Sephiroth in having poor kill potential outside of tippers. I like the actual mixups in store as well, such as using the DAir stall then fall to trick foes expecting her quicker aerials.
As the guy who made the other Guilty Gear set this contest (as of this writing), however, there are a few things holding it back. For one, there’s no actual reason for Bridget to have enhanced Specials. Yes, Ryu and Terry have them, but in those cases they’re meant to replicate the EX Special functionality of their home games; Guilty Gear has no equivalent mechanic in most games, and even the one exception (Force Breaks in Accent Core) restricted it to one or two moves. This can best be seen with Kazuya, who has no equivalent mechanic despite having command input moves as Tekken generally does not have EX special moves. It also irks me a bit that the actual effects of the buffed Specials are just standard buffs and aren’t elaborated on.
Secondly, the overall Bridget feel is hampered by the Specials. Most notably is having Return of the Killing Machine on a Special; even beyond the fact it’s an Overdrive in STRIVE it gives her a spammable projectile, which goes against her actual playstyle in the game. Bridget has range, yes, but no actual projectiles; her gameplan typically revolves around getting in with her mobility tools and starting a blender. A projectile like this encourages camping on the Bridget player’s part, which is not at all how the character fights. Additionally, Rolling Movement is vastly undertuned in the set, despite it arguably being the most important tool in Bridget’s toolkit in STRIVE. The uses are briefly mentioned in the description for the Special, but not detailed in depth, which is a shame given how cool the base idea is. Despite all that, however, these are ultimately nitpicks from a setmaker who wants FGCs to be as accurate as possible, and without those Bridget is a quite solid set.
Also, all those tracks and no Crash and Burn? That’s the best Bridget theme don’t @ me
Comment block link here!
The Empress’ most notable move is easily the DSpec, which allows her to summon a whopping 15 minions from a random selection provided. These minions are largely meant to supplement her normally lacking combo game or lead into her big hits, such as the Animated Armor and Knife and the Gibbering Mouther. Some of them are meant to be big hits themselves, however, such as the T-rex, which initially doesn’t attack foes until it’s hit by an attack. There’s a good amount of synergy with the different minion types, such as using a minion that forces the opponent to move with the massive T-rex to corral their options. Some of the minions do come off as a bit too strong, like the Air Elemental and the utterly massive Treant, but considering the selection is random it isn’t as big of an issue as it would be otherwise.
Aside from that Special, the Empress’ other moves are fine. NSpec is easily the second most interesting of her Specials, a simple but effective offense/defense buff, though it doesn’t really get mentioned all that often. FSmash is a great move in this context, a big heavyweight move that the Empress’ minions can set up for that has incredible endlag if it whiffs. Lastly, I did like the awareness of moves that can set up for minion hits such as FTilt and DTilt, and awareness that a character like this needs a strong prone game. While certainly not as good as it could be, the sheer ambition at play with the DSpec makes it easily my favorite set of yours thus far.
BRIDGET (wiz)
While I’m somewhat miffed that I wasn’t the one to make the second Bridget set, I do still like this one! The set is fairly accurate to her playstyle in STRIVE, a ranged mixup character, and takes some cues from Sephiroth in having poor kill potential outside of tippers. I like the actual mixups in store as well, such as using the DAir stall then fall to trick foes expecting her quicker aerials.
As the guy who made the other Guilty Gear set this contest (as of this writing), however, there are a few things holding it back. For one, there’s no actual reason for Bridget to have enhanced Specials. Yes, Ryu and Terry have them, but in those cases they’re meant to replicate the EX Special functionality of their home games; Guilty Gear has no equivalent mechanic in most games, and even the one exception (Force Breaks in Accent Core) restricted it to one or two moves. This can best be seen with Kazuya, who has no equivalent mechanic despite having command input moves as Tekken generally does not have EX special moves. It also irks me a bit that the actual effects of the buffed Specials are just standard buffs and aren’t elaborated on.
Secondly, the overall Bridget feel is hampered by the Specials. Most notably is having Return of the Killing Machine on a Special; even beyond the fact it’s an Overdrive in STRIVE it gives her a spammable projectile, which goes against her actual playstyle in the game. Bridget has range, yes, but no actual projectiles; her gameplan typically revolves around getting in with her mobility tools and starting a blender. A projectile like this encourages camping on the Bridget player’s part, which is not at all how the character fights. Additionally, Rolling Movement is vastly undertuned in the set, despite it arguably being the most important tool in Bridget’s toolkit in STRIVE. The uses are briefly mentioned in the description for the Special, but not detailed in depth, which is a shame given how cool the base idea is. Despite all that, however, these are ultimately nitpicks from a setmaker who wants FGCs to be as accurate as possible, and without those Bridget is a quite solid set.
Arctic Tern
Smash Apprentice
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2022
- Messages
- 133
"...Oh! Am I late? The others told me to be here, but I was sleeping in and I got the letter after everyone else did so I had to rush to get my hair done and...
Heheh... it's already the 26th contest... guess I am. Here's my set, anyways. Hope it being late to the party doesn't detract from your experience... oh, who am I kidding, of course it will..."
Heheh... it's already the 26th contest... guess I am. Here's my set, anyways. Hope it being late to the party doesn't detract from your experience... oh, who am I kidding, of course it will..."
Katapultar
Smash Lord
I’m not a big GG player since I don’t have the console or means to play the game, but I echo the rest of MYM in being happy that we got a (modern) set for her. This set’s Specials are short and simple like Akutagawa’s was, but Bridget’s feel a bit more interesting because they’re movement options.
Side Special is by far and away the best Special you’ve ever written, one that cements Bridget as my favourite set of yours so far. This stems from Side Special having a cool concept in general - set object in place, use the move again to pull yourself towards it or reel the object back - while also having various mix-ups when you’re reeling yourself in and reduced start-up on some attacks when you do. The write-up at the bottom of the Specials also helps to sell Side Special’s uses, which is appreciated as diving into attack applications in tons of detail can be hard. Finally, what appears to be a very simple move in Down Special gets some neat usage out of Side Special, as you can have your bear run towards you from where your yo-yo was placed.
This moveset goes into more detail on attack usages beyond what a move can combo or be comboed into, like Dash Attack’s applications and Jab’s various uses, as well as the little write-ups for the Grounded and Aerials section. In fact, the melee on Bridget’s regular attacks feels notably better than your previous entries thanks to that extra substance, to the point where it was genuinely interesting to read and not too far from what you’d see from a veteran MYM’er. I actually found most of the ground moves to be pretty neat, with F-tilt having a ranged sweetspot and F-Smash having a powerful but committal sweetspot from a specific distance. D-tilt starts combos, and Jab is a quick poke that can combo into itself. Bridget also a a genuinely neat grab as it makes her jump forward - which works well with all those ranged hitboxes she has!
Minor nitpicks/suggestions:
Overall, Bridget ended up being a surprisingly good and enjoyable set! I hope that people don’t sleep on this one, and actually give her some attention. Bridget is good enough that I could actually vote for her if this contest doesn’t get stacked and/or get an extension, which would be good so you can have some Top 50 representation. Well done, Wiz!
Side Special is by far and away the best Special you’ve ever written, one that cements Bridget as my favourite set of yours so far. This stems from Side Special having a cool concept in general - set object in place, use the move again to pull yourself towards it or reel the object back - while also having various mix-ups when you’re reeling yourself in and reduced start-up on some attacks when you do. The write-up at the bottom of the Specials also helps to sell Side Special’s uses, which is appreciated as diving into attack applications in tons of detail can be hard. Finally, what appears to be a very simple move in Down Special gets some neat usage out of Side Special, as you can have your bear run towards you from where your yo-yo was placed.
This moveset goes into more detail on attack usages beyond what a move can combo or be comboed into, like Dash Attack’s applications and Jab’s various uses, as well as the little write-ups for the Grounded and Aerials section. In fact, the melee on Bridget’s regular attacks feels notably better than your previous entries thanks to that extra substance, to the point where it was genuinely interesting to read and not too far from what you’d see from a veteran MYM’er. I actually found most of the ground moves to be pretty neat, with F-tilt having a ranged sweetspot and F-Smash having a powerful but committal sweetspot from a specific distance. D-tilt starts combos, and Jab is a quick poke that can combo into itself. Bridget also a a genuinely neat grab as it makes her jump forward - which works well with all those ranged hitboxes she has!
Minor nitpicks/suggestions:
- Up Special claims to come out on frame 2 or 3, then the green text says it comes out on frame 9. I assume it’s meant to be the former, which is comparable to the speed of other speed OoS recoveries.
- I think it would be cool if Down Special made a slight mention of being usable as a combo extender this way - if Roger is running towards you, I could see him being able to punch opponents towards you to combo off of. You can then knock your opponent to where your yo-yo was set and zip yourself towards it for even more combos!
- Rolling Movement’s ability to reduce the start-up on some of your attacks feels a little under-elaborated upon - it’s not mentioned how much lag moves like NSpec and USpec have shaved off. Aerials don’t mention having lag shaved off in their write-ups. It would be cool if each of Bridget’s Aerials went into a tiny bit of detail on their uses from Rolling Movement.
- You know what would be awesome? If B-air got a big cut to its starting lag if it was used out of Rolling Movement, so maybe it came out on frame 6 or 8. Now, Bridget has her 1v1 auto-facing mechanic and presumably turns to face her yo-yo when she uses Rolling Movement, so she can’t land her B-air reliably from it. Maybe to land her B-air when approaching with Rolling Movement, Bridget has to cross-up her opponent… but if they see that coming, they can just smack her. If Bridget thinks her opponent is going to do that, she can just whack them with her F-air, which will probably outrange the attack they were going to punish her with.
- It would be ideal if the set elaborated on how Bridget could mix up her various aerial options when she’s approaching with Rolling Movement.
Overall, Bridget ended up being a surprisingly good and enjoyable set! I hope that people don’t sleep on this one, and actually give her some attention. Bridget is good enough that I could actually vote for her if this contest doesn’t get stacked and/or get an extension, which would be good so you can have some Top 50 representation. Well done, Wiz!
This character came as a big surprise, especially when the two Witchcrafter sets from last contest were telegraphed. I now get the impression that you’d want to make sets for every Witchcrafter monster, just like how US and I made sets for nearly every Dragonmaid monster. Also impressive that you got so much mileage out of this more simple Witchcrafter monster.
Potterie greatly reminds me of the average high-end US set, as she can set down most of her attacks and activate them later with unique effects. Plus she can paint over all of these displayed attacks to increase their speed or power in exchange for weakening the other.
The Smashes are all good stage control elements you’d expect from a set with this concept (walls, various projectiles), but the Jab that followed was the big standout move for me. For one, I like Jabs that have a projectile element to them: this one feels fair since you have to land Jab 1 to get it (outside of displaying Jab), and the missile’s presence or the threat of it is a cool mix-up/conditioning tool with Side Special being a command grab. What really sells the move is how the displayed missile can be implemented: Potterie’s ability to set the missile, fire it off by using Jab and get unique follow-ups out of it based on where the missile was positioned! Some other notable fun moves were the D-air, because Steve D-airs are always fun, B-air for its arcing projectile properties and the displayed grab - one of the more interesting uses of paint, where you can change up the timing of the delayed grab to alter the properties of a throw if it connects.
Very minor complaint: I think Potterie’s edgeguarding game is a bit too strong. She can display her Aerials offstage, letting her fire them off pretty risk-free and cover a good amount of airspace with them and herself. All her displayed Aerials minus U-air have potent edgeguarding capabilities too, especially if they are painted over. Part of me also thinks that N-airs that deal radial knockback would be more potent in Smash than people might think, though I know this set is far from the only one to employ such a move. In this set’s defense, Potterie doesn’t have a ton of strong moves outside of displayed moves. Her more casual/horizontal-launching aerials are pretty weak too, and she has to manually activate displayed Aerials as well as take the time to set them offstage while her opponent is busy recovering. Potterie could display her Aerials offstage beforehand, but doing so means she has to risk being edgeguarded by her opponent, and she can’t use moves she has on display as melee attacks. She also has to knock her opponent offstage too. So all that potent edgeguarding is actually pretty deserved!
While not as conceptually unique as Madame Verre, as the “set your hitboxes and activate them remotely,” concept has been done a decent amount, Potterie is still a pleasantly strong set and one of the stronger entries we have so far. Would have gotten a RV last contest. Well done.
Potterie greatly reminds me of the average high-end US set, as she can set down most of her attacks and activate them later with unique effects. Plus she can paint over all of these displayed attacks to increase their speed or power in exchange for weakening the other.
The Smashes are all good stage control elements you’d expect from a set with this concept (walls, various projectiles), but the Jab that followed was the big standout move for me. For one, I like Jabs that have a projectile element to them: this one feels fair since you have to land Jab 1 to get it (outside of displaying Jab), and the missile’s presence or the threat of it is a cool mix-up/conditioning tool with Side Special being a command grab. What really sells the move is how the displayed missile can be implemented: Potterie’s ability to set the missile, fire it off by using Jab and get unique follow-ups out of it based on where the missile was positioned! Some other notable fun moves were the D-air, because Steve D-airs are always fun, B-air for its arcing projectile properties and the displayed grab - one of the more interesting uses of paint, where you can change up the timing of the delayed grab to alter the properties of a throw if it connects.
Very minor complaint: I think Potterie’s edgeguarding game is a bit too strong. She can display her Aerials offstage, letting her fire them off pretty risk-free and cover a good amount of airspace with them and herself. All her displayed Aerials minus U-air have potent edgeguarding capabilities too, especially if they are painted over. Part of me also thinks that N-airs that deal radial knockback would be more potent in Smash than people might think, though I know this set is far from the only one to employ such a move. In this set’s defense, Potterie doesn’t have a ton of strong moves outside of displayed moves. Her more casual/horizontal-launching aerials are pretty weak too, and she has to manually activate displayed Aerials as well as take the time to set them offstage while her opponent is busy recovering. Potterie could display her Aerials offstage beforehand, but doing so means she has to risk being edgeguarded by her opponent, and she can’t use moves she has on display as melee attacks. She also has to knock her opponent offstage too. So all that potent edgeguarding is actually pretty deserved!
While not as conceptually unique as Madame Verre, as the “set your hitboxes and activate them remotely,” concept has been done a decent amount, Potterie is still a pleasantly strong set and one of the stronger entries we have so far. Would have gotten a RV last contest. Well done.
n88
Smash Lord
- Joined
- Oct 10, 2008
- Messages
- 1,534
Just dropping a friendly reminder (for myself as much as anyone else) that Jamcon voting period is halfway up! And it's still anyone's game! If you intend to vote in Jamcon 2, you've got one more week to get those comments/votes in.
The reading load is light this time (see here), so it's not too late to jump in even if you weren't planning to.
The reading load is light this time (see here), so it's not too late to jump in even if you weren't planning to.
UserShadow7989
Smash Journeyman
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2007
- Messages
- 307
Junkrat by
tunz
Bit slow on the comments these days, aren't I? Junkrat is a fine submission for the Jamcon, the explosives appreciator (not sure you can say 'expert' given the sheer lack of respect toward his own safety even after losing a few limbs) bringing a lot of personality to the stage, unsurprising given this is a tunz set.
I'll give props where they're due to start with: Junkrat has a defined gameplan and a few fun little quirks to most of his set, zoning by way of leaving traps around and hocking bouncing projectiles which work nicely in tandem with a few means to start tech chases or immobilize the opponent, putting them on the backfoot and constantly forcing them to maneuver around his dangerous explosives. The Specials and Smashes feel realized and suitably quirky while shaping his playstyle, and his standards, aerials, and grab game, while a bit slimmer, do give basically each move a place in his toolkit.
Even on respawn, he's bringing the pain with a spread of explosives. The mechanic got a knee jerk out of me for the potential damage cap, but between being tied to his respawn location (which he can't really control) and the described spread/the delay, it's situational enough that he's unlikely to actually hit with it- rather, it's another means to buy himself needed breathing space at the start of a new stock.
He is noted to be better out of shield than he probably should be as a zoner, but I agree he's got enough weaknesses that it's not a major issue. Plus it lets us have things like Up Special, which is really cool.
For suggestions:
-I would make the bear trap’s duration work like a bury, likely base it on K. Rool DThrow- 3.5 seconds can be an eternity in smash time, with even the laggiest power moves in the game taking barely past 2, and all fully charged smashes (1 second of charge + the rest of the frame data) completing in a similar time frame or less. Granted, the opponent has their grounded moveset available, can shield, etc so it’s not as absurd as an actual stun effect would be, but given Junkrat’s high damage output it’s scary regardless, and Down Throw letting him force the effect is especially scary given his grab's not all that bad (perhaps nerf the throw version a teensy bit?).
-Dash Attack and Forward Tilt both mention they can set up for tech chases, which is a sensible thing to focus on a bit when Junkrat has so many explosives lying around to limit or punish certain options like Side and Down Special, but there’s no mention among moves about which are good once you’re doing the tech chase. Neutral Special alone could cover a few options depending on angle and height, so that feels like a natural if finicky high risk high reward option, while his standards could include more reliable but less rewarding options (significantly less so to encourage risk taking given the character, but still). From moves mentioned, Down Tilt sounds great against techs in and Dash Attack’s wheel can cover techs away, maybe FTilt working nice for teching in place? Down Smash would work nicely on those who tech in but don’t react in time, and Forward Smash would be your even more risky “gamble on them messing up the tech” even higher reward trick.
-Listing a knockback direction on NAir would be appreciated; if radial (hits them away in whichever direction they are relevant to Junkrat) it's a potential combo starter that can bump opponents into his traps if positioned right, which is neat.
Bandit by
majora_787
Bandit's starts off with a handful of cool mechanics, two of which allow him to snowball over the course of multiple stocks in a manner befitting of his roguelite source material. These mechanics all provide a simple throughline throughout his set, with moment to moment gameplay spruced up by the advantages gained if he can cross the opponent up to hit them from behind, and long-term gameplay made interesting by landing well-timed hits and weighing the risk of going in aggressively when the 'x' appears over the opponent's head to being more defensive and baiting something to punish instead.
Bandit's moves are simple in application, but have interesting little quirks on them all to give them a unique identity, and there's more attention paid here to each move's role in how he plays or how they're used. strength I've noticed in your set is adding a little bit special something to each move on a conceptual level, a good example being Neutral Aerial, which is something from older MYM I'm happy to see here (with more level heads about what's a good idea and less doing it out of obligation, of course).
Stand out moves for me (NAir aside) were Side and Up Specials; the Damage buff from Side Special struck me as very potent and lasting a little long, but low average damage balances it out I think, and the fact that it exaggerates the benefits of his snowballing makes it a welcome addition. The DoT seems fine, though, and I like that quick use of Jab can extend the duration some. The fact he can flinch the opponent if he gets in close enough after the fact is a cool detail, and I could see him rolling past opponents with that set up to get in a free backstab at their most vulnerable. Up Special's simpler, but no less cool, with the short-lived but extreme speed boost and backstab effect being a neat way to play with a smokescreen.
To list off some random nitpicks: NSpec doesn't note any knockback, which is a little odd for such a central move. I recommend for Down Special that you mention the start up for the spider's jolt; there should probably be enough leeway for opponents on the move to evade or shield it, maybe add a little telegraph animation of electrical sparks coming from the spider? Given Back Throw leaves the opponent spinning, would it have some synergy with the backstab mechanic?
tunz
Bit slow on the comments these days, aren't I? Junkrat is a fine submission for the Jamcon, the explosives appreciator (not sure you can say 'expert' given the sheer lack of respect toward his own safety even after losing a few limbs) bringing a lot of personality to the stage, unsurprising given this is a tunz set.
I'll give props where they're due to start with: Junkrat has a defined gameplan and a few fun little quirks to most of his set, zoning by way of leaving traps around and hocking bouncing projectiles which work nicely in tandem with a few means to start tech chases or immobilize the opponent, putting them on the backfoot and constantly forcing them to maneuver around his dangerous explosives. The Specials and Smashes feel realized and suitably quirky while shaping his playstyle, and his standards, aerials, and grab game, while a bit slimmer, do give basically each move a place in his toolkit.
Even on respawn, he's bringing the pain with a spread of explosives. The mechanic got a knee jerk out of me for the potential damage cap, but between being tied to his respawn location (which he can't really control) and the described spread/the delay, it's situational enough that he's unlikely to actually hit with it- rather, it's another means to buy himself needed breathing space at the start of a new stock.
He is noted to be better out of shield than he probably should be as a zoner, but I agree he's got enough weaknesses that it's not a major issue. Plus it lets us have things like Up Special, which is really cool.
For suggestions:
-I would make the bear trap’s duration work like a bury, likely base it on K. Rool DThrow- 3.5 seconds can be an eternity in smash time, with even the laggiest power moves in the game taking barely past 2, and all fully charged smashes (1 second of charge + the rest of the frame data) completing in a similar time frame or less. Granted, the opponent has their grounded moveset available, can shield, etc so it’s not as absurd as an actual stun effect would be, but given Junkrat’s high damage output it’s scary regardless, and Down Throw letting him force the effect is especially scary given his grab's not all that bad (perhaps nerf the throw version a teensy bit?).
-Dash Attack and Forward Tilt both mention they can set up for tech chases, which is a sensible thing to focus on a bit when Junkrat has so many explosives lying around to limit or punish certain options like Side and Down Special, but there’s no mention among moves about which are good once you’re doing the tech chase. Neutral Special alone could cover a few options depending on angle and height, so that feels like a natural if finicky high risk high reward option, while his standards could include more reliable but less rewarding options (significantly less so to encourage risk taking given the character, but still). From moves mentioned, Down Tilt sounds great against techs in and Dash Attack’s wheel can cover techs away, maybe FTilt working nice for teching in place? Down Smash would work nicely on those who tech in but don’t react in time, and Forward Smash would be your even more risky “gamble on them messing up the tech” even higher reward trick.
-Listing a knockback direction on NAir would be appreciated; if radial (hits them away in whichever direction they are relevant to Junkrat) it's a potential combo starter that can bump opponents into his traps if positioned right, which is neat.
Bandit by
majora_787
Bandit's starts off with a handful of cool mechanics, two of which allow him to snowball over the course of multiple stocks in a manner befitting of his roguelite source material. These mechanics all provide a simple throughline throughout his set, with moment to moment gameplay spruced up by the advantages gained if he can cross the opponent up to hit them from behind, and long-term gameplay made interesting by landing well-timed hits and weighing the risk of going in aggressively when the 'x' appears over the opponent's head to being more defensive and baiting something to punish instead.
Bandit's moves are simple in application, but have interesting little quirks on them all to give them a unique identity, and there's more attention paid here to each move's role in how he plays or how they're used. strength I've noticed in your set is adding a little bit special something to each move on a conceptual level, a good example being Neutral Aerial, which is something from older MYM I'm happy to see here (with more level heads about what's a good idea and less doing it out of obligation, of course).
Stand out moves for me (NAir aside) were Side and Up Specials; the Damage buff from Side Special struck me as very potent and lasting a little long, but low average damage balances it out I think, and the fact that it exaggerates the benefits of his snowballing makes it a welcome addition. The DoT seems fine, though, and I like that quick use of Jab can extend the duration some. The fact he can flinch the opponent if he gets in close enough after the fact is a cool detail, and I could see him rolling past opponents with that set up to get in a free backstab at their most vulnerable. Up Special's simpler, but no less cool, with the short-lived but extreme speed boost and backstab effect being a neat way to play with a smokescreen.
To list off some random nitpicks: NSpec doesn't note any knockback, which is a little odd for such a central move. I recommend for Down Special that you mention the start up for the spider's jolt; there should probably be enough leeway for opponents on the move to evade or shield it, maybe add a little telegraph animation of electrical sparks coming from the spider? Given Back Throw leaves the opponent spinning, would it have some synergy with the backstab mechanic?
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GolisoPower
Smash Master
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- Sep 17, 2017
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- 4,358
Jailhouse Rockin' With A Hound Dog
Dog Witch Caligo by
Arctic Tern
...I knew something was missing from this contest! It just wouldn't be MYM without at least one Witchverse set these days!
So Caligo does a few things that stand out in comparison to fellow canine cop Veronica, while she also has police pooches to aid her, Caligo's are much more simple in comparison to Veronica's wolf pack due to the Dog Witch not having an alternate stance like the Wolf Witch. Although to make up for the lack of complexity, her Guard Dogs have the powerful effect of inflicting hitstun that gives Caligo a big opportunity to follow up from one of her more committal, but powerful moves...which includes her Up Special...though come to think of it I can't help but wonder about her tastes using a leash in that get-up. ANYWAYS, the execution of Up Special makes me think of how I imagined Decidueye's Spirit Shackle working if he was added to Smash instead of Incineroar. It seems to be the perfect remedy against characters who're known for being better from a distance but having played a bit of UMvC3 recently it almost reminds me of Spencer's arm in a way, especially with the follow-ups you have here. Another contrast with Veronica that I really love is that as opposed to a full transformation, Caligo does a partial transformation instead, allowing for some more creativity with the attack animations, with Side Special showcasing it the best here. I'd happily stay quietly in my cell if this gargantuan woman transformed her head into that of a rabid dog in front of me. The reference to IRL American justice laws with the Down Special is actually kind fun, being a counter that gets stronger with each attack landed.
Out of all of her normals, I'd have to say Up Smash, Up-tilt and D-throw are stand-out moves. Up Smash showcases her extreme strength in such a badass manner, U-tilt just exudes power and shows that it could probably kill me IRL if I were hit by that, and D-throw because I'm pretty curious about the history of the Black Dog and what led to her inventing it. But honestly, what stands out with Caligo is what us anime-enjoyers would call "gap moe", which is to describe when somebody has a moment contrary to their usual appearance/demeanor that comes off as majorly endearing. The idea of her changing from this stoic, extremely-strict prison warden with a fearful reputation to this big happy girl with the demeanor of a puppy just puts a big smile on my face. And the quote with Veronica in the victory animations is also a really cute touch that plays into this friendship they have in canon.
Overall, I'd say Caligo's the strongest contender for my nomination thus far, managing to surpass the Bandit! I'd say this doggy has earned you a treat, Tern!
Dog Witch Caligo by
Arctic Tern
...I knew something was missing from this contest! It just wouldn't be MYM without at least one Witchverse set these days!
So Caligo does a few things that stand out in comparison to fellow canine cop Veronica, while she also has police pooches to aid her, Caligo's are much more simple in comparison to Veronica's wolf pack due to the Dog Witch not having an alternate stance like the Wolf Witch. Although to make up for the lack of complexity, her Guard Dogs have the powerful effect of inflicting hitstun that gives Caligo a big opportunity to follow up from one of her more committal, but powerful moves...which includes her Up Special...though come to think of it I can't help but wonder about her tastes using a leash in that get-up. ANYWAYS, the execution of Up Special makes me think of how I imagined Decidueye's Spirit Shackle working if he was added to Smash instead of Incineroar. It seems to be the perfect remedy against characters who're known for being better from a distance but having played a bit of UMvC3 recently it almost reminds me of Spencer's arm in a way, especially with the follow-ups you have here. Another contrast with Veronica that I really love is that as opposed to a full transformation, Caligo does a partial transformation instead, allowing for some more creativity with the attack animations, with Side Special showcasing it the best here. I'd happily stay quietly in my cell if this gargantuan woman transformed her head into that of a rabid dog in front of me. The reference to IRL American justice laws with the Down Special is actually kind fun, being a counter that gets stronger with each attack landed.
Out of all of her normals, I'd have to say Up Smash, Up-tilt and D-throw are stand-out moves. Up Smash showcases her extreme strength in such a badass manner, U-tilt just exudes power and shows that it could probably kill me IRL if I were hit by that, and D-throw because I'm pretty curious about the history of the Black Dog and what led to her inventing it. But honestly, what stands out with Caligo is what us anime-enjoyers would call "gap moe", which is to describe when somebody has a moment contrary to their usual appearance/demeanor that comes off as majorly endearing. The idea of her changing from this stoic, extremely-strict prison warden with a fearful reputation to this big happy girl with the demeanor of a puppy just puts a big smile on my face. And the quote with Veronica in the victory animations is also a really cute touch that plays into this friendship they have in canon.
Overall, I'd say Caligo's the strongest contender for my nomination thus far, managing to surpass the Bandit! I'd say this doggy has earned you a treat, Tern!
wizfoot
Smash Apprentice
I said I was writing comments, so here!
Oh, yeah! I have a Jamcomments doc!
"I'm a dinkum Aussie, not some bloody cartoon!"
Let’s get my first compliment out of the way: presentation! Junkrat’s grimy, greenish-brown being used as a background fits him a lot despite my misgivings towards it as a color, and the use of the full-page feature to give Junkrat a large banner as an introduction looks fantastic.
The description of Junkrat as a “trap-based setup fighter” is pretty unique, and it shows. Being able to move around with Neutral Special active gives a rather slow fighter some pretty decent coverage, and I’m a fan of the reloading function. I think it being used as a keepaway option and not a kill option definitely works, but 400% is a very high percent to kill at. For reference, Greninja’s up taunt kills Jigglypuff at 395%. I feel like that should be lowered: it’s not a kill move, but it should definitely still have a point where it can realistically kill.
His Side Special basically making a new part of the terrain that deals damage after a while is very unique and inspired: there’s not much else to say about it! It’s just a really good move that ties into the rest of his kit very well. His Up Special is pretty similar: giving Junkrat a lot of movement, and a spike, and no freefall is absolutely insane and fits Junkrat so well. His Down Special is an iconic part of his kit and gives him a really unique niche.
If I had to figure out a criticism, I wish that his moves felt like they meshed together better. You mention Down Special and Down Tilt working well with his Neutral Special, but what about meshing with his Neutral Air or his grabs, especially Back Throw? What about Neutral Special being able to send foes into a bit of hitstun to follow up with a Dash Attack?
Overall, this is a pretty good set and admittedly the first of yours I’ve read: like I said, I wish that the moves meshed together a bit more, but there’s a lot of really cool stuff in here, and all of his specials are really inspired. I’m a huge fan of his Up Special in particular. Great job!
Let’s get my first compliment out of the way: presentation! Junkrat’s grimy, greenish-brown being used as a background fits him a lot despite my misgivings towards it as a color, and the use of the full-page feature to give Junkrat a large banner as an introduction looks fantastic.
The description of Junkrat as a “trap-based setup fighter” is pretty unique, and it shows. Being able to move around with Neutral Special active gives a rather slow fighter some pretty decent coverage, and I’m a fan of the reloading function. I think it being used as a keepaway option and not a kill option definitely works, but 400% is a very high percent to kill at. For reference, Greninja’s up taunt kills Jigglypuff at 395%. I feel like that should be lowered: it’s not a kill move, but it should definitely still have a point where it can realistically kill.
His Side Special basically making a new part of the terrain that deals damage after a while is very unique and inspired: there’s not much else to say about it! It’s just a really good move that ties into the rest of his kit very well. His Up Special is pretty similar: giving Junkrat a lot of movement, and a spike, and no freefall is absolutely insane and fits Junkrat so well. His Down Special is an iconic part of his kit and gives him a really unique niche.
If I had to figure out a criticism, I wish that his moves felt like they meshed together better. You mention Down Special and Down Tilt working well with his Neutral Special, but what about meshing with his Neutral Air or his grabs, especially Back Throw? What about Neutral Special being able to send foes into a bit of hitstun to follow up with a Dash Attack?
Overall, this is a pretty good set and admittedly the first of yours I’ve read: like I said, I wish that the moves meshed together a bit more, but there’s a lot of really cool stuff in here, and all of his specials are really inspired. I’m a huge fan of his Up Special in particular. Great job!
Oh, yeah! I have a Jamcomments doc!
GolisoPower
Smash Master
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2017
- Messages
- 4,358
Ginyu Force Called, They Want Their Pizazz Back
Dark Scorpions by U UserShadow7989
...you know when you're a fan of Yu-Gi-Oh!, it sometimes can feel like eons between the last Yu-Gi-Oh set and the next. That's the feeling I got when I started reading the old relic of an Archetype known as the Dark Scorpions. A Hugo set taking all 5 characters and putting them across five different categories, these Zeon commando-lookin' MFs have a fun general rushdown playstyle with some oppressive stage control and pincer tactics on the fly. By himself he's got his trusty pistols and knife to help him do battle, the former being his NSpec that's a stronger disjoint at the cost of fewer movement options, the latter being a SSpec assault that can be angled for extra mind games and is overall a very versatile move. And lastly is the Up Special, a unique and speedy attack that stuns opponents close by for additional set-up potential and gives some decent burst mobility. It gives off a sort of Ginyu Force-style vibe to the whole team that I can't help but enjoy.
Moving onto his cronies, Don Zaloog's clearly not the only one who can pull his weight. Gorg's got absolute power, giving the Smash attacks the burst damage this team deserves using his massive mace. Cliff more than makes up for his lankiness with amazing ground speed, something he's definitely going to need because of those moderately speedy normals in the kit. Good ol' Chick, the comic relief of the group, uses a large hammer to smack people upside the head for a variety of moves that give the set a surprisingly strong air game. I especially love the use of the golf club swing for his Down aerial. Lastly but certainly not least, Meanae takes over the grabs, using her whip to make foes submit. Arguably, she's the strongest of the team by virtue of being able to bypass shields entirely because of it. These together make a machine that needs just the right oil for it to function, and with the right oil, nearly nothing can stop these five.
These five are dangerously close to toppling Caligo as a nomination, but I'mma have to let it sit for a moment. Otherwise, you did splendidly here!
Dark Scorpions by U UserShadow7989
...you know when you're a fan of Yu-Gi-Oh!, it sometimes can feel like eons between the last Yu-Gi-Oh set and the next. That's the feeling I got when I started reading the old relic of an Archetype known as the Dark Scorpions. A Hugo set taking all 5 characters and putting them across five different categories, these Zeon commando-lookin' MFs have a fun general rushdown playstyle with some oppressive stage control and pincer tactics on the fly. By himself he's got his trusty pistols and knife to help him do battle, the former being his NSpec that's a stronger disjoint at the cost of fewer movement options, the latter being a SSpec assault that can be angled for extra mind games and is overall a very versatile move. And lastly is the Up Special, a unique and speedy attack that stuns opponents close by for additional set-up potential and gives some decent burst mobility. It gives off a sort of Ginyu Force-style vibe to the whole team that I can't help but enjoy.
Moving onto his cronies, Don Zaloog's clearly not the only one who can pull his weight. Gorg's got absolute power, giving the Smash attacks the burst damage this team deserves using his massive mace. Cliff more than makes up for his lankiness with amazing ground speed, something he's definitely going to need because of those moderately speedy normals in the kit. Good ol' Chick, the comic relief of the group, uses a large hammer to smack people upside the head for a variety of moves that give the set a surprisingly strong air game. I especially love the use of the golf club swing for his Down aerial. Lastly but certainly not least, Meanae takes over the grabs, using her whip to make foes submit. Arguably, she's the strongest of the team by virtue of being able to bypass shields entirely because of it. These together make a machine that needs just the right oil for it to function, and with the right oil, nearly nothing can stop these five.
These five are dangerously close to toppling Caligo as a nomination, but I'mma have to let it sit for a moment. Otherwise, you did splendidly here!
UnknownFate
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2022
- Messages
- 6
"Let's be honest. There's nothing great about the real world, is there? It's just dull and annoying as hell."
ADACHI COMES TO THE BIG SCREEN
MYM 26
Katapultar
Smash Lord
We had an Adachi set back in MYM7 before the Persona series really took off in MYM (and before the Arena fighting games were released), but it’s still hype to get another Adachi set, especially since we got Akechi this contest.
Adachi is a short and simple set, but one with a solid amount of potential. What brings him up for me a bit is his Specials: Neutral Special is fun for its “move Adachi around while Izanagi is attacking,” deal if you charge it and Side Special being a simple combo extender. But the Down Special is easily the best Special, one that can hit opponents at their current location and lets you use your Persona attacks from a distance! NSpec and DSpec also work nicely with the Persona card mechanic, where separating Izanagi from yourself too much means you risk losing cards.
Where the set could improve on is general melee and exploring more on how moves work with each other. For instance, Forward Tilt is stated to have tech chase potential - what moves could Adachi go into if he knocks his opponent down successfully? (Down Special would obviously be very good, since it targets his opponent) Likewise, Dash Attack being a notable anti-shield option would be sold more if some of Adachi’s more prominent moves were stated to be unsafe on block, so that way Dash Attack could serve as a mix-up to those moves. It would also be interesting if Adachi’s combo game was explored in more detail, especially since Down Special exists - I could see scenarios where an opponent air dodges an attack that would have comboed them, only to get caught out by Adachi’s Down Special instead. Heck, it would also be cool to hear what Persona attacks Down Special's hitbox could follow up into!
- The UI image is cool. Funny cabbage icons that don’t have any gameplay effects.
- “All persona moves will become disabled and Adachi will have to wait about 20 seconds to start again,” This sentence implies that Adachi has to wait 5 seconds for a grayed-out Persona card to get restored, but it’s previously mentioned that grayed-out cards are restored by dealing 25% or KO’ing an opponent. Does the 20 second timer only count if you have no grayed-out cards?
- I really like the presentation behind Jab, where the images and damage/frame data details are all horizontally aligned. I also like the hitbox images on the Smashes.
- I don’t mind Dash Attacks with grab hitboxes, but I think this one in particular is redundant because dash grabs exist. Maybe it should just be a strong non-grab hit that launches opponents far away for Special set-ups?
Adachi is a short and simple set, but one with a solid amount of potential. What brings him up for me a bit is his Specials: Neutral Special is fun for its “move Adachi around while Izanagi is attacking,” deal if you charge it and Side Special being a simple combo extender. But the Down Special is easily the best Special, one that can hit opponents at their current location and lets you use your Persona attacks from a distance! NSpec and DSpec also work nicely with the Persona card mechanic, where separating Izanagi from yourself too much means you risk losing cards.
Where the set could improve on is general melee and exploring more on how moves work with each other. For instance, Forward Tilt is stated to have tech chase potential - what moves could Adachi go into if he knocks his opponent down successfully? (Down Special would obviously be very good, since it targets his opponent) Likewise, Dash Attack being a notable anti-shield option would be sold more if some of Adachi’s more prominent moves were stated to be unsafe on block, so that way Dash Attack could serve as a mix-up to those moves. It would also be interesting if Adachi’s combo game was explored in more detail, especially since Down Special exists - I could see scenarios where an opponent air dodges an attack that would have comboed them, only to get caught out by Adachi’s Down Special instead. Heck, it would also be cool to hear what Persona attacks Down Special's hitbox could follow up into!
GolisoPower
Smash Master
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2017
- Messages
- 4,358
...Damn, Rouge Ain't Got Nothin' On This Chick.
Bandit Gal by
Daehypeels
Okay, so, I know I made a moveset for some ****post-y TF2 animation character, but I think the sexy genderbending of a Mario/Yoshi mook kinda tops that, NGL.
Bandit Gal is essentially like a mosquito: she's everywhere, she wears you down little by little, is annoying as all hell, and occasionally she'll actually kill somebody. First, we have a parallel to surprisingly Faust from Guilty Gear with her random-projectile Neutral Special, which I know can be considered a crime if done wrong, yet in this I...find this in the legally gray. I do especially like how it steals from Yoshi using his egg and brings back old Smash relics with the Red Shell. It simultaneously calls back to the Smash, Mario and Yoshi series in one fell swoop in that regard...but then there's the fact that you can summon a Smash Ball with the egg, something that would probably get this character banned in tourneys LOL. The cutouts in Side Special seem extremely versatile, either resulting in an explosion that can get you an easy kill or an uppercut follow-up that basically gets your foe off your ass. The amount of shenanigans to be had with this move is arguably kind of hilarious so as to ensure that regardless of win or loss it end with a good chuckle. Up Special's bomb jump feels almost more fun than Junkrat's Up Special, maybe it's because Bandit Gal's using a cluster bomb, but that might be just me. That's not even getting to the Dark Dive-style command grab during ascension that leads to a stronger footstool and refreshes your use of Up Special. Feels almost evil if you're trying to recover, NGL, but hey, Crime's the theme of this JamCon, so...yeah. Anyways, Down Special gets Bandit Gal into the spirit of rasslin' and does what's effectively something you'd see at WWE. If you manage to land this attack, as God as my witness that foe's getting broken in half. This is the most notable part of when I say she'll "occasionally kill somebody" as a mosquito, but goddammit I'm gonna try to give my foe that dark evil malaria with this.
All her tilts seem pretty nice and has me pretty conflicted flavorwise: seeing this lady dressed as a Bandit doing stuff like hand-to-hand combat and acrobatic techniques on top of the many thief's gadgets she has comes from the benefit of not being built like a mini-marshmallow, but the way minus8 designed her is giving me images I wasn't ready for. I do like that she's just as mischievous as any other Bandit in moves like U-tilt or D-tilt doing some underhanded sneaky ****. Honestly, overall, this set was on the higher end, which is a relief since after this I have something dreaded to read after this. Nice work, Dae!
Peak JamCon Crime
Trol by
FrozenRoy
If this were a contest of fitting a JamCon theme the best, you would've damn well come out on top, no question.
Anyways, joining n88 in being crucified for making a Heavy Nova set is Froy with the first boss of arguably one of the biggest contenders to go against Expect No Mercy on The Worst Fighting Game by Matt McMuscles. I'll have to call a previous set of mine, Wolf Witch Veronica, to read you your charges in this set:
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Now then, my nomination for this JamCon...I'm giving this to Dog Witch Caligo by Arctic Tern!
Bandit Gal by
Daehypeels
Okay, so, I know I made a moveset for some ****post-y TF2 animation character, but I think the sexy genderbending of a Mario/Yoshi mook kinda tops that, NGL.
Bandit Gal is essentially like a mosquito: she's everywhere, she wears you down little by little, is annoying as all hell, and occasionally she'll actually kill somebody. First, we have a parallel to surprisingly Faust from Guilty Gear with her random-projectile Neutral Special, which I know can be considered a crime if done wrong, yet in this I...find this in the legally gray. I do especially like how it steals from Yoshi using his egg and brings back old Smash relics with the Red Shell. It simultaneously calls back to the Smash, Mario and Yoshi series in one fell swoop in that regard...but then there's the fact that you can summon a Smash Ball with the egg, something that would probably get this character banned in tourneys LOL. The cutouts in Side Special seem extremely versatile, either resulting in an explosion that can get you an easy kill or an uppercut follow-up that basically gets your foe off your ass. The amount of shenanigans to be had with this move is arguably kind of hilarious so as to ensure that regardless of win or loss it end with a good chuckle. Up Special's bomb jump feels almost more fun than Junkrat's Up Special, maybe it's because Bandit Gal's using a cluster bomb, but that might be just me. That's not even getting to the Dark Dive-style command grab during ascension that leads to a stronger footstool and refreshes your use of Up Special. Feels almost evil if you're trying to recover, NGL, but hey, Crime's the theme of this JamCon, so...yeah. Anyways, Down Special gets Bandit Gal into the spirit of rasslin' and does what's effectively something you'd see at WWE. If you manage to land this attack, as God as my witness that foe's getting broken in half. This is the most notable part of when I say she'll "occasionally kill somebody" as a mosquito, but goddammit I'm gonna try to give my foe that dark evil malaria with this.
All her tilts seem pretty nice and has me pretty conflicted flavorwise: seeing this lady dressed as a Bandit doing stuff like hand-to-hand combat and acrobatic techniques on top of the many thief's gadgets she has comes from the benefit of not being built like a mini-marshmallow, but the way minus8 designed her is giving me images I wasn't ready for. I do like that she's just as mischievous as any other Bandit in moves like U-tilt or D-tilt doing some underhanded sneaky ****. Honestly, overall, this set was on the higher end, which is a relief since after this I have something dreaded to read after this. Nice work, Dae!
Peak JamCon Crime
Trol by
FrozenRoy
If this were a contest of fitting a JamCon theme the best, you would've damn well come out on top, no question.
Anyways, joining n88 in being crucified for making a Heavy Nova set is Froy with the first boss of arguably one of the biggest contenders to go against Expect No Mercy on The Worst Fighting Game by Matt McMuscles. I'll have to call a previous set of mine, Wolf Witch Veronica, to read you your charges in this set:
- Making a Heavy Nova set in general.
- Having only 4 attacks in the entire set, shaking up everything that makes a moveset in this contest.
- Combining so many gimmicks into a singular set, which I will not be getting into at the moment.
- Transplanting that godawful stamina gauge from the game, though to your credit it isn't as backstabby to you as it is in Heavy Nova.
- All that min-maxed insanity dependent on the Power Meter. BRUH, y'all're wildin'.
- The painstaking amount of detail in making this play as frustratingly as in Heavy Nova.
- Look out Steve, here comes Trol with the intentionally janky animations.
----
Now then, my nomination for this JamCon...I'm giving this to Dog Witch Caligo by Arctic Tern!
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UserShadow7989
Smash Journeyman
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2007
- Messages
- 307
Dog Witch Caligo by
Arctic Tern
Caligo is one of those Jamcon entries that don't feel like a Jamcon entry, which I feel is another hallmark of Arctic Tern Quality (tm). She starts off with a foundation of somewhat typical superheavyweight stats and the strengths and weaknesses of the archetype you'd expect, and leads into four really solid Specials that give her the tools to deal with the weaknesses while emphasizing her strengths.
Give her any prep time, and she can set up her Guard Dogs to turn her singular big hits into combo chains by using their own attacks as glue, piling on damage as punishment for trying to camp her out instead of fighting her more aggressively. Get sloppy trying to stick just out of range, and she'll slap a leash on you to keep you where she wants you and limit your tech and roll options, or enter an armored command dash and close the gap herself. Go ham trying to rack up damage on her heavy body? You risk an increasingly deadly counter each time you slip up and give her any breathing room. It all compounds, too, with her assorted approaching, spacing, tech chasing, and roll punishing tools and the mounting pressure of trying to knock her away to break your leash giving her ample opportunities to keep landing more and more powerful counters.
Past the smashes, which have animations that properly convey the warden's raw power, Caligo as a set focuses on a strongly interlaced melee game that fills in the framework outlined by the set's intended concept and her Specials nicely, giving her the exactly right number of tools of the exact right amount of strength and weakness to do what she's supposed to, all the while giving her her own flair of how she approaches the heavy archetype.
Set aside, I'm also quite the fan of the character concept and fluff- while it's not something I'm accounting for in appraising it as a Jamcon entry as said fluff existed before the set or the Jamcon did, it's something I wanted to mention here to give credit where it's due, and also to pad this admittedly short comment. It's hard for me to comment sets like Caligo, where everything is neatly and properly polished and executed to the point I have a hard time even finding things to nitpick. It might not be the most crazy, moveset crime-type set, but there's something to be said for just being a really good finished product that's (not to belabor the point) especially impressive for a set made in a time crunch.
Bandit Gal by
Daehypeels
This was a delightful surprise, not going to lie. Ignoring the origins of the character, I've always been a fan of seeing generic enemy designs made into something more individualized or anthropomorphized- it tends to lead to some interesting creative interpretations that balance the original design and disposition with something new. That's not what makes the set so interesting, though.
Bandit Gal’s strength for me is how well she captures her intended concept- to be as irritating to play against and hard to pin down as possible while still being fair, especially for how limited she is in her combo options. She’s ridiculously safe in most circumstances, but has to scrape for every bit of damage, combining a typical lightweight’s individual move damage output with a heavyweight’s inability to consistently combo.
Bandit Gal deliberately finds new crazy and exciting ways to accomplish her goal (be obnoxious) with every move, a tack from older MYMs that I often find myself missing, but does so in manners that show thought put into keeping the set balanced. Balance is always something outside of my area of expertise, but I feel the set does its job well given her glaring weaknesses to counteract her amazing strengths.
The Specials (and Down Smash) I want to give a shout out to for how they tie the set together beautifully- not by introducing mechanics or shared quirks that are then threaded through the set, but by tying together loose ends in her playstyle with a few tools she craved to be the annoying little pain in the backside she was meant to be. Down Special specifically ends the set on a high note, for as simple a move as it is compared to many of her other options and especially the preceding specials, because it adds a layer to all other interactions- it gives her a singular good KO move that doesn't involve suckerpunching the foe as they recover, and the fact that it can be a mix-up option with all of her most annoying tools that punishes respecting her too much while falling flat against an opponent that insists on being aggressive makes for a neat balance.
Bandit Girl might be my favorite of your sets, if only because it appeals to that little gremlin inside of me for whom she is everything I could want in a character I would actually play (much as I love the Rube Goldberg antics of my and several of other sets most of all, I'd never even have a chance to play them properly).
Misc. Notes:
-DTilt usage description trails off at the very end.
-UThrow feels a little redundant with BThrow, but would be useful in different enough situations/would lead to different things with her and the opponent both being airborne that it feels alright.
-I think 12 seconds cooldown is fair re: NSpec. Could also make it so the cooldown varies based on how many uses she has left, so if she’s picking her shots she’s not in trouble of running out, but spam will leave her without for a while.
-You made the right call on scrapping the old idea; a character who spawns with three stashed items is a neat concept but it definitely would’ve taken too much time to really work out the details and properly integrate it with the rest of the set/build around it.
-I’ve gained a softspot for rng stuff as time’s gone on, and Neutral Special feels reasonable enough to me- while the weapon she procures for the toss is random, she’ll always have the same coverage options, with the main difference being how much the opponent needs to worry about flubbing the read. The cooldown works well enough to limit the frustration from the rng if she somehow gets insanely lucky, so there’s not too much issue here.
-Side Special is possibly my favorite individual move of this jamcon, I just love the wacky flavor and versatility of the tool.
Trol by
FrozenRoy
And ending off the crime-themed jamcon, we have the crime of false advertising- the set has 8 moves counting the throws under the command grab, and thus you will be hearing from my lawyer.
Despite having only 4 moves with omnidirectional aim (and 4 throws), Trol has a decent bit going on under the hood to make use of, including each move having multiple hitboxes and conditional effects that give it at least one or two of every kind of tool you need, and they're all quite powerful in combination with the laundry list of mechanics that are meant to simulate the jank of Heavy Nova, but the lack of real movepool variety limits Trol's options at every turn, and there's just as many negatives to those mechanics as positives.
I feel that Trol overall trends a bit on the strong side; while it doesn't have a ton of mix-ups, it has excellent stats, its moves are all omnidirectional giving it a good few plays from any position, it hits like a truck, it has some high risk high reward invulnerability tools that can let it go in, and it can even confirm off of one of its throws into a KO move that can end a stock at 85-ish%. That said, balance is hard to judge here, and it's probably not the main selling point of the set.
Instead, the fact that Trol is a fully functional set with 4 (8) moves and a few mechanics makes for a fun joke character, wherever its balance might land. While it didn't come out to my favorite set of the Jamcon, I'll say it's a solid addition to the MYM 26 roster.
My Jamcon 26-2 Nomination is Dog Witch Caligo by
Arctic Tern
, with special mention of Bandit Girl for being the close second I didn't expect to show up immediately after. All of these entries are pretty dang good, though, including a few that are the new favorites of mine from established set makers.
Arctic Tern
Caligo is one of those Jamcon entries that don't feel like a Jamcon entry, which I feel is another hallmark of Arctic Tern Quality (tm). She starts off with a foundation of somewhat typical superheavyweight stats and the strengths and weaknesses of the archetype you'd expect, and leads into four really solid Specials that give her the tools to deal with the weaknesses while emphasizing her strengths.
Give her any prep time, and she can set up her Guard Dogs to turn her singular big hits into combo chains by using their own attacks as glue, piling on damage as punishment for trying to camp her out instead of fighting her more aggressively. Get sloppy trying to stick just out of range, and she'll slap a leash on you to keep you where she wants you and limit your tech and roll options, or enter an armored command dash and close the gap herself. Go ham trying to rack up damage on her heavy body? You risk an increasingly deadly counter each time you slip up and give her any breathing room. It all compounds, too, with her assorted approaching, spacing, tech chasing, and roll punishing tools and the mounting pressure of trying to knock her away to break your leash giving her ample opportunities to keep landing more and more powerful counters.
Past the smashes, which have animations that properly convey the warden's raw power, Caligo as a set focuses on a strongly interlaced melee game that fills in the framework outlined by the set's intended concept and her Specials nicely, giving her the exactly right number of tools of the exact right amount of strength and weakness to do what she's supposed to, all the while giving her her own flair of how she approaches the heavy archetype.
Set aside, I'm also quite the fan of the character concept and fluff- while it's not something I'm accounting for in appraising it as a Jamcon entry as said fluff existed before the set or the Jamcon did, it's something I wanted to mention here to give credit where it's due, and also to pad this admittedly short comment. It's hard for me to comment sets like Caligo, where everything is neatly and properly polished and executed to the point I have a hard time even finding things to nitpick. It might not be the most crazy, moveset crime-type set, but there's something to be said for just being a really good finished product that's (not to belabor the point) especially impressive for a set made in a time crunch.
Bandit Gal by
Daehypeels
This was a delightful surprise, not going to lie. Ignoring the origins of the character, I've always been a fan of seeing generic enemy designs made into something more individualized or anthropomorphized- it tends to lead to some interesting creative interpretations that balance the original design and disposition with something new. That's not what makes the set so interesting, though.
Bandit Gal’s strength for me is how well she captures her intended concept- to be as irritating to play against and hard to pin down as possible while still being fair, especially for how limited she is in her combo options. She’s ridiculously safe in most circumstances, but has to scrape for every bit of damage, combining a typical lightweight’s individual move damage output with a heavyweight’s inability to consistently combo.
Bandit Gal deliberately finds new crazy and exciting ways to accomplish her goal (be obnoxious) with every move, a tack from older MYMs that I often find myself missing, but does so in manners that show thought put into keeping the set balanced. Balance is always something outside of my area of expertise, but I feel the set does its job well given her glaring weaknesses to counteract her amazing strengths.
The Specials (and Down Smash) I want to give a shout out to for how they tie the set together beautifully- not by introducing mechanics or shared quirks that are then threaded through the set, but by tying together loose ends in her playstyle with a few tools she craved to be the annoying little pain in the backside she was meant to be. Down Special specifically ends the set on a high note, for as simple a move as it is compared to many of her other options and especially the preceding specials, because it adds a layer to all other interactions- it gives her a singular good KO move that doesn't involve suckerpunching the foe as they recover, and the fact that it can be a mix-up option with all of her most annoying tools that punishes respecting her too much while falling flat against an opponent that insists on being aggressive makes for a neat balance.
Bandit Girl might be my favorite of your sets, if only because it appeals to that little gremlin inside of me for whom she is everything I could want in a character I would actually play (much as I love the Rube Goldberg antics of my and several of other sets most of all, I'd never even have a chance to play them properly).
Misc. Notes:
-DTilt usage description trails off at the very end.
-UThrow feels a little redundant with BThrow, but would be useful in different enough situations/would lead to different things with her and the opponent both being airborne that it feels alright.
-I think 12 seconds cooldown is fair re: NSpec. Could also make it so the cooldown varies based on how many uses she has left, so if she’s picking her shots she’s not in trouble of running out, but spam will leave her without for a while.
-You made the right call on scrapping the old idea; a character who spawns with three stashed items is a neat concept but it definitely would’ve taken too much time to really work out the details and properly integrate it with the rest of the set/build around it.
-I’ve gained a softspot for rng stuff as time’s gone on, and Neutral Special feels reasonable enough to me- while the weapon she procures for the toss is random, she’ll always have the same coverage options, with the main difference being how much the opponent needs to worry about flubbing the read. The cooldown works well enough to limit the frustration from the rng if she somehow gets insanely lucky, so there’s not too much issue here.
-Side Special is possibly my favorite individual move of this jamcon, I just love the wacky flavor and versatility of the tool.
Trol by
FrozenRoy
And ending off the crime-themed jamcon, we have the crime of false advertising- the set has 8 moves counting the throws under the command grab, and thus you will be hearing from my lawyer.
Despite having only 4 moves with omnidirectional aim (and 4 throws), Trol has a decent bit going on under the hood to make use of, including each move having multiple hitboxes and conditional effects that give it at least one or two of every kind of tool you need, and they're all quite powerful in combination with the laundry list of mechanics that are meant to simulate the jank of Heavy Nova, but the lack of real movepool variety limits Trol's options at every turn, and there's just as many negatives to those mechanics as positives.
I feel that Trol overall trends a bit on the strong side; while it doesn't have a ton of mix-ups, it has excellent stats, its moves are all omnidirectional giving it a good few plays from any position, it hits like a truck, it has some high risk high reward invulnerability tools that can let it go in, and it can even confirm off of one of its throws into a KO move that can end a stock at 85-ish%. That said, balance is hard to judge here, and it's probably not the main selling point of the set.
Instead, the fact that Trol is a fully functional set with 4 (8) moves and a few mechanics makes for a fun joke character, wherever its balance might land. While it didn't come out to my favorite set of the Jamcon, I'll say it's a solid addition to the MYM 26 roster.
My Jamcon 26-2 Nomination is Dog Witch Caligo by
Arctic Tern
, with special mention of Bandit Girl for being the close second I didn't expect to show up immediately after. All of these entries are pretty dang good, though, including a few that are the new favorites of mine from established set makers.
n88
Smash Lord
- Joined
- Oct 10, 2008
- Messages
- 1,534
Thanks to the jamcon participants, readers and writers alike! This time the win goes to
Arctic Tern
!
1) Dog Witch Caligo by Arctic Tern (3.5 pts)
(Kat, US, Goliso, voter bonus)
2) Dark Scorpions by UserShadow7989 (1.5 pts)
(Tern, voter bonus)
3) Trol by FrozenRoy (1 pt)
(tunz)
Junkrat by tunz (0.5 pt)
(voter bonus)
Bandit Gal by Daehypeels
Bandit by majora_787
Here's looking forward to whatever Tern picks for the theme next time around!
Arctic Tern
!1) Dog Witch Caligo by Arctic Tern (3.5 pts)
(Kat, US, Goliso, voter bonus)
2) Dark Scorpions by UserShadow7989 (1.5 pts)
(Tern, voter bonus)
3) Trol by FrozenRoy (1 pt)
(tunz)
Junkrat by tunz (0.5 pt)
(voter bonus)
Bandit Gal by Daehypeels
Bandit by majora_787
AwfulBeast
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2022
- Messages
- 8
Astor from Hyrule Warriors, Age of Calamity, is my second moveset entering into MYM26 (Following off of Lana).
Astor, Prophet of Doom, Moveset
Arctic Tern
Smash Apprentice
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2022
- Messages
- 133
TOHRU ADACHI (UnknownFate)
Persona 4 is a game I’ve always had a great fondness for, and Adachi in particular is a character I’ve been conceptualizing quite a lot recently, so this is a really hype choice for me. The set itself is primarily based on his appearance in Arena Ultimax, taking the Persona Break mechanic as a means to balance out his otherwise immensely powerful Specials and Smashes. This basic concept is fairly neat in my opinion, and could be an interesting way to balance other Persona characters. My favorite move is probably DSpec, a move that automatically tracks the foe within a certain distance, since it both allows Magatsu-Izanagi to act desynced from Adachi and gives him the presence he needs as a major villain. I also liked the USpec fog recovery, and coincidentally the Dash Attack grab is also something in my set.
Outside of lack of elaboration, the biggest stickler for me is that you don’t use nearly as much of Adachi’s potential as you could have. He’s missing a lot of fairly iconic moves, like the Ghastly Wail/Evil Smile combo and Magatsu Mandala, and in my sets I try to include as much of them as possible. Additionally, there’s not a lot of personality here. Adachi’s trollish personality is one of his defining characteristics, but it doesn’t show in the animations, not even his laugh - you could easily add some taunts to fix this issue, but I feel that it needs to be somewhere in the set. Lastly, the grab game was notably lacking, especially since there wasn’t anything that started tech chases despite his skill set being very good for this; since you’re already pulling a lot of stuff from Arena, why not replace the current DThrow with his throw in that game, which knocks down the opponent? It also has him trip the foe and laugh at them, so that adds a bit of character to the set as well.
In summary, while it doesn’t feel “Adachi” enough for my tastes, the base mechanics would still be fun to mess around with, and it’s nice to see another set for him.
ASTOR (AwfulBeast)
Astor is another character who plays with the long-dead “cage” genre of set. His Shield Special allows him to create a barrier around himself that bars foes from passing through it, thus keeping them in range of his attacks. What makes this more interesting is the fact that all of Astor’s setup is restricted to the area of his cage, thus providing a fairly interesting reason as to why he wants to keep an opponent in there beyond just restricting their movements. He also can’t move while the cage is up, having to rely on his disjointed moves to keep the foe at bay. I am concerned that it may make Astor a bit too campy/obnoxious at ledge, but damaging the cage does also damage his shield, so if he keeps it out then the foe can just batter it and punish the resulting shield break. Edgeguarding remains an issue, but at least it can’t bar low recoveries; I personally suggest making it so that the cage can be entered, but not left.
Besides the cage, Astor has a lot of neat tricks up his sleeve. His SSpec has him create a clone of his foe, which he can use as a stage control tool as well as command during Shield Special (though the inputs required to command said clone when holding SSpec aren’t actually specified - additionally, it’s a weird input choice for a stage control move. NSpec is a projectile but there are plenty of SSpec projectiles). DSpec creates a robot that can become an automated projectile launcher, and if it stays out long enough becomes a very powerful enemy. Aside from the concept fitting a character like Astor, it also puts immense pressure on the opponent to approach him and fall within range of his attacks.
Every input section in the set fills a different role in Astor’s gameplan. His Standards are what he’ll normally be using, from a long range Jab that grants immense midrange pressure to his Dash Attack burst option to a FTilt projectile that bounces off of his cage’s walls. Smashes are meant for hard punishing approach options at the cost of leaving Astor vulnerable on whiff: DSmash is probably my favorite for its ability to mindgame what response the foe has to take since the attack changes if charged. Aerials are more conventional, but there’s still a standout move in the FAir, a boomerang move that can potentially combo into other moves. Lastly, Grab is meant as a punish option, with a particularly neat animation of Astor taking the opponent’s soul - DThrow is the highlight, forcing them into a pool of Malice that debuffs their movement and puts them at further risk of his punish options. Despite how powerful his advantage state can get, Astor has notable weaknesses of poor OoS and recovery, plus a lack of launchers into his strong anti-air tools and not being able to properly edgeguard due to having to risk removing his setup. All this combines into a set that, despite having a few mechanical kinks, is a very solid modernization of the cage genre and a worthy entry into MYM’s playbooks.
Comment block link here!
Persona 4 is a game I’ve always had a great fondness for, and Adachi in particular is a character I’ve been conceptualizing quite a lot recently, so this is a really hype choice for me. The set itself is primarily based on his appearance in Arena Ultimax, taking the Persona Break mechanic as a means to balance out his otherwise immensely powerful Specials and Smashes. This basic concept is fairly neat in my opinion, and could be an interesting way to balance other Persona characters. My favorite move is probably DSpec, a move that automatically tracks the foe within a certain distance, since it both allows Magatsu-Izanagi to act desynced from Adachi and gives him the presence he needs as a major villain. I also liked the USpec fog recovery, and coincidentally the Dash Attack grab is also something in my set.
Outside of lack of elaboration, the biggest stickler for me is that you don’t use nearly as much of Adachi’s potential as you could have. He’s missing a lot of fairly iconic moves, like the Ghastly Wail/Evil Smile combo and Magatsu Mandala, and in my sets I try to include as much of them as possible. Additionally, there’s not a lot of personality here. Adachi’s trollish personality is one of his defining characteristics, but it doesn’t show in the animations, not even his laugh - you could easily add some taunts to fix this issue, but I feel that it needs to be somewhere in the set. Lastly, the grab game was notably lacking, especially since there wasn’t anything that started tech chases despite his skill set being very good for this; since you’re already pulling a lot of stuff from Arena, why not replace the current DThrow with his throw in that game, which knocks down the opponent? It also has him trip the foe and laugh at them, so that adds a bit of character to the set as well.
In summary, while it doesn’t feel “Adachi” enough for my tastes, the base mechanics would still be fun to mess around with, and it’s nice to see another set for him.
ASTOR (AwfulBeast)
Astor is another character who plays with the long-dead “cage” genre of set. His Shield Special allows him to create a barrier around himself that bars foes from passing through it, thus keeping them in range of his attacks. What makes this more interesting is the fact that all of Astor’s setup is restricted to the area of his cage, thus providing a fairly interesting reason as to why he wants to keep an opponent in there beyond just restricting their movements. He also can’t move while the cage is up, having to rely on his disjointed moves to keep the foe at bay. I am concerned that it may make Astor a bit too campy/obnoxious at ledge, but damaging the cage does also damage his shield, so if he keeps it out then the foe can just batter it and punish the resulting shield break. Edgeguarding remains an issue, but at least it can’t bar low recoveries; I personally suggest making it so that the cage can be entered, but not left.
Besides the cage, Astor has a lot of neat tricks up his sleeve. His SSpec has him create a clone of his foe, which he can use as a stage control tool as well as command during Shield Special (though the inputs required to command said clone when holding SSpec aren’t actually specified - additionally, it’s a weird input choice for a stage control move. NSpec is a projectile but there are plenty of SSpec projectiles). DSpec creates a robot that can become an automated projectile launcher, and if it stays out long enough becomes a very powerful enemy. Aside from the concept fitting a character like Astor, it also puts immense pressure on the opponent to approach him and fall within range of his attacks.
Every input section in the set fills a different role in Astor’s gameplan. His Standards are what he’ll normally be using, from a long range Jab that grants immense midrange pressure to his Dash Attack burst option to a FTilt projectile that bounces off of his cage’s walls. Smashes are meant for hard punishing approach options at the cost of leaving Astor vulnerable on whiff: DSmash is probably my favorite for its ability to mindgame what response the foe has to take since the attack changes if charged. Aerials are more conventional, but there’s still a standout move in the FAir, a boomerang move that can potentially combo into other moves. Lastly, Grab is meant as a punish option, with a particularly neat animation of Astor taking the opponent’s soul - DThrow is the highlight, forcing them into a pool of Malice that debuffs their movement and puts them at further risk of his punish options. Despite how powerful his advantage state can get, Astor has notable weaknesses of poor OoS and recovery, plus a lack of launchers into his strong anti-air tools and not being able to properly edgeguard due to having to risk removing his setup. All this combines into a set that, despite having a few mechanical kinks, is a very solid modernization of the cage genre and a worthy entry into MYM’s playbooks.
Comment block link here!
Katapultar
Smash Lord
Another AwfulBeast moveset, another Hyrule Warriors moveset. Once again, I love the intro write-up, as it showcases Astor’s character more compellingly than a simple tell-based write-up.
I had the impression that Astor would outdo Lana from his wordcount alone, and that is further evident by his very unique concepts. He has a AoE field that his Calamity-based attacks can’t move past, which gets even more juicy when he can turn that field into a barrier around himself! You can use this barrier to lock foes out or cage them in, but it’s perfectly balanced in every way I’d want it to be. No cheesing recoveries, attacks will still launch opponents through the barrier to KO them, and outsiders can attack the barrier to damage Astor’s shield.
The Side Special Hollow is further reminiscent of old popular MYM concepts, as it gives you a Nana fighter that copies the opponent’s moveset! Love the little touches of Astor getting a Link clone in mirror matches, the banter where Astor stops you from describing long-winded match-up related situations, and of course the balance factor of your clone being stuck with Astor’s more sluggish movement. You can also control the Hollow directly while Astor stays invincible while he has his barrier up, but the Hollow’s limited HP + the limited AoE of Calamity means that the Hollow can’t go too far or go off-stage to attack enemies, which is a really nice balancing touch.
“The Hollow will be able to sustain up to 15% of damage before disappearing, and any damage done to it will contribute to Astor getting screwed over in the later stages of the game.” This almost makes it sound like any damage done to a Hollow is transferred to Astor. Not entirely sure what the “getting screwed over later in the game,” part of the sentence means, as it sounds like Astor could just make another Hollow if he loses one.
The Neutral and Down Specials get particularly unique when you have the minion that evolves if it stays out for 30 seconds! I could see arguments for this timer being brought down to 20 seconds (Harbinger Ganon has 15HP, and you do need to put in a bit of set-up time between summoning the robot and then using Neutral Special), but I’m not concerned with the current timer balance-wise.
The melee goes off to a promising start, with Jab being a slow defensive pressure tool and Dash Attack being an intangible escape option that loses to shields, which the former is good at pressuring. F-tilt is a fun little use of Astor’s base mechanics, as a projectile that disappears if it leaves your AoE but can bounce off of your barrier if you put it up afterwards. U-tilt has some funny flavour to its attack animation: the fact that it is stated to hit 4 tiles above Astor makes it sound like it could hit foes on the top platform of Battlefield, but the move reads like the hitbox connects directly above Astor. It is good to see you straight-up referencing Specials in the regular attacks, and how they all synergize together.
Then we have the Smash attacks, which are just straight-up big, hard-read moves to annihilate anyone who is struck by them. Down Smash is different in that it’s a quick but unrewarding defensive option that’s best used to trap opponents in your other hitboxes - I do like how this move gets a much-needed upgrade when you charge it halfway. It is good to see Hollow move-copying being acknowledged in these attacks. The fact that both versions serve as mix-ups is cool, too. One note, though:
“A common set-up would be to charge up this attack on a platform while having a Hollow sit in the ledge, preparing it’s own Down Smash. More often than not the Hollow’s own Down Smash will finish before Astor’s when he uses his, allowing for it to react to the opponent’s option from ledge.” This write-up implies that Hollows cannot charge their Smash attacks - we know that Astor and Hollows perform the same attack input in unison, and that Down Smash needs to be charged for a bit to get the Waterblight. I actually think Hollows not being able to charge their Smashes would be very cool and work super well with Astor’s Smashes. Not only does this prevent Hollows from being too powerful, it would also work really well with the sheer slowness of Astor’s F-Smash and U-Smashes. If you have a Hollow of an opponent with a fast U-Smash that deals upwards knockback, you could have that Hollow bop the opponent upwards as you keep charging your own U-Smash - then release it when your opponent falls within range of its high hitbox!
Aerials continue to be unique attacks: N-air has the radial knockback you see on a lot of veteran N-airs, with armour to punch through enemy attacks, while F-air is a neat mid-ranged boomerang projectile that can set up into your U-tilt. B-air gives Astor much-needed spacing, while his U-air pressures landings and works nicely with a Hollow that’s separated from you. On the subjects, I like that only the Hollow will grab if Astor has one with him. Astor’s throws are all simple, but they go into the level of detail I’d want from these kinds of moves.
As for complaints. This is going to sound contradictory for how much I praised Side Special, but… I think that Hollows are straight-up overpowered, in ways that aren’t necessarily touched upon in the set. Sure, there’s a decent amount of lag to summoning a Hollow, and they die when they take 15%, but - unless I’m mistaken - they allow Astor to double down with two full-powered hitboxes, both from himself and the opponent the Hollow was cloned from. This would lead to Astor having much better shield pressure, and a much better defensive game than his own attacks would imply. And though I praised the Hollows’ synergy with the Smashes, I could see scenarios where Astor uses a quicker F-Smash to lock foes into their shield for his own stronger F-Smash and instantly breaks them (this feels like it could absolutely be a thing in the match-ups you described, like with Zelda or Sonic since their F-Smashes aren’t too slow). It gets particularly tricky when Hollow attacks are not consistent, since they’re match-up dependent. As far as dialing down Hollows go:
All things said, Astor is a genuinely great set that blows Lana out of the water, and handily my favourite set from the FFC community as of now. You don’t need to be a foreseer like Astor to predict that this set should do decently well this contest. I’d definitely say that focusing on tying all these moves together paid off, because that’s exactly what we in MYM want to see. I still enjoyed the little dialogue write-ups too - they and move-related images are honestly a bonus, because they are so rare in modern MYM and not necessary at all to get a high vote. Anyway, great work on this moveset!
I had the impression that Astor would outdo Lana from his wordcount alone, and that is further evident by his very unique concepts. He has a AoE field that his Calamity-based attacks can’t move past, which gets even more juicy when he can turn that field into a barrier around himself! You can use this barrier to lock foes out or cage them in, but it’s perfectly balanced in every way I’d want it to be. No cheesing recoveries, attacks will still launch opponents through the barrier to KO them, and outsiders can attack the barrier to damage Astor’s shield.
The Side Special Hollow is further reminiscent of old popular MYM concepts, as it gives you a Nana fighter that copies the opponent’s moveset! Love the little touches of Astor getting a Link clone in mirror matches, the banter where Astor stops you from describing long-winded match-up related situations, and of course the balance factor of your clone being stuck with Astor’s more sluggish movement. You can also control the Hollow directly while Astor stays invincible while he has his barrier up, but the Hollow’s limited HP + the limited AoE of Calamity means that the Hollow can’t go too far or go off-stage to attack enemies, which is a really nice balancing touch.
“The Hollow will be able to sustain up to 15% of damage before disappearing, and any damage done to it will contribute to Astor getting screwed over in the later stages of the game.” This almost makes it sound like any damage done to a Hollow is transferred to Astor. Not entirely sure what the “getting screwed over later in the game,” part of the sentence means, as it sounds like Astor could just make another Hollow if he loses one.
The Neutral and Down Specials get particularly unique when you have the minion that evolves if it stays out for 30 seconds! I could see arguments for this timer being brought down to 20 seconds (Harbinger Ganon has 15HP, and you do need to put in a bit of set-up time between summoning the robot and then using Neutral Special), but I’m not concerned with the current timer balance-wise.
- I think that Calamity Orbs should just deal a little downwards knockback or send opponents tumbling if they’re hit by one in midair. Leaving your opponent in freefall is just a straight-up death sentence offstage, and these are slow projectiles that Astor can have a good number of out, as well as set up his robot to fire them.
- “Before getting to those, it should be mentioned that you cannot use Side Special again while Harbinger Ganon is on the field, using it will just do nothing.” Do you mean Down Special? Because that’s the input that you use to summon the Calamity-possessed robots. Side Special is the input that’s used to summon Hollows. Unless I’m mistaken and you actually mean to ban Hollow-summoning while the evolved minion is out?
- Jumping back to the weaker Harbinger Ganon minion for a moment, is there anything that prevents opponents who destroy the minion from just being hit by the malice that the robot generates on death? Maybe the malice flies away like it took knockback from the killing blow, then flies back towards the fighter who killed the robot.
- I initially thought that Ganon’s death explosion was instant until I went down and read that it took 3 seconds to trigger. I like that this gives foes time to get out of the way and not casually get punished for killing Ganon. Gives Astor a little something he can use against his opponent as payback for killing his beloved god. Could be cool if the explosion had a bit of linger to it like a Smart Bomb, where it can deny the part of the stage that Ganon was killed on? Very evil if Ganon was killed at the ledge and Astor managed to knock his opponent offstage before the explosion commenced.
- Glad to see that Down Special has a second effect beyond the robot, as the move didn’t seem to have that much substance with just the tapped version.
- Up Special is indeed simple, but the explosive orbs Astor leaves behind are a cool twist on teleportation that works with the constructs he needs to protect.
The melee goes off to a promising start, with Jab being a slow defensive pressure tool and Dash Attack being an intangible escape option that loses to shields, which the former is good at pressuring. F-tilt is a fun little use of Astor’s base mechanics, as a projectile that disappears if it leaves your AoE but can bounce off of your barrier if you put it up afterwards. U-tilt has some funny flavour to its attack animation: the fact that it is stated to hit 4 tiles above Astor makes it sound like it could hit foes on the top platform of Battlefield, but the move reads like the hitbox connects directly above Astor. It is good to see you straight-up referencing Specials in the regular attacks, and how they all synergize together.
Then we have the Smash attacks, which are just straight-up big, hard-read moves to annihilate anyone who is struck by them. Down Smash is different in that it’s a quick but unrewarding defensive option that’s best used to trap opponents in your other hitboxes - I do like how this move gets a much-needed upgrade when you charge it halfway. It is good to see Hollow move-copying being acknowledged in these attacks. The fact that both versions serve as mix-ups is cool, too. One note, though:
“A common set-up would be to charge up this attack on a platform while having a Hollow sit in the ledge, preparing it’s own Down Smash. More often than not the Hollow’s own Down Smash will finish before Astor’s when he uses his, allowing for it to react to the opponent’s option from ledge.” This write-up implies that Hollows cannot charge their Smash attacks - we know that Astor and Hollows perform the same attack input in unison, and that Down Smash needs to be charged for a bit to get the Waterblight. I actually think Hollows not being able to charge their Smashes would be very cool and work super well with Astor’s Smashes. Not only does this prevent Hollows from being too powerful, it would also work really well with the sheer slowness of Astor’s F-Smash and U-Smashes. If you have a Hollow of an opponent with a fast U-Smash that deals upwards knockback, you could have that Hollow bop the opponent upwards as you keep charging your own U-Smash - then release it when your opponent falls within range of its high hitbox!
Aerials continue to be unique attacks: N-air has the radial knockback you see on a lot of veteran N-airs, with armour to punch through enemy attacks, while F-air is a neat mid-ranged boomerang projectile that can set up into your U-tilt. B-air gives Astor much-needed spacing, while his U-air pressures landings and works nicely with a Hollow that’s separated from you. On the subjects, I like that only the Hollow will grab if Astor has one with him. Astor’s throws are all simple, but they go into the level of detail I’d want from these kinds of moves.
As for complaints. This is going to sound contradictory for how much I praised Side Special, but… I think that Hollows are straight-up overpowered, in ways that aren’t necessarily touched upon in the set. Sure, there’s a decent amount of lag to summoning a Hollow, and they die when they take 15%, but - unless I’m mistaken - they allow Astor to double down with two full-powered hitboxes, both from himself and the opponent the Hollow was cloned from. This would lead to Astor having much better shield pressure, and a much better defensive game than his own attacks would imply. And though I praised the Hollows’ synergy with the Smashes, I could see scenarios where Astor uses a quicker F-Smash to lock foes into their shield for his own stronger F-Smash and instantly breaks them (this feels like it could absolutely be a thing in the match-ups you described, like with Zelda or Sonic since their F-Smashes aren’t too slow). It gets particularly tricky when Hollow attacks are not consistent, since they’re match-up dependent. As far as dialing down Hollows go:
- Make them deal half as much damage?
- Make them deal little or no shield damage/stun?
- Let opponents beat out their hitboxes with any attack? Maybe disjointed hitboxes are still a part of the Hollows’ hurtbox?
- Negate super armour and other defensive properties on Hollow attacks?
All things said, Astor is a genuinely great set that blows Lana out of the water, and handily my favourite set from the FFC community as of now. You don’t need to be a foreseer like Astor to predict that this set should do decently well this contest. I’d definitely say that focusing on tying all these moves together paid off, because that’s exactly what we in MYM want to see. I still enjoyed the little dialogue write-ups too - they and move-related images are honestly a bonus, because they are so rare in modern MYM and not necessary at all to get a high vote. Anyway, great work on this moveset!
AwfulBeast
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2022
- Messages
- 8
Ahh, thank you so much for the comment! I'll admit that there wasn't much proofreading when I finished the set,which is why there was some confusion. I had some ideas that were there before I removed them, which is why I had that sentence about the Hollow getting hit screwing Astor over in the later stages of the game. Also I meant to say Down Special, and you CAN use it again, it'll only be the Pool of Malice though, which is yet another mistake of not proofreading. I also probably should've been more specific about how the Hollow works and the implications behind it, but some of the ideas you gave for it I'll definitely consider.
But uh, favorite set in FFC? That's a really big compliment, thanks so much for that! I'm really happy you enjoyed the set as much as you did, as I always try my hardest with these things. I'll look over your ideas if I ever decide to update this set. I hope you look forward to my future movesets! = D
ForwardArrow
Smash Ace
- Joined
- Aug 17, 2011
- Messages
- 502
Astor
You know, I kept thinking about reading Lana even during my hiatus, and then this set pops up as something clearly hyped up to a greater degree than she was looking at the early comments. Its really nice to see FFC adapting to MYM and throwing out what actually feels like a heavy hitter of a set, to be honest.
Honestly the whole Calamity Aura mechanic is a very cool idea. Its a nice limiting factor on this Astor's otherwise very strong stage control, keeping it limited to an area somewhat close to his body as a solid means of balance. The ability to potentially lock the opponent in with you brings, as has already been mentioned, old Cage sets to mind, but the fact that Astor can get his shield broken by hitting the barrier enough makes it feel like the consequences for failure are much more dire here, and the space is big enough that the opponent has a reasonable amount of room to play with. And honestly, the Specials are a very fun core, between a construct that gives you a monstrously powerful minion if you can keep it alive long enough. What makes me like this more is that the giant minion is VERY telegraphed in its attacks and has limited stamina so at no point is the foe really playing PvE, more functioning like an enhancer for Astor's kit. That's an easy mistake for a super big and powerful minion like that to fall into, I'm glad its avoided here. The hollows are also a very fun and versatile tool, there's a lot of cool ways for Astor to set up for them in the moveset, and I do sorta like the premise of taking Astor out of the fight and forcing the foe to deal with the hollow in the cage with their brief 15 stamina... although this feels like something that makes me think the Hollow mechanic really needs a cooldown timer. As is it feels very strong, and the start lag to summon one doesn't feel like enough of a limit.
What's nice is after a pretty strong set of specials, NSpecial and USpecial both being solid little additions to his kit with the latter giving him an interesting flaw, the set avoids losing steam, something I often feel sets from newer people who make a cool core tend to do. Jab/FTilt/Dash Attack are all great moves, with smart weaknesses applied while giving incredible utility to his zoner playstyle with all kinds of verasatile use cases. DTilt feels a little odd on the input, sure, but I still like the move even if I wish it gave specific damage/knockback numbers for the spike variant. The Smashes give him some real giant zoning/killing attacks which feel very at home as payoffs to Astor's kit, and Down Smash makes some pretty fun use of charging an attack as an opponent approaches you. Waterblight feels... shockingly practical for a move that requires you to charge a Smash even if its definitely not something you can bust out all the time, which I appreciate. Even the aerials have some fun stuff, Nair/Fair definitely being highlights with their solid synergy with the rest of his pressure and kit, but I'd say everything manages to fulfill a niche he probably wants here.
Now, I do feel the grab game is a bit of a disappointment. The set hypes him up as having great payoffs to his grab, and then it gives him three payoffs that feel pretty standard, and DThrow which feels like its capitalizing on a mechanic I already felt might be too powerful in tapped Down Special in a way that seems terrifyingly hard to deal with. Being in prone with your movement cut by a third against a guy who has some fantastic anti-shield options just seems rough to a degree I'm not sure was even intended. And after how the rest of the set felt specialized and full of synergies in an impressive way for most of the inputs, the rest of his throws feel weirdly uninspired, even if Astor is at least having fun in the animations. They're functional, but I find myself wishing for the kind of nuance of things like Dash Attack's protective qualities/high base knockback but failing on shield, which has some multi-layered synergy with all Astor's other tools while keeping an otherwise very powerful attack respectful. The throws... don't feel like they've got that kind of nuance, and they're fine aside from DThrow(even if I enjoy it from a character standpoint), but in a set that was doing a lot more than "fine" for the rest of its runtime its a bit of a letdown to end on.
I also feel like, to be honest, Astor feels a bit... much, at times. His ledge game is hysterically powerful between all the tools he has to completely dominate it, he's got a whole bunch of stage control tools including the VERY powerful Hollows, all of which he can have out at the same time. Its limited by his Calamity Aura, sure, but I still feel like the foe having like 4 things to weave around at once can be a bit of a nightmare especially when he can box the opponent in with them. He's also got multiple very potent stunning options that can set up for really early kills off Fireblight Ganon, and combined with the fact once they get out of the stun they're worried about Hollows I feel like his advantage state is maybe too insane for the set's own good. He's not THAT overpowered, I feel, because of his poor recovery and the fact he does need a moment to set these things up, but it does feel like matches involving him are a bit too much of a hard back and forth seesaw for my liking, and I feel both the potency of the Hollows and the movement nerf on tapped DSpecial would be better off dialed back a bit.
All the same, this is a very cool set and feels like a solid contender, and also shows you've adapted to MYM's environment impressively well. The grab game and balance could be better, but there's some rock solid ideas in the Specials/Mechanics carried along by surprisingly well designed Standards/Smashes/Aerials with little twists that show a willingness to experiment. I know you've been making sets for a while, but even considering that, MYM has some pretty absurd expectations and this set somehow feels like its meeting all our standards this early into joining, so you should be VERY proud of that.
Trol
You know, I have to say, this is a very special kind of moveset crime. Having less than the normal number of inputs is not like, a thing people started disliking in MYM13-15 or whatever like a lot of old moveset crimes. No, this is a concept that has been hated since the dawn of time, since the days of Ekans not having a DThrow being a feature, not a bug, or something. Trol not only neglects to give a full of set of inputs, he only has 4(well, 8 if you count throws, and I kinda do, but throws feel like the least terrible inputs to skip on), which is the kind of thing that puts you in "immediately burned at the stake" territory. Very bold choice, on top of giving us a second Heavy Nova character, so as far as making a moveset crime goes you absolutely knocked it out of the park, this set is positively vile.
And you know, I'd say on a basic level, you did fine balancing the concept of "this character has 4 inputs". He's got some options to go briefly invincible, some ROB-esque flight, and his small list of attacks are omni-directional and usable in places Smashes and Grabs couldn't normally be used, so in terms of options he's got more than you'd expect for what is, in theory, 4 inputs. And also this small list of options absolutely has the power and speed it needs to make his predictability less of a painful downside. I really do think even with the extra directions, Trol kinda needed his attacks to be at this power level to be viable. Such a small movelist is inherently going to make him very predictable, so what he CAN do better be very good, and I think the flight and invincibility tools give him some nice but not completely overpowered ways to mix up his attacks on top of that. I think you could put this character in the game, he'd fit in with the rest of Smash's cast in terms of balance and be basically fine.
Except... I'll be honest, this set runs into a conceptual flaw despite its impressive attempts to balance something so fundamentally flawed. Yes, compared to another famous crime set in Fire Bar, Trol has... probably everything he needs to play the game and play it reasonably well. But where it loses out to Fire Bar, I feel, is in a more important area: The games are just not interesting. I think on a fundamental level the lack of variety in Trol's tools will make for a very simplified and kinda of dull game state, where all the stages of his game just come down to using the same 4 crazy strong tools over and over with no room for variety. These tools are strong enough, he can make a match out of it, but I feel like it raises the question of why when imagining 23 weaker but more varied tools is just... a lot more interesting. I could also see some of his matchups end up very one sided, because if one of Trol's crazy options is a liiiittle too much for a character's kit, or a character is JUST good enough at shutting down Trol's 4 options, then they're only going to really get small windows to make a match out of things. There's a reason this concept is not approached, and like... this set succeeds at it, but for what purpose? Comedy? Being true to Heavy Nova? Honestly, at least one of those things is a respectable cause, but I don't feel this set works all that well as a serious moveset once you get past the novelty of "this is probably about as good as a 4 input moveset for a heavy nova character is gonna get".
I'm glad the set exists, and I think it succeeded at what it set out to do. But as a serious moveset, if I still had rankings I'd probably still have to give it a like 2-3 star score because I cannot imagine matches involving this set playing well or being interesting at all. It doesn't really... work beyond the bare minimum. But at the very least, the fact it DOES succeed at the bare minimum is still somewhat impressive.
You know, I kept thinking about reading Lana even during my hiatus, and then this set pops up as something clearly hyped up to a greater degree than she was looking at the early comments. Its really nice to see FFC adapting to MYM and throwing out what actually feels like a heavy hitter of a set, to be honest.
Honestly the whole Calamity Aura mechanic is a very cool idea. Its a nice limiting factor on this Astor's otherwise very strong stage control, keeping it limited to an area somewhat close to his body as a solid means of balance. The ability to potentially lock the opponent in with you brings, as has already been mentioned, old Cage sets to mind, but the fact that Astor can get his shield broken by hitting the barrier enough makes it feel like the consequences for failure are much more dire here, and the space is big enough that the opponent has a reasonable amount of room to play with. And honestly, the Specials are a very fun core, between a construct that gives you a monstrously powerful minion if you can keep it alive long enough. What makes me like this more is that the giant minion is VERY telegraphed in its attacks and has limited stamina so at no point is the foe really playing PvE, more functioning like an enhancer for Astor's kit. That's an easy mistake for a super big and powerful minion like that to fall into, I'm glad its avoided here. The hollows are also a very fun and versatile tool, there's a lot of cool ways for Astor to set up for them in the moveset, and I do sorta like the premise of taking Astor out of the fight and forcing the foe to deal with the hollow in the cage with their brief 15 stamina... although this feels like something that makes me think the Hollow mechanic really needs a cooldown timer. As is it feels very strong, and the start lag to summon one doesn't feel like enough of a limit.
What's nice is after a pretty strong set of specials, NSpecial and USpecial both being solid little additions to his kit with the latter giving him an interesting flaw, the set avoids losing steam, something I often feel sets from newer people who make a cool core tend to do. Jab/FTilt/Dash Attack are all great moves, with smart weaknesses applied while giving incredible utility to his zoner playstyle with all kinds of verasatile use cases. DTilt feels a little odd on the input, sure, but I still like the move even if I wish it gave specific damage/knockback numbers for the spike variant. The Smashes give him some real giant zoning/killing attacks which feel very at home as payoffs to Astor's kit, and Down Smash makes some pretty fun use of charging an attack as an opponent approaches you. Waterblight feels... shockingly practical for a move that requires you to charge a Smash even if its definitely not something you can bust out all the time, which I appreciate. Even the aerials have some fun stuff, Nair/Fair definitely being highlights with their solid synergy with the rest of his pressure and kit, but I'd say everything manages to fulfill a niche he probably wants here.
Now, I do feel the grab game is a bit of a disappointment. The set hypes him up as having great payoffs to his grab, and then it gives him three payoffs that feel pretty standard, and DThrow which feels like its capitalizing on a mechanic I already felt might be too powerful in tapped Down Special in a way that seems terrifyingly hard to deal with. Being in prone with your movement cut by a third against a guy who has some fantastic anti-shield options just seems rough to a degree I'm not sure was even intended. And after how the rest of the set felt specialized and full of synergies in an impressive way for most of the inputs, the rest of his throws feel weirdly uninspired, even if Astor is at least having fun in the animations. They're functional, but I find myself wishing for the kind of nuance of things like Dash Attack's protective qualities/high base knockback but failing on shield, which has some multi-layered synergy with all Astor's other tools while keeping an otherwise very powerful attack respectful. The throws... don't feel like they've got that kind of nuance, and they're fine aside from DThrow(even if I enjoy it from a character standpoint), but in a set that was doing a lot more than "fine" for the rest of its runtime its a bit of a letdown to end on.
I also feel like, to be honest, Astor feels a bit... much, at times. His ledge game is hysterically powerful between all the tools he has to completely dominate it, he's got a whole bunch of stage control tools including the VERY powerful Hollows, all of which he can have out at the same time. Its limited by his Calamity Aura, sure, but I still feel like the foe having like 4 things to weave around at once can be a bit of a nightmare especially when he can box the opponent in with them. He's also got multiple very potent stunning options that can set up for really early kills off Fireblight Ganon, and combined with the fact once they get out of the stun they're worried about Hollows I feel like his advantage state is maybe too insane for the set's own good. He's not THAT overpowered, I feel, because of his poor recovery and the fact he does need a moment to set these things up, but it does feel like matches involving him are a bit too much of a hard back and forth seesaw for my liking, and I feel both the potency of the Hollows and the movement nerf on tapped DSpecial would be better off dialed back a bit.
All the same, this is a very cool set and feels like a solid contender, and also shows you've adapted to MYM's environment impressively well. The grab game and balance could be better, but there's some rock solid ideas in the Specials/Mechanics carried along by surprisingly well designed Standards/Smashes/Aerials with little twists that show a willingness to experiment. I know you've been making sets for a while, but even considering that, MYM has some pretty absurd expectations and this set somehow feels like its meeting all our standards this early into joining, so you should be VERY proud of that.
Trol
You know, I have to say, this is a very special kind of moveset crime. Having less than the normal number of inputs is not like, a thing people started disliking in MYM13-15 or whatever like a lot of old moveset crimes. No, this is a concept that has been hated since the dawn of time, since the days of Ekans not having a DThrow being a feature, not a bug, or something. Trol not only neglects to give a full of set of inputs, he only has 4(well, 8 if you count throws, and I kinda do, but throws feel like the least terrible inputs to skip on), which is the kind of thing that puts you in "immediately burned at the stake" territory. Very bold choice, on top of giving us a second Heavy Nova character, so as far as making a moveset crime goes you absolutely knocked it out of the park, this set is positively vile.
And you know, I'd say on a basic level, you did fine balancing the concept of "this character has 4 inputs". He's got some options to go briefly invincible, some ROB-esque flight, and his small list of attacks are omni-directional and usable in places Smashes and Grabs couldn't normally be used, so in terms of options he's got more than you'd expect for what is, in theory, 4 inputs. And also this small list of options absolutely has the power and speed it needs to make his predictability less of a painful downside. I really do think even with the extra directions, Trol kinda needed his attacks to be at this power level to be viable. Such a small movelist is inherently going to make him very predictable, so what he CAN do better be very good, and I think the flight and invincibility tools give him some nice but not completely overpowered ways to mix up his attacks on top of that. I think you could put this character in the game, he'd fit in with the rest of Smash's cast in terms of balance and be basically fine.
Except... I'll be honest, this set runs into a conceptual flaw despite its impressive attempts to balance something so fundamentally flawed. Yes, compared to another famous crime set in Fire Bar, Trol has... probably everything he needs to play the game and play it reasonably well. But where it loses out to Fire Bar, I feel, is in a more important area: The games are just not interesting. I think on a fundamental level the lack of variety in Trol's tools will make for a very simplified and kinda of dull game state, where all the stages of his game just come down to using the same 4 crazy strong tools over and over with no room for variety. These tools are strong enough, he can make a match out of it, but I feel like it raises the question of why when imagining 23 weaker but more varied tools is just... a lot more interesting. I could also see some of his matchups end up very one sided, because if one of Trol's crazy options is a liiiittle too much for a character's kit, or a character is JUST good enough at shutting down Trol's 4 options, then they're only going to really get small windows to make a match out of things. There's a reason this concept is not approached, and like... this set succeeds at it, but for what purpose? Comedy? Being true to Heavy Nova? Honestly, at least one of those things is a respectable cause, but I don't feel this set works all that well as a serious moveset once you get past the novelty of "this is probably about as good as a 4 input moveset for a heavy nova character is gonna get".
I'm glad the set exists, and I think it succeeded at what it set out to do. But as a serious moveset, if I still had rankings I'd probably still have to give it a like 2-3 star score because I cannot imagine matches involving this set playing well or being interesting at all. It doesn't really... work beyond the bare minimum. But at the very least, the fact it DOES succeed at the bare minimum is still somewhat impressive.
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FrozenRoy
Smash Lord
Brisket Guilty Gear (Bridget
wizfoot
)
The first Guilty Gear set we ever got, way back in MYM2, returns to help out with the Guilty Gear revival along with Dizzy! It had been a decade since our last Guilty Gear sets (and that itself was like 5 years after the first three), so hopefully Dizzy/Bridget along with Hakumen's success let us see more Arc System Works sets rising. This is also, as far as I know, the longest Wizfoot set to date which is cool.
The way this set starts out with how the intro and ideas behind the set are presented reminds me of the FFCer sets, which is interesting to see. The input overviews also remind me of some of my own old experiments with that, such as Mace Windu.
Up Special (thanks to Kat's suggestion?) having specific starting lag reduction from out of shield is rather interesting, lets her have a strong out of shield option but not too super fast of an actual Up Special. I liked the primer on Side Special, seeing as it is Bridget's cornerstone move of the set I'd say, and an example of how it might be used (although I might use someone less safe on aggression than Sheik but it gets the point across). As a note, Side Special says it lasts "about 5 seconds" while the primer says 7 seconds so there's a mismatch there. I'd go with the 7 second number myself. The Specials overall paint a nice picture of the mobility-and-setup vibe that a Bridget set should logically have, a solid start. BTW, I like the way you inset the GIFs in the document here.
As I go through the standards, I do sometimes wish the set would acknowledge and relate to the reader about Bridget's weapon some. Logically speaking, the hitboxes on a lot of her attacks is rather thing, which AFAIK is also true in Guilty Gear. But in Smash, with some exaggerated crouches and a much more robust jumping game than most tradfighters, that kind of thin-ness can be more important. For example, can Bridget angle her F-Tilt like other Smash F-Tilts? Doing so would allow her to use it for a ton of spacing, while not doing so would give her a shorthop weakness that Up Tilt's highly anti-shorthop angle would excel at covering. It's also worth noting her Up Tilt, assuming it follows the angle of the image which feels implied, is a great anti-air against approaches or recoveries but might struggle to get foes directly above her or juggles, does this mean that Side Special being directly or near-directly above her is a good idea to place it to use it to anti-air that?
"If Bridget and her opponent both try to close the gap at the same time, sending out a Dash Attack can give Bridget the advantage. " It feels a bit unclear why this is the case on Dash Attack.
Frame 18 honestly isn't all THAT fast for an Up Smash, that's Palu/Bayo/Shulk speed. For reference, King Dedede's is Frame 17 and Bowser's is Frame 16, and the mean of Up Smash starting lags is 12. I wonder if Frame 13 (Byleth/Corrin) might give a better "feel" that the set seems to want. Similarly, Frame 14 is more like Charizard Down Smash than the quick "breakdance" style attacks you might be looking for. For reference, Mario's first hit is Frame 5 (with the back hit being Frame 14). Bridget's strong keepaway game means it being slower makes sense, but maybe more Frame 8-10 would be good? The smashes and standards otherwise feel, you know, fine. They feel like straightforward implementations of Bridget's general Guilty Gear moveset, nothing particularly taking advantage of the Smash engine but still having a good idea of what to do with the set. And the grab game...certainly does exist, I feel like there has to be more that could be done, especially seems weird to have multiple kill throws and then her last throw kills much earlier than any of them.
"Meanwhile, her down air is a complete 180 from the rest of her kit and probably her most move overall for just being what it is." Truly, this is one of the moves of all time.
I like the way Neutral Aerial combines a Smash sex kick with the more "omnidirectional" NAir vibe, it feels like a clever use of the source material as something to translate into Smash. Forward Aerial, I suspect, does have some more uses that the set could work together: The fact that it is a poke aerial means that, compared to her other pokes, she could also use it while RETREATING with Rolling Movement situationally, in exchange it has lesser range than her big poke like Forward Tilt or power poke Forward Smash. Back Aerial being a difficult-to-land, sweetspot kill move that lacks play into Bridget's combo game but gets a large lag reduction from Rolling Movement for punishment felt like one of my favorite moves in the set. I wonder if Down Aerial being weaker but having reduced landing lag, think Mr. Game & Watch's Down Aerial, would be a better fit into the set's playstyle? More safety landing would mean it can mix up out of Rolling Movement more, and in general it might provide a bit of a stronger niche than it currently has IMO. Alternately, pumping up the power (since Bridget is quite lacking in strong moves) but making it even more punishing could fit a niche as well but it feels like it would play less into Rolling Movement like that.
I don't think I had quite as much to say as I had hoped, I would say this feels like a general improvement from you Wiz, which is a good sign. It sometimes feels a bit heavily like just taking stuff from the games, but it does bust out enough to make it stay unique to keep it boosted up some, and the aerials were a good section to end the set on. I actually think one of my bigger issues with the set might be that it really feels designed almost entirely with Side Special in mind, which means that Kick Start My Heart and Roger Rush get almost no attention. KSMH really only gets mention when it is in a combo section and not how it might help out or play into her neutral, and Roger Rush feels in particular like it would be an alternative to Rolling Movement where setting the Yo-Yo is used to combo extend with Roger's return attack rather than the chasing movement. But the idea of how Bridget might threaten via KSMH without Rolling Movement to set Roger Rush up, for example, is relatively unexplored both in the move design and how the set approaches it IMO. I think if there was anywhere it felt like Bridget's quality could be improved, that was where. But overall, it still feels like a solid improvement, particularly on the writing front. And it got across how much you like ol' Brisket well, so that's good too. Hopefully you keep on truckin' on Wiz!
wizfoot
)The first Guilty Gear set we ever got, way back in MYM2, returns to help out with the Guilty Gear revival along with Dizzy! It had been a decade since our last Guilty Gear sets (and that itself was like 5 years after the first three), so hopefully Dizzy/Bridget along with Hakumen's success let us see more Arc System Works sets rising. This is also, as far as I know, the longest Wizfoot set to date which is cool.
The way this set starts out with how the intro and ideas behind the set are presented reminds me of the FFCer sets, which is interesting to see. The input overviews also remind me of some of my own old experiments with that, such as Mace Windu.
Up Special (thanks to Kat's suggestion?) having specific starting lag reduction from out of shield is rather interesting, lets her have a strong out of shield option but not too super fast of an actual Up Special. I liked the primer on Side Special, seeing as it is Bridget's cornerstone move of the set I'd say, and an example of how it might be used (although I might use someone less safe on aggression than Sheik but it gets the point across). As a note, Side Special says it lasts "about 5 seconds" while the primer says 7 seconds so there's a mismatch there. I'd go with the 7 second number myself. The Specials overall paint a nice picture of the mobility-and-setup vibe that a Bridget set should logically have, a solid start. BTW, I like the way you inset the GIFs in the document here.
As I go through the standards, I do sometimes wish the set would acknowledge and relate to the reader about Bridget's weapon some. Logically speaking, the hitboxes on a lot of her attacks is rather thing, which AFAIK is also true in Guilty Gear. But in Smash, with some exaggerated crouches and a much more robust jumping game than most tradfighters, that kind of thin-ness can be more important. For example, can Bridget angle her F-Tilt like other Smash F-Tilts? Doing so would allow her to use it for a ton of spacing, while not doing so would give her a shorthop weakness that Up Tilt's highly anti-shorthop angle would excel at covering. It's also worth noting her Up Tilt, assuming it follows the angle of the image which feels implied, is a great anti-air against approaches or recoveries but might struggle to get foes directly above her or juggles, does this mean that Side Special being directly or near-directly above her is a good idea to place it to use it to anti-air that?
"If Bridget and her opponent both try to close the gap at the same time, sending out a Dash Attack can give Bridget the advantage. " It feels a bit unclear why this is the case on Dash Attack.
Frame 18 honestly isn't all THAT fast for an Up Smash, that's Palu/Bayo/Shulk speed. For reference, King Dedede's is Frame 17 and Bowser's is Frame 16, and the mean of Up Smash starting lags is 12. I wonder if Frame 13 (Byleth/Corrin) might give a better "feel" that the set seems to want. Similarly, Frame 14 is more like Charizard Down Smash than the quick "breakdance" style attacks you might be looking for. For reference, Mario's first hit is Frame 5 (with the back hit being Frame 14). Bridget's strong keepaway game means it being slower makes sense, but maybe more Frame 8-10 would be good? The smashes and standards otherwise feel, you know, fine. They feel like straightforward implementations of Bridget's general Guilty Gear moveset, nothing particularly taking advantage of the Smash engine but still having a good idea of what to do with the set. And the grab game...certainly does exist, I feel like there has to be more that could be done, especially seems weird to have multiple kill throws and then her last throw kills much earlier than any of them.
"Meanwhile, her down air is a complete 180 from the rest of her kit and probably her most move overall for just being what it is." Truly, this is one of the moves of all time.
I like the way Neutral Aerial combines a Smash sex kick with the more "omnidirectional" NAir vibe, it feels like a clever use of the source material as something to translate into Smash. Forward Aerial, I suspect, does have some more uses that the set could work together: The fact that it is a poke aerial means that, compared to her other pokes, she could also use it while RETREATING with Rolling Movement situationally, in exchange it has lesser range than her big poke like Forward Tilt or power poke Forward Smash. Back Aerial being a difficult-to-land, sweetspot kill move that lacks play into Bridget's combo game but gets a large lag reduction from Rolling Movement for punishment felt like one of my favorite moves in the set. I wonder if Down Aerial being weaker but having reduced landing lag, think Mr. Game & Watch's Down Aerial, would be a better fit into the set's playstyle? More safety landing would mean it can mix up out of Rolling Movement more, and in general it might provide a bit of a stronger niche than it currently has IMO. Alternately, pumping up the power (since Bridget is quite lacking in strong moves) but making it even more punishing could fit a niche as well but it feels like it would play less into Rolling Movement like that.
I don't think I had quite as much to say as I had hoped, I would say this feels like a general improvement from you Wiz, which is a good sign. It sometimes feels a bit heavily like just taking stuff from the games, but it does bust out enough to make it stay unique to keep it boosted up some, and the aerials were a good section to end the set on. I actually think one of my bigger issues with the set might be that it really feels designed almost entirely with Side Special in mind, which means that Kick Start My Heart and Roger Rush get almost no attention. KSMH really only gets mention when it is in a combo section and not how it might help out or play into her neutral, and Roger Rush feels in particular like it would be an alternative to Rolling Movement where setting the Yo-Yo is used to combo extend with Roger's return attack rather than the chasing movement. But the idea of how Bridget might threaten via KSMH without Rolling Movement to set Roger Rush up, for example, is relatively unexplored both in the move design and how the set approaches it IMO. I think if there was anywhere it felt like Bridget's quality could be improved, that was where. But overall, it still feels like a solid improvement, particularly on the writing front. And it got across how much you like ol' Brisket well, so that's good too. Hopefully you keep on truckin' on Wiz!
WeirdChillFever
Smash Hero
Calamity Inkantation (Astor by
A
AwfulBeast
)
This comment is copied from Discord
Astor is a unique set in that the gameplan isn’t a flowchart but rather a toolbox that he has at his disposal: It’s up to the player to find the synergy in the various tools and to unleash a cacophonic calamity between the Harbingers and Hollows. It’s more in-Smash like than the average MYM-set, but it does apply MYM-ian sensibilities by drawing links between the various tools, especially in the absolutely cracking melee.
Where the rough edges start to show in the otherwise smooth ride of the set is in the balance with many of the options being in need of touch-ups in order to make Astor’s gameplan less lopsided:
Pool of Malice, for example, is very overtuned: A 75% decrease in all sorts of mobility is a very overcentralizing way of balancing and it’s something the set barely acknowledges.
The Devilled Egg’s, aka the Harbinger’s, 30 second transforming time, meanwhile, is on the long side; a shame, since a transforming minion is too good an idea to relegate to a niche scenario that barely ever comes into play.
When nerfing and buffing, you could take the opportunity to apply a bit more focus on the set by creating a hierarchy in importance between the various specials, rather than three equal tools, though the toolbox approach definitely shines through on its own right, so take that suggestion with a grain of salt.
Those balance issues disappear completely in the melee, which combines inventive moves with the right around of clunkiness plus a centralizing move in the Future Sight (oh yeah final nitpick, please refer to non-Specials and Smashes by their inputs rather than their name)
Overall, a standout set that can definitely measure itself up to a good day of the old guard. Good job!
This comment is copied from Discord
Astor is a unique set in that the gameplan isn’t a flowchart but rather a toolbox that he has at his disposal: It’s up to the player to find the synergy in the various tools and to unleash a cacophonic calamity between the Harbingers and Hollows. It’s more in-Smash like than the average MYM-set, but it does apply MYM-ian sensibilities by drawing links between the various tools, especially in the absolutely cracking melee.
Where the rough edges start to show in the otherwise smooth ride of the set is in the balance with many of the options being in need of touch-ups in order to make Astor’s gameplan less lopsided:
Pool of Malice, for example, is very overtuned: A 75% decrease in all sorts of mobility is a very overcentralizing way of balancing and it’s something the set barely acknowledges.
The Devilled Egg’s, aka the Harbinger’s, 30 second transforming time, meanwhile, is on the long side; a shame, since a transforming minion is too good an idea to relegate to a niche scenario that barely ever comes into play.
When nerfing and buffing, you could take the opportunity to apply a bit more focus on the set by creating a hierarchy in importance between the various specials, rather than three equal tools, though the toolbox approach definitely shines through on its own right, so take that suggestion with a grain of salt.
Those balance issues disappear completely in the melee, which combines inventive moves with the right around of clunkiness plus a centralizing move in the Future Sight (oh yeah final nitpick, please refer to non-Specials and Smashes by their inputs rather than their name)
Overall, a standout set that can definitely measure itself up to a good day of the old guard. Good job!
FrozenRoy
Smash Lord
Since the pace of the contest to get 100~ sets seems a bit more fit for this timeline and it would make it much easier for Jamcon purposes, plus it might help out with some end of contest plans, Leadership has decided to move the end date of MYM26 to the end of July 31st. Please Understand.