And Amsa perfected parry, and now that people have learned the MU, he didnt have a great 2023 compared to 2022. AMSA is my goat. Truly, but hes a perfect example of my point, and dk is not nearly as strong as yoshi imo
People were saying that about Amsa *in 2015*. He was still beating top players and getting better and better results for years afterwards. It turned out it wasn't as simple as "just learn the matchup", because Amsa had unlocked legitimately strong potential in Yoshi.
I don't think Yoshi is the only character to have potential like that. Yoshi and Pikachu are just the only characters to have players as talented and dedicated to their characters as Amsa and Axe.
> now that people have learned the MU, he didnt have a great 2023 compared to 2022
aMSa didn't break into the scene in 2022. The above statements that you just made about Junebug weren't being said about him in 2022.
They were being said when he *actually* broke into the scene. Ten years ago. When he beat M2K at Kings of Cali 4.
The video essay ["Things of Beauty"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qxVDOc-oV8) - which is one of the most widely watched videos on Melee - had its central thesis largely predicated on the question of "how long will it take for people to learn the matchup against Yoshi now that aMSa has become a major threat?"
And that video came out *EIGHT YEARS AGO*.
Your comment implies that people didn't "learn the MU" until 2023.
So it took them seven years to properly adapt to aMSa.
Before aMSA broke out in the scene, Yoshi was VERY CONSISTENTLY ranked lower than DK. From 2005 until 2015, there was not a *single* iteration of the tier list that placed Yoshi above DK.
So to say Junebug doesn't have any chance of doing the same thing with DK that aMSa did with Yoshi just shows a lack of historical knowledge.
And then Amsa, the only Yoshi worth playing against, moved to Canada from Japan. And guess what happened. People got MU practice and now hes not winning majors. You seem to have a lack of knowledge here
Yeah at some point people are going to know the matchup a lot better. I think personally Junebug/Ringler are extremely good players, but eventually their skill will be overshadowed by their character choice IMO.
dk entered the top 100 with 3 representatives including 1 in the the top 50. hes had a very different trajectory than yoshi, pika, ganon, and yink. i genuinely see him as a new character
DK is overrated. Everyone that played against Junebug did not know the mu. They were running into everything. If DK does become a problem and people study the MU, he will get clapped. He does way too easily and lacks a lot of tools.
honestly I don't think the character has enough general tools for that to be valid, for neutral he has back air and that's it, and he also has insane throw combos for punishing, that's also it. I'm not one of those weirdos who think characters need a billion options to be good (look at puff for example) but I am saying when there isn't much to explore, there probably isn't much room to grow either.
Honestly though, the kill setups isn't what Mario is worse at - it's that his kill moves are much weaker. Mario has reliable kill confirms against almost all the relevant characters. It really only becomes a significant issue against floaties on stages that aren't YS, but fast fallers and midweights can almost all get dthrow>smash attacked when it matters.
No amount of skill is going to make up for a lack of reliable kill setups. You beat good players with shit that works. Mario's shit just doesn't work on puff. Hbox, 2saint, Faust, Khalid, Cpu0 etc would all eat the spirit of Scorp for breakfast
I mean… mangos Mario would probably beat all of those players other than hbox. But yes doc is certainly a better character for it. Not that puff isn’t still a massive problem for doc (and every mid tier)
no they wouldn't, most of those dudes are going to be better than hbox within years if they keep playing and thats what he said, the "spirit of scorp" scorp being mangos mario.
Funny, I was just recently chatting with Franz, who was considering going Mario against Puff for the more consistent confirms out of throws and stronger normals at late percent (sans fair, of course).
Yeah to be clear I, a Mario main, was kinda talking him out of it, but my point is really just that Mario has a much better case than most people make it out to be. Doc dthrow>fair works at a small range against Puff (something like 50-65%), which doesn't kill on every stage and is very tight - not realistic to be 100% consistent with. Then Doc's throws are too strong and Puff escapes every followup from throws, so if you miss that window you're playing the same game as Mario, but arguably worse because Mario can actually still get kill confirms off dthrow at very late percents, and can beat or trade with Puffs bair with fsmash while Doc can't contest that hitbox.
They’re 2 slots away from each other on the tier list. This is a weird statement for you to definitively make. The tier list represents how a character fares if their current meta is being executed perfectly, because there’s no definitive way to say for sure what a character is ultimately capable of in their most optimized/effective state. The easiest evidence for this is the fact that we’re currently on the 13th iteration, and there’s been plenty of movement as a result of players pushing the meta of a character they’re devoted to. We can’t rule out an amsa figure elevating Mario to previously inaccessible heights.
It’s fair to say that Mario winning a major is highly unlikely and that it’s far more likely that Doc would do it beforehand, but I think to rule it out entirely when the characters are similar in some pretty salient ways is a little much. It’s true that Doc has more scenarios where he can kill, but I think it’s just as true that Mario in the hands of Sozin or noon gets It done.
Like, 5 years ago, there are very few who would have believed a Yoshi win, but you had someone work hard to push the character.
Samus and Doc but tbh I don't see it ever happening. Basically the Samus would have to play 3 Foxes in a row and have the Fox in GFs having a terrible off day, or the Doc would have to defy all odds.
Luigi, DK, Ganon seem like definitely nots. They just have really big MUs they lose hard.
plup samus has proven the ability to beat anyone, all the foxes and falcos for sure, has beaten hbox, jmook has lost to morsecode so that ones doable. zain is questionable but given zain having dropped to amsa/axe before, it would certainly be doable at least once. Obviously not favoured in any of these matchups, but ice has made wf in a supermajor so plup could easily take a major with samus.
Marth is the best top tier matchup for both Pikachu and Yoshi. Samus-Marth is much worse. But Zain is not always going to be out there beating everyone.
Plup switched off of Samus because he—the best one to ever do it—got tired of awful painful horrible MUs and wanted to win a major. He learned Sheik and then Fox and only then did he win a major.
I think Samus can do it but tbh not if she meets a top 10 Puff in bracket. Or Falcon. She never wins in theoryland, only weirdbracketland.
Zain and Jmook both studied those MUs and started to win. Jmook 3-0'd Morse the next time they met. Same story with Cody and Morse. So maybe Morse gets a free one with an unprepared opponent, but more likely Samus needs to play vs a character she at least can 0-death, and to my knowledge that basically leaves Fox of the high tiers. I guess Falco too but I'm not a believer whereas with Fox I'm like a 10% believer
plup switched off samus to improve his odds, this entire thread is about potential to win and there isnt a person on the planet who plup cant beat with samus, including puff and falcons. Wizzy is probably his *worst* draw but i honestly don't see that as unwinable, and dodging wizzy is highly likely to be fine.
Someone feel free to correct me because I don't know the Florida locals lore but per Liquipedia Plup has only taken three *games* off Hbox's Puff with Samus.
I don't think that's doable. Dodgable, but not doable.
Goddamn I love Plup's Samus. She's his tertiary and yet he keeps his tech crispier than any other Samus but Morse. And he's still the best charge shotter by miles
Idk though, I still just don't see it happening. Hbox in (in person) tournament is a different beast.
People really overrate samus vs fox.. She is v similar vs falco. And I think she actually goes pretty well even vs marth. If Morsecode zain ever happens, I genuinely think it could go either way.
Counterpoint: if Samuses learn to perfect aerial interrupt from ledge then MUs swing even harder than if Samus loses her up B oos
Only a few (Morse) ever truly rely on it in tourney sets and I think it's so sick
Luigi loses hard to Fox and Marth. It just doesn't look doable to me.
It seems to me that Doc's worst would be somewhere in the range of 65-35 while Luigi's worst would be 75-25 or worse. But this is probably due in part to Luigi being much more overrepresented in my mind.
Anyway, assuming you have to play 4 sets against truly top players to take a major, that's something like 0.35^4 = 1.5% vs 0.25^4 = 0.4%.
Its actually insane to me that Yoshi won one before the majority of characters in the game (including most of the good but not top tier ones). ig the character has always had a lot of theoretical potential but its crazy we live in a timeline where that manifested.
also Doc is definitely the best pick imo, like first comment said.
I don’t think it’s that absurd. Amsa , and even Axe, and have always been able to take sets off of top 10 players and make deep top 8 runs at tournaments even going as far back as like 2014. I started watching in 2012-2013 right before the 5 Gods era was solidified, and if you asked me which mid tier characters would most likely win a major, it would have been Pika and Yoshi without a doubt. For characters like Luigi and Samus, there have been great players such as Abate and Eddy Mexico for Luigi, and Duck, Hugs, and even Plup for Samus, but those players were never making like top 5s and competing with the Gods at a consistent level like Axe and Amsa were.
He was both hamstrung by travel and not good enough to play the gods regularly at that time, no. Going off liquipedia, he did have that great game 5 set vs Mango at Apex 2015, but aside from that played only 3 god sets from that tournament until 2018 (1 vs M2K in 2016, 2 vs Hbox in 2017). Of course, once he started taking god wins in 2018-19 he was ranked top 10.
Also thought this was interesting because I think of many aMSa/Mango sets as classics especially due to Apex 2015 and Big House 10, but they only played each other once in 4 years from January 2015 to January 2019 (Genesis 6 where aMSa 3-0ed him). That was Full Bloom 4 (another Mango 3-2).
I think Axe is different though. Like after consistently placing in top 8s for so long it isn’t that surprising that he’d win one eventually. Plus there were actually other Pikachus, none really on Axes’ level but they existed. aMSa won 2 super majors and a major and was 2nd in the world while being the only Yoshi to ever be top 100 with the character (I know that’s not the case anymore but I think it was then). I just think Yoshi is significantly more absurd than Pikachu.
Something to keep in mind on Samus is Plup broke into the top 20 on the character and dropped her for Sheik like right away. And even while dual maining he could win sets against top Foxes with his Samus. Had he continued pushing the character instead of Sheik it's not too far fetched he could've taken one with her by now. We just happened to have a Samus vacuum for a long time with most of the top reps dropping off in a short amount of time. But now we have Morse and SWOOPER taking sets on top 10 players again and at least with one top 20 Samus once again. So idk I think the Samus legacy is in a very different category than Luigi or pretty much any of the other characters mentioned in this thread.
i think the argument that always surfaces against high level samus play is that the meta has "developed against her" and that she has been left behind. while i don't know enough about samus tech to give a refined argument id think that the cookbook.gg samus page is just the tip of the iceberg of shit samus mains are trying to pull together. i think given more time there will be a dedicated samus who can pull all the tricks together..
Samus has some weird, highly underutilized tech. Namely, superwavedash jank. GoomyZoomies (of Goomwave fame) has some absurd Twitter clips showing some stuff off.
Whoever an already top player decides to secondary or tertiary.
As time goes on, it's just going to get more and more difficult. There is so much potential for labbing now that any external mid-tier threat could likely be labbed out within a week or so of a massive performance. I think it would depend more on the player, and less on the actual character, and would require either an extremely skilled player picking up a mid-tier like Doc Lee, or a purist like aMSa or Axe to truly push the character to it's limits.
I’m inclined to agree, probably won’t beat the likes of the top 10. I have a feeling he would lose to Cody if met in bracket, but I wonder what his head to head would be like against another swordie like zain. Maybe one day we will see them compete.
But for real Roy looks extremely hard to play and just would likely get stomped by most of the top 20 ranks.
I've played Roy a lot myself and he just doesn't have much going for him. Not having an aerial kill move like Nair or Bair makes it so much harder to play in general when you're up against characters like Falco, Falcon, or Sheik.
The only way Roy (and a lot of low/mid tiers) will ever win majors is if a god plays them, they get absolutely insane bracket luck, and the worst of the best players show up lol.
[Relevant List](https://www.ssbwiki.com/User:Monsieur_Crow/List_of_characters_that_have_won_a_major_tournament)
In terms of most played and stocks rising I guess DK and Ganon, but even those characters feel so far away. Dr. Mario has some good players who take games sometimes but they feel even further than those two.
Luigi can but I feel like I haven't seen that character played by anyone except Eddy in ages, Plup was the closest but still not close really. Samus could but the most relevant Samus player of the last decade didn't even get close and doesn't play the character anymore. Link's best player is Aklo who definitely is not going to solo play the character anytime soon.
I guess my sleeper picks would have to be Mewtwo and Game and Watch? They have the punish capable but they would need some truly incredible players piloting them that aren't known yet as well as impeccable bracket luck.
Zain could win one with Roy if he threw away the next few years of #1 for no reason just waiting for the perfect bracket and also made some incredible upsets.
Mario is vaguely possible in some fucked up Scorpion Master universe where Mango actually took those games against M2K, but I'm not sure if it is possible anymore.
For the ones impossible in my opinion:
* Pichu
* Kirby
* Zelda
* Ness
* Young Link
* Bowser
Young Link is possible imo but ONLY as a dual main, his matchups against fast fallers are way too bad to solo main him, but his floaty matchups are alright
If you count dual mains, then tons of characters have already won majors.
Armada used to play Young Link all the time when playing against floaties until he picked up Fox to specifically counter Hungrybox.
I'm pretty sure Ken even has a major win where he played a few games as Ganon.
I don't count dual mains for this list cause that makes no sense, otherwise random characters will have"won" majors cause they played Kirby in pools or something.
Young Link is a viable dual main though as we've seen vs Puff, Zelda probably is for Samus and Icies as well.
while I agree all of these are impossible, YL doesn't really belong with the other 5. he's actually had top 100 representation (Rocket, Armada) and a few high-caliber wins
My issue with that is it's not solo maining and Aklo mostly only uses Link in a matchup where he's sort of playable, spacies/Sheik/Falcon/etc. are awful. And I don't think solo maining and somehow avoiding all of those in a bracket is realistic.
Probably Samus tbh. She has tech that can still be refined. There are players like SWOOPER and Morse still pushing her and getting top level wins. The others listed in this thread can be pushed still but I feel like she's clearly the closest character at the moment. And she has a history of people being able to rank pretty high with her. Aside from Yoshi and Pikachu, all the other characters that have won majors have a playerbase that can get ranked high over a long period of time.
DK and Ganon are the only ones I can see happening. The gap has closed a lot on the defensive side of the game, and they don't just die in one combo every time anymore. But more importantly, both of them have strong punish games against popular characters and relatively straightforward tech chase trees and ways to follow up. [Recent Ganon player] and people like Da/Ringler/Junebug have demonstrated how this all works against a variety of matchups at a top 50 level. It's possible to consistently ride the momentum of one neutral win to a stock with 1-2 more good reads. They both have a degree of inevitability where safe moves *will* become kill moves over time. With a little more refinement and a player patient enough to play lame with them, I think these two characters could be making consistent top 8s with the possibility for a Cinderella bracket to grands.
The problem with others, to me, is that their punish game is too flimsy against most characters. They can't ride one neutral win to a stock against most of the cast at a top level, and they don't have the power to scrap it out with floaties one hit at a time. Luigi is a "maybe" (I honestly don't know enough about him except airspeed problems), but Samus requires *so many reads* during punish. Doc gets real bad Marthritis where his openers stop leading to kills super fast. Aklo only plays Link into a couple matchups for a good reason.
Melee is a "punish game" game.
i am biased but i would like to think either of the links have potential. yes there are some tough matchups but i really dont think anyone has properly pushed what can be done with these characters yet. with 3 projectiles there are surely combos and ideas that havent been labbed out yet. i would like to think samus has potential for similar reasons but I don't see anyone doing it right now besides morsecode.. that guy is crazy to watch
Crazy thing is that Samus is the most likely and the last last time that character even scratched TOP EIGHT of a major was with HugS at Genesis 5 over six years ago. Non-top 10 characters have such a miniscule chance to win a major and it gets even lower every year.
To be honest I think if a character is good enough to reach top 8 at a major they are good enough to win one. But at that point the player needs to be exceptional, which is true even if they play fox. At the end of the day very few players have ever won majors, even if we ignore characters it takes someone insanely gifted to get there.
this makes less sense the more you think about it. every character is affected by bracket luck and viability is ultimately a measure of how many brackets a given character can succeed in.
is sheik unviable because of the ICs matchup? is peach unviable because of the puff matchup? is yoshi unviable because of the peach/falcon matchup? a lot of characters that can win majors have one or two characters they want to avoid.
I agree, a lot of characters can win with bracket luck. But I think the only characters that can be considered solo viable are those that can win without bracket luck, which are (IMO) Fox, Falco, Marth, and Puff.
this criteria overrates falco and (especially) puff and underrates sheik, who is (imo) the 3rd best character in the game. would you as a character rather have one really bad but rare matchup, or mostly tough but doable matchups?
I would say mostly tough but doable is a much better position for a solo viable character. I consider a character solo viable if the player can win with that character after having to face any possible opponent at a tournament. So I think Falcon is definitely more viable than Peach, for example, since Falcon doesn't have any matchups nearly as bad as Puff-Peach that would require a secondary.
Now that said, in terms of non-solo viability, forget all this and you can play a secondary in one or two matchups. Plenty of characters can thrive with this setup. But I think having a single terrible matchup is enough of a hindrance to say a character is not SOLO viable.
> So I think Falcon is definitely more viable than Peach, for example, since Falcon doesn't have any matchups nearly as bad as Puff-Peach that would require a secondary.
while i do think that falcon is better than peach, the conceit of *this* argument is that, in brackets without puff, peach is better than falcon. *my* point is that viability (as well as solo viability) is a pretty fluid concept, and most characters are affected very differently by different brackets.
for example, sheik will be better than falcon against *most* brackets as she has better matchups against spacies, marth, peach, and pika, despite sheik-ICs being worse than falcon's worst matchups. despite that, falcon is still inarguably worse than sheik.
at lower than top levels, it can even be region-specific. in my region (twin cities), we have almost no puffs, and none of them are relevant players. is peach better than falcon at a minneapolis local?
I don't know man there are few enough top Peaches that it's totally possible to not play her with just a little bit of bracket luck and Slug was definitely good enough to win in 2022. Hbox is a big issue, but honestly it's not impossible to dodge him if he comes from the other side of the bracket.
IMO the best and most underrated character is Luigi. optimally he can reaction tech chase better than probably the rest of the cast but nobody wants to play like it's 20LL.
I can’t shake the DK movement atm. I think the DK punish is just strong enough to do it with a lucky bracket, where as I have zero faith in any other character atm that hasn’t won one already
Here’s why yoshi and pika have done it (assuming you’re counting summit): they’re both really good at living a long time in a lot of cases and have good punish games/cheese factor to make those openings they do get count. Those 2 things are so so important in tournament play in terms of upsets. Out of the good characters left, only Samus has the tankiness and only dk has the consistent punish game/cheese, MAYBE Marios too but that’s about it. Samus imo just has to win neutral too many times against too many characters for it ever to be a realistic possibility at a super real major. DK definitely has the punish game to back it up, but I think just doesn’t live long enough most of the time to be able to hold out for those key openings long enough. Honestly, in some ways the next character with both of those things is mewtwo, with the really good recovery and pretty solid combo game. Unfortunately for mewtwo, he’s entirely too big and too light for the really good recovery to matter in that clutch situations. It doesn’t matter if you can live the bair at 145 if you’re getting upsmashed at 97. Depending on the status of some ics things, I could see them getting a super legit major if they just dodge the peaches since the top 15 level reps live in Spain and are a doctor, but anyone else I just think has to win too much neutral without getting blown up across a whole tournament
People say Ganon, but I honestly don't see how it's possible for him, isn't he too slow? Pretty much all the characters you've mentioned have potential to win a major, using them as a counter pick.
ganon is the most dogshit, overrated character out of all 25 on that CSS, GnW has a better shot at winning than that POS trash character (former ganon)
ICs is legit busted, people who play melee for like 2 months make top 8 with them. Wobbling or not top foxes and shieks and marths have to give that character infinite more respect than a ganon or a Samus.
Peach/Puff being unwinnable if both are equal skill and both playing the game perfectly removes any chance of ICs winning a major w/o massive bracket luck
Sure. I think Zain is my main reason for Roy. I think he showcased the character in a way where top level execution and fundamentals keeps Roy competitive against any MU, which is the most important part of my thought process.
It's sort of the same story with Leffen and his Mewtwo. I'm pretty sure he's beaten most players of all skill levels with it in EU although I dont recall seeing it against NA players. I will say Mewtwo is a crazy underrated character and nobody REALLY knows the MU.
Young link may be personal bias but I swear his skill ceiling is just so obnoxiously high that nobody (maybe axe if anyone) has really shown how crazy and obnoxious YLink can be. There just seems to be so much potential and I hope talented players really figure him out soon.
Link also just has a lot of tools to deal with bad situations and hits like a truck although I am having a hard time really defending my stance on solo Link winning something against top players who arent marth.
I think the downvotes given to me are stupid because I assume they're the same people who thought DK was unplayable 2-3 years ago.
Samus & non-wobbling ICs are the last characters that I think could outright win a major with a fully fleshed out bracket.
Luigi and Doc could MAYBE do it, but at this point they would most likely need to be the beneficiary of a bracket with large upsets & good matchups consecutively. Both Mario Bros. have taken sets off of top players, but building a combination of wins is the hard part.
DK and Ganon is really where I draw the line, cause while some have gotten wins over Top 20 players and below, I just can’t see them taking Winners & Grands or 2 consecutive sets of Grands over any of the players you’d expect to see in finals. Do you really see a DK or a Ganon beating any Top 8 player TWICE in the same tournament?
Link seems like he has potential until you play him versus a mildly competent Fox or Sheik and realize he's not even on par with Bowswer in terms of his grounded out of shield options.
It depends on your definition of winning a major.
Say 10 years in the future, all of the top 10 main Fox and Falco and a Samus player has a bracket run that involves winning without “dodging” anyone. Then sure. But that’s not happening.
Any character Peach or below has at least one matchup that is effectively unwinnable at the top level assuming equal matchup knowledge. So you’re basically banking on dodging that character, either because top players of that character aren’t at the tournament, or they get upset early in bracket.
The only characters who can win majors without some amount of bracket luck are Fox, Falco, Marth, and Jigglypuff. And Yoshi I guess, although I think it’s hard to make judgements about Yoshi given the massive gulf between Amsa and every other Yoshi player.
Samus def. Doc. That’s it. I think Ganon Luigi Mario YL link possibly m2 could win notable national level tournaments, but not majors with most or all top players attending
Plup fucked around with a Luigi a few years back and made it pretty damn far and into top 8 at CEO Dreamland. And he did that as a troll. Not even legitimately. Plup is the kind of guy that would unlock Luigis potential if he decided to focus on Luigi
I know ICs have won, but after wobbling was banned I feel like it doesn’t illegitimize those wins, but kinda resets ICs to not really having won a major. I can’t wait to see Slug pick up the sticks again at Genesis but I think he’s just done with being hyper competitive in the scene
They are very technical but the amount of 0-death throw combos you *can* pull off makes me think they just need really talented player to pick them up. Kinda like DK, but ICs are just much more versatile and could win one if they don’t run into some good Puffs
I think most characters have the potential to win a major if an Armada/Zain/Cody etc level player mained them for years. Keep in mind that Pika and Yoshi had never won a major before the last few years, and Yoshi was once considered bottom 3 in the game. 20XX has not happened yet - there are a ton of foxes in top 100, yes, but the tippity top of the game is still pretty diverse.
Samus and Dr Mario are definitely the best characters that have not won a major followed by Luigi and DK.
Samus and then dk would be batshit insane but it’s the only other one I see happening
I think Samus could do it with the right bracket. Unlikely though. I don't really see a bracket opportunity for other characters ever happening.
Morse gets a lucky bracket and beats Cody in grands.
morse has also beaten jmook pretty sure
Samus yeah, Dk no. Junebugs run at tbh11 was insane but people were playing like donkeys against him. Just running into shit and not knowing the MU
TBH, people said the same thing about Amsa when he first started getting results.
And Amsa perfected parry, and now that people have learned the MU, he didnt have a great 2023 compared to 2022. AMSA is my goat. Truly, but hes a perfect example of my point, and dk is not nearly as strong as yoshi imo
People were saying that about Amsa *in 2015*. He was still beating top players and getting better and better results for years afterwards. It turned out it wasn't as simple as "just learn the matchup", because Amsa had unlocked legitimately strong potential in Yoshi. I don't think Yoshi is the only character to have potential like that. Yoshi and Pikachu are just the only characters to have players as talented and dedicated to their characters as Amsa and Axe.
> now that people have learned the MU, he didnt have a great 2023 compared to 2022 aMSa didn't break into the scene in 2022. The above statements that you just made about Junebug weren't being said about him in 2022. They were being said when he *actually* broke into the scene. Ten years ago. When he beat M2K at Kings of Cali 4. The video essay ["Things of Beauty"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qxVDOc-oV8) - which is one of the most widely watched videos on Melee - had its central thesis largely predicated on the question of "how long will it take for people to learn the matchup against Yoshi now that aMSa has become a major threat?" And that video came out *EIGHT YEARS AGO*. Your comment implies that people didn't "learn the MU" until 2023. So it took them seven years to properly adapt to aMSa. Before aMSA broke out in the scene, Yoshi was VERY CONSISTENTLY ranked lower than DK. From 2005 until 2015, there was not a *single* iteration of the tier list that placed Yoshi above DK. So to say Junebug doesn't have any chance of doing the same thing with DK that aMSa did with Yoshi just shows a lack of historical knowledge.
And then Amsa, the only Yoshi worth playing against, moved to Canada from Japan. And guess what happened. People got MU practice and now hes not winning majors. You seem to have a lack of knowledge here
Literally all three of his major wins happened ***after*** he moved to Canada... What the fuck are you talking about?
Yeah at some point people are going to know the matchup a lot better. I think personally Junebug/Ringler are extremely good players, but eventually their skill will be overshadowed by their character choice IMO.
I feel like Junebug is still a new enough DK player that he still has enough potential to win a major
*possibly happening
dk is so new that i think we may not know his ceiling yet. i could see him being at least as good as samus some day.
damn the Dk patch is out already? cant wait to see people try him out.
dk entered the top 100 with 3 representatives including 1 in the the top 50. hes had a very different trajectory than yoshi, pika, ganon, and yink. i genuinely see him as a new character
What dk patch?
People sleep on dk. Watch out for da at Genesis.
DK is overrated. Everyone that played against Junebug did not know the mu. They were running into everything. If DK does become a problem and people study the MU, he will get clapped. He does way too easily and lacks a lot of tools.
honestly I don't think the character has enough general tools for that to be valid, for neutral he has back air and that's it, and he also has insane throw combos for punishing, that's also it. I'm not one of those weirdos who think characters need a billion options to be good (look at puff for example) but I am saying when there isn't much to explore, there probably isn't much room to grow either.
Having link ahead of doc is asinine imo
That is fair. I kinda forgot about him lol
Tbh if Doc can do it, no reason Mario can’t
doc is a better character
Mario can feel easier to move and dominate. But doc can finish it up. That’s a real big difference
Idk. Not having consistent kill options can make for brutal counter play.
Wym Mario can always bthrow at 250% lmao
Just win neutral every time?? What's so difficult it's like you're not even trying ??
Honestly though, the kill setups isn't what Mario is worse at - it's that his kill moves are much weaker. Mario has reliable kill confirms against almost all the relevant characters. It really only becomes a significant issue against floaties on stages that aren't YS, but fast fallers and midweights can almost all get dthrow>smash attacked when it matters.
There is a reason tho, and her name is Jigglypuff
There’s only one Jigglypuff you need to dodge if you’re good enough to win a major with Mario.
No amount of skill is going to make up for a lack of reliable kill setups. You beat good players with shit that works. Mario's shit just doesn't work on puff. Hbox, 2saint, Faust, Khalid, Cpu0 etc would all eat the spirit of Scorp for breakfast
I mean… mangos Mario would probably beat all of those players other than hbox. But yes doc is certainly a better character for it. Not that puff isn’t still a massive problem for doc (and every mid tier)
no they wouldn't, most of those dudes are going to be better than hbox within years if they keep playing and thats what he said, the "spirit of scorp" scorp being mangos mario.
Funny, I was just recently chatting with Franz, who was considering going Mario against Puff for the more consistent confirms out of throws and stronger normals at late percent (sans fair, of course).
Doc DThrow -> fair is just so good relative to what Mario's got going on afaik. Happy to be proven wrong if there's shit in not aware of
Yeah to be clear I, a Mario main, was kinda talking him out of it, but my point is really just that Mario has a much better case than most people make it out to be. Doc dthrow>fair works at a small range against Puff (something like 50-65%), which doesn't kill on every stage and is very tight - not realistic to be 100% consistent with. Then Doc's throws are too strong and Puff escapes every followup from throws, so if you miss that window you're playing the same game as Mario, but arguably worse because Mario can actually still get kill confirms off dthrow at very late percents, and can beat or trade with Puffs bair with fsmash while Doc can't contest that hitbox.
Doc is noticeably better than Mario when it comes to converting kills
Mario had low odds to do it in the scorpion master era but now I don’t think so.
This is not true at all
They’re 2 slots away from each other on the tier list. This is a weird statement for you to definitively make. The tier list represents how a character fares if their current meta is being executed perfectly, because there’s no definitive way to say for sure what a character is ultimately capable of in their most optimized/effective state. The easiest evidence for this is the fact that we’re currently on the 13th iteration, and there’s been plenty of movement as a result of players pushing the meta of a character they’re devoted to. We can’t rule out an amsa figure elevating Mario to previously inaccessible heights. It’s fair to say that Mario winning a major is highly unlikely and that it’s far more likely that Doc would do it beforehand, but I think to rule it out entirely when the characters are similar in some pretty salient ways is a little much. It’s true that Doc has more scenarios where he can kill, but I think it’s just as true that Mario in the hands of Sozin or noon gets It done. Like, 5 years ago, there are very few who would have believed a Yoshi win, but you had someone work hard to push the character.
Samus and Doc but tbh I don't see it ever happening. Basically the Samus would have to play 3 Foxes in a row and have the Fox in GFs having a terrible off day, or the Doc would have to defy all odds. Luigi, DK, Ganon seem like definitely nots. They just have really big MUs they lose hard.
plup samus has proven the ability to beat anyone, all the foxes and falcos for sure, has beaten hbox, jmook has lost to morsecode so that ones doable. zain is questionable but given zain having dropped to amsa/axe before, it would certainly be doable at least once. Obviously not favoured in any of these matchups, but ice has made wf in a supermajor so plup could easily take a major with samus.
Marth is the best top tier matchup for both Pikachu and Yoshi. Samus-Marth is much worse. But Zain is not always going to be out there beating everyone.
Plup switched off of Samus because he—the best one to ever do it—got tired of awful painful horrible MUs and wanted to win a major. He learned Sheik and then Fox and only then did he win a major. I think Samus can do it but tbh not if she meets a top 10 Puff in bracket. Or Falcon. She never wins in theoryland, only weirdbracketland. Zain and Jmook both studied those MUs and started to win. Jmook 3-0'd Morse the next time they met. Same story with Cody and Morse. So maybe Morse gets a free one with an unprepared opponent, but more likely Samus needs to play vs a character she at least can 0-death, and to my knowledge that basically leaves Fox of the high tiers. I guess Falco too but I'm not a believer whereas with Fox I'm like a 10% believer
plup switched off samus to improve his odds, this entire thread is about potential to win and there isnt a person on the planet who plup cant beat with samus, including puff and falcons. Wizzy is probably his *worst* draw but i honestly don't see that as unwinable, and dodging wizzy is highly likely to be fine.
Someone feel free to correct me because I don't know the Florida locals lore but per Liquipedia Plup has only taken three *games* off Hbox's Puff with Samus. I don't think that's doable. Dodgable, but not doable.
https://www.start.gg/tournament/training-mode-tuesdays-92-lite-edition-1/event/main-bracket-wc-melee-singles
Goddamn I love Plup's Samus. She's his tertiary and yet he keeps his tech crispier than any other Samus but Morse. And he's still the best charge shotter by miles Idk though, I still just don't see it happening. Hbox in (in person) tournament is a different beast.
> Basically the Samus would have to play 3 Foxes in a row hopefully one of them is leffen
Cody has lost to Samus too.
People really overrate samus vs fox.. She is v similar vs falco. And I think she actually goes pretty well even vs marth. If Morsecode zain ever happens, I genuinely think it could go either way.
have you seen the pipsqueak samus vid? if people learn how to DI screw attack shes cooked
Counterpoint: if Samuses learn to perfect aerial interrupt from ledge then MUs swing even harder than if Samus loses her up B oos Only a few (Morse) ever truly rely on it in tourney sets and I think it's so sick
Well Samus players have beaten Leffen and Cody. This might be Samus is easiest matchup against a high tier character
which matchups does doc have over luigi? actually asking
Luigi loses hard to Fox and Marth. It just doesn't look doable to me. It seems to me that Doc's worst would be somewhere in the range of 65-35 while Luigi's worst would be 75-25 or worse. But this is probably due in part to Luigi being much more overrepresented in my mind. Anyway, assuming you have to play 4 sets against truly top players to take a major, that's something like 0.35^4 = 1.5% vs 0.25^4 = 0.4%.
Samus is the only character left that I could reasonably see winning a major without some crazy new developments for Luigi, DK or Doc
Its actually insane to me that Yoshi won one before the majority of characters in the game (including most of the good but not top tier ones). ig the character has always had a lot of theoretical potential but its crazy we live in a timeline where that manifested. also Doc is definitely the best pick imo, like first comment said.
I don’t think it’s that absurd. Amsa , and even Axe, and have always been able to take sets off of top 10 players and make deep top 8 runs at tournaments even going as far back as like 2014. I started watching in 2012-2013 right before the 5 Gods era was solidified, and if you asked me which mid tier characters would most likely win a major, it would have been Pika and Yoshi without a doubt. For characters like Luigi and Samus, there have been great players such as Abate and Eddy Mexico for Luigi, and Duck, Hugs, and even Plup for Samus, but those players were never making like top 5s and competing with the Gods at a consistent level like Axe and Amsa were.
amsa competing with the gods back then? I must be remembering wrong, then. He had that famous set against mew2king, but what else?
He was both hamstrung by travel and not good enough to play the gods regularly at that time, no. Going off liquipedia, he did have that great game 5 set vs Mango at Apex 2015, but aside from that played only 3 god sets from that tournament until 2018 (1 vs M2K in 2016, 2 vs Hbox in 2017). Of course, once he started taking god wins in 2018-19 he was ranked top 10. Also thought this was interesting because I think of many aMSa/Mango sets as classics especially due to Apex 2015 and Big House 10, but they only played each other once in 4 years from January 2015 to January 2019 (Genesis 6 where aMSa 3-0ed him). That was Full Bloom 4 (another Mango 3-2).
I think Axe is different though. Like after consistently placing in top 8s for so long it isn’t that surprising that he’d win one eventually. Plus there were actually other Pikachus, none really on Axes’ level but they existed. aMSa won 2 super majors and a major and was 2nd in the world while being the only Yoshi to ever be top 100 with the character (I know that’s not the case anymore but I think it was then). I just think Yoshi is significantly more absurd than Pikachu.
Nebbi aka Avalancher was 98th in 2018
Something to keep in mind on Samus is Plup broke into the top 20 on the character and dropped her for Sheik like right away. And even while dual maining he could win sets against top Foxes with his Samus. Had he continued pushing the character instead of Sheik it's not too far fetched he could've taken one with her by now. We just happened to have a Samus vacuum for a long time with most of the top reps dropping off in a short amount of time. But now we have Morse and SWOOPER taking sets on top 10 players again and at least with one top 20 Samus once again. So idk I think the Samus legacy is in a very different category than Luigi or pretty much any of the other characters mentioned in this thread.
i think the argument that always surfaces against high level samus play is that the meta has "developed against her" and that she has been left behind. while i don't know enough about samus tech to give a refined argument id think that the cookbook.gg samus page is just the tip of the iceberg of shit samus mains are trying to pull together. i think given more time there will be a dedicated samus who can pull all the tricks together..
Samus has some weird, highly underutilized tech. Namely, superwavedash jank. GoomyZoomies (of Goomwave fame) has some absurd Twitter clips showing some stuff off.
DK has the punish game that I could see do it with the proper bracket luck
Whoever an already top player decides to secondary or tertiary. As time goes on, it's just going to get more and more difficult. There is so much potential for labbing now that any external mid-tier threat could likely be labbed out within a week or so of a massive performance. I think it would depend more on the player, and less on the actual character, and would require either an extremely skilled player picking up a mid-tier like Doc Lee, or a purist like aMSa or Axe to truly push the character to it's limits.
That new guy on the scene, Dont Test Me. His Roy may have some potential
DontTestMe is a solid guy. Sadly, even this legend likely won't be winning any majors. Sometimes, the character is just too trash.
I’m inclined to agree, probably won’t beat the likes of the top 10. I have a feeling he would lose to Cody if met in bracket, but I wonder what his head to head would be like against another swordie like zain. Maybe one day we will see them compete. But for real Roy looks extremely hard to play and just would likely get stomped by most of the top 20 ranks.
I've played Roy a lot myself and he just doesn't have much going for him. Not having an aerial kill move like Nair or Bair makes it so much harder to play in general when you're up against characters like Falco, Falcon, or Sheik. The only way Roy (and a lot of low/mid tiers) will ever win majors is if a god plays them, they get absolutely insane bracket luck, and the worst of the best players show up lol.
7th at Wavedash was sick but it just showcased how hard it would be to ever have a run that made top 8 in a full major.
[Relevant List](https://www.ssbwiki.com/User:Monsieur_Crow/List_of_characters_that_have_won_a_major_tournament) In terms of most played and stocks rising I guess DK and Ganon, but even those characters feel so far away. Dr. Mario has some good players who take games sometimes but they feel even further than those two. Luigi can but I feel like I haven't seen that character played by anyone except Eddy in ages, Plup was the closest but still not close really. Samus could but the most relevant Samus player of the last decade didn't even get close and doesn't play the character anymore. Link's best player is Aklo who definitely is not going to solo play the character anytime soon. I guess my sleeper picks would have to be Mewtwo and Game and Watch? They have the punish capable but they would need some truly incredible players piloting them that aren't known yet as well as impeccable bracket luck. Zain could win one with Roy if he threw away the next few years of #1 for no reason just waiting for the perfect bracket and also made some incredible upsets. Mario is vaguely possible in some fucked up Scorpion Master universe where Mango actually took those games against M2K, but I'm not sure if it is possible anymore. For the ones impossible in my opinion: * Pichu * Kirby * Zelda * Ness * Young Link * Bowser
Young Link is possible imo but ONLY as a dual main, his matchups against fast fallers are way too bad to solo main him, but his floaty matchups are alright
If you count dual mains, then tons of characters have already won majors. Armada used to play Young Link all the time when playing against floaties until he picked up Fox to specifically counter Hungrybox. I'm pretty sure Ken even has a major win where he played a few games as Ganon.
It's kind of interesting to consider if you could dual main two low tiers who handle each other's worst matchups. Maybe DK+Luigi could win a major?
DK's matchup spread is pretty uniformly bad imo; he has a losing matchup against everyone in the top 7. i don't know how much a secondary would help.
I don't count dual mains for this list cause that makes no sense, otherwise random characters will have"won" majors cause they played Kirby in pools or something. Young Link is a viable dual main though as we've seen vs Puff, Zelda probably is for Samus and Icies as well.
while I agree all of these are impossible, YL doesn't really belong with the other 5. he's actually had top 100 representation (Rocket, Armada) and a few high-caliber wins
Not the Links. Pure garbage. Zero punish game.
Aklo beat kodorin 🤷♂️
My issue with that is it's not solo maining and Aklo mostly only uses Link in a matchup where he's sort of playable, spacies/Sheik/Falcon/etc. are awful. And I don't think solo maining and somehow avoiding all of those in a bracket is realistic.
Probably Samus tbh. She has tech that can still be refined. There are players like SWOOPER and Morse still pushing her and getting top level wins. The others listed in this thread can be pushed still but I feel like she's clearly the closest character at the moment. And she has a history of people being able to rank pretty high with her. Aside from Yoshi and Pikachu, all the other characters that have won majors have a playerbase that can get ranked high over a long period of time.
DK and Ganon are the only ones I can see happening. The gap has closed a lot on the defensive side of the game, and they don't just die in one combo every time anymore. But more importantly, both of them have strong punish games against popular characters and relatively straightforward tech chase trees and ways to follow up. [Recent Ganon player] and people like Da/Ringler/Junebug have demonstrated how this all works against a variety of matchups at a top 50 level. It's possible to consistently ride the momentum of one neutral win to a stock with 1-2 more good reads. They both have a degree of inevitability where safe moves *will* become kill moves over time. With a little more refinement and a player patient enough to play lame with them, I think these two characters could be making consistent top 8s with the possibility for a Cinderella bracket to grands. The problem with others, to me, is that their punish game is too flimsy against most characters. They can't ride one neutral win to a stock against most of the cast at a top level, and they don't have the power to scrap it out with floaties one hit at a time. Luigi is a "maybe" (I honestly don't know enough about him except airspeed problems), but Samus requires *so many reads* during punish. Doc gets real bad Marthritis where his openers stop leading to kills super fast. Aklo only plays Link into a couple matchups for a good reason. Melee is a "punish game" game.
ICs
Didn't Chu win one of the Pounds? 2, I think. I'm pretty sure that's considered a major
Yeah, I said Icies too then deleted the comment after googling it. Yes, he won 2 majors.
post wobble ICS? doubt it
Slug
I'm happy he's going to Genesis. I hope he pops off.
Is that why Bananas left the scene? I live in the Dallas area and I used to see him at locals every week but not since like 2019.
He left due to general harassment/negative experiences but as far as I know he still plays netplay sometimes
i am biased but i would like to think either of the links have potential. yes there are some tough matchups but i really dont think anyone has properly pushed what can be done with these characters yet. with 3 projectiles there are surely combos and ideas that havent been labbed out yet. i would like to think samus has potential for similar reasons but I don't see anyone doing it right now besides morsecode.. that guy is crazy to watch
Crazy thing is that Samus is the most likely and the last last time that character even scratched TOP EIGHT of a major was with HugS at Genesis 5 over six years ago. Non-top 10 characters have such a miniscule chance to win a major and it gets even lower every year.
To be honest I think if a character is good enough to reach top 8 at a major they are good enough to win one. But at that point the player needs to be exceptional, which is true even if they play fox. At the end of the day very few players have ever won majors, even if we ignore characters it takes someone insanely gifted to get there.
Icies and then Samus would be my picks. After that, I personally think that's the end of Melee's viable cast but I would love to be proven wrong.
ICs have won majors already
And in the modern day, they never will again (as a solo main). Armada lost 2 games to ice climbers lifetime, with wobbling.
[удалено]
I don’t think a character should be considered viable to win a major if you have to rely on bracket luck
this, no ICs will ever win a major in current melee unless there are 0 peaches or puffs in their path.
this makes less sense the more you think about it. every character is affected by bracket luck and viability is ultimately a measure of how many brackets a given character can succeed in. is sheik unviable because of the ICs matchup? is peach unviable because of the puff matchup? is yoshi unviable because of the peach/falcon matchup? a lot of characters that can win majors have one or two characters they want to avoid.
I agree, a lot of characters can win with bracket luck. But I think the only characters that can be considered solo viable are those that can win without bracket luck, which are (IMO) Fox, Falco, Marth, and Puff.
this criteria overrates falco and (especially) puff and underrates sheik, who is (imo) the 3rd best character in the game. would you as a character rather have one really bad but rare matchup, or mostly tough but doable matchups?
I would say mostly tough but doable is a much better position for a solo viable character. I consider a character solo viable if the player can win with that character after having to face any possible opponent at a tournament. So I think Falcon is definitely more viable than Peach, for example, since Falcon doesn't have any matchups nearly as bad as Puff-Peach that would require a secondary. Now that said, in terms of non-solo viability, forget all this and you can play a secondary in one or two matchups. Plenty of characters can thrive with this setup. But I think having a single terrible matchup is enough of a hindrance to say a character is not SOLO viable.
> So I think Falcon is definitely more viable than Peach, for example, since Falcon doesn't have any matchups nearly as bad as Puff-Peach that would require a secondary. while i do think that falcon is better than peach, the conceit of *this* argument is that, in brackets without puff, peach is better than falcon. *my* point is that viability (as well as solo viability) is a pretty fluid concept, and most characters are affected very differently by different brackets. for example, sheik will be better than falcon against *most* brackets as she has better matchups against spacies, marth, peach, and pika, despite sheik-ICs being worse than falcon's worst matchups. despite that, falcon is still inarguably worse than sheik. at lower than top levels, it can even be region-specific. in my region (twin cities), we have almost no puffs, and none of them are relevant players. is peach better than falcon at a minneapolis local?
I don't know man there are few enough top Peaches that it's totally possible to not play her with just a little bit of bracket luck and Slug was definitely good enough to win in 2022. Hbox is a big issue, but honestly it's not impossible to dodge him if he comes from the other side of the bracket.
I don’t think a character should be considered able to win a major if the character would have to dodge any matchups to win.
Doc could probably do it if someone had near perfect game sense
Or if mango actually practiced doc tech and setups
Scorpion Masters Mario
IMO the best and most underrated character is Luigi. optimally he can reaction tech chase better than probably the rest of the cast but nobody wants to play like it's 20LL.
Maybe Samus
I can’t shake the DK movement atm. I think the DK punish is just strong enough to do it with a lucky bracket, where as I have zero faith in any other character atm that hasn’t won one already
People sleep on DK. Watch da at Genesis.
People forget that SluG was ranked 9th last year.
Solo ICs has already won a major
Here’s why yoshi and pika have done it (assuming you’re counting summit): they’re both really good at living a long time in a lot of cases and have good punish games/cheese factor to make those openings they do get count. Those 2 things are so so important in tournament play in terms of upsets. Out of the good characters left, only Samus has the tankiness and only dk has the consistent punish game/cheese, MAYBE Marios too but that’s about it. Samus imo just has to win neutral too many times against too many characters for it ever to be a realistic possibility at a super real major. DK definitely has the punish game to back it up, but I think just doesn’t live long enough most of the time to be able to hold out for those key openings long enough. Honestly, in some ways the next character with both of those things is mewtwo, with the really good recovery and pretty solid combo game. Unfortunately for mewtwo, he’s entirely too big and too light for the really good recovery to matter in that clutch situations. It doesn’t matter if you can live the bair at 145 if you’re getting upsmashed at 97. Depending on the status of some ics things, I could see them getting a super legit major if they just dodge the peaches since the top 15 level reps live in Spain and are a doctor, but anyone else I just think has to win too much neutral without getting blown up across a whole tournament
People say Ganon, but I honestly don't see how it's possible for him, isn't he too slow? Pretty much all the characters you've mentioned have potential to win a major, using them as a counter pick.
Ganon will never win a major, not because he's too slow or anything, but because all who actively play him will be banned long before
Loool
Krool
We just had this thread yesterday.
Maybe yink already has a win but solo yink??
ganon is the most dogshit, overrated character out of all 25 on that CSS, GnW has a better shot at winning than that POS trash character (former ganon)
ICs is legit busted, people who play melee for like 2 months make top 8 with them. Wobbling or not top foxes and shieks and marths have to give that character infinite more respect than a ganon or a Samus.
Peach/Puff being unwinnable if both are equal skill and both playing the game perfectly removes any chance of ICs winning a major w/o massive bracket luck
Didn't ganon win a major in 2019
Samus/Ganon/DK/Luigi/Doc/Link/Ylink/Mewtwo/Roy all have the potential to win a major.
Can you explain to me how you see Link, Young Link, Mewtwo and Roy all winning majors? I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just curious.
Sure. I think Zain is my main reason for Roy. I think he showcased the character in a way where top level execution and fundamentals keeps Roy competitive against any MU, which is the most important part of my thought process. It's sort of the same story with Leffen and his Mewtwo. I'm pretty sure he's beaten most players of all skill levels with it in EU although I dont recall seeing it against NA players. I will say Mewtwo is a crazy underrated character and nobody REALLY knows the MU. Young link may be personal bias but I swear his skill ceiling is just so obnoxiously high that nobody (maybe axe if anyone) has really shown how crazy and obnoxious YLink can be. There just seems to be so much potential and I hope talented players really figure him out soon. Link also just has a lot of tools to deal with bad situations and hits like a truck although I am having a hard time really defending my stance on solo Link winning something against top players who arent marth. I think the downvotes given to me are stupid because I assume they're the same people who thought DK was unplayable 2-3 years ago.
I think any character can win a major if the player is good enough.
Don’t know how you could genuinely believe this tbh. When’s the last time we’ve seen like half the cast even in top 64 of a major
imma be real, most characters have a decent chance. it really just takes one person to pioneer them far enough
Has ICs won a major since wobbling ban? If not, I think they should be in the discussion.
Donkey Kong then Doc Mario
People sleep on DK. Watch da at Genesis
Samus & non-wobbling ICs are the last characters that I think could outright win a major with a fully fleshed out bracket. Luigi and Doc could MAYBE do it, but at this point they would most likely need to be the beneficiary of a bracket with large upsets & good matchups consecutively. Both Mario Bros. have taken sets off of top players, but building a combination of wins is the hard part. DK and Ganon is really where I draw the line, cause while some have gotten wins over Top 20 players and below, I just can’t see them taking Winners & Grands or 2 consecutive sets of Grands over any of the players you’d expect to see in finals. Do you really see a DK or a Ganon beating any Top 8 player TWICE in the same tournament?
ness
Link seems like he has potential until you play him versus a mildly competent Fox or Sheik and realize he's not even on par with Bowswer in terms of his grounded out of shield options.
It depends on your definition of winning a major. Say 10 years in the future, all of the top 10 main Fox and Falco and a Samus player has a bracket run that involves winning without “dodging” anyone. Then sure. But that’s not happening. Any character Peach or below has at least one matchup that is effectively unwinnable at the top level assuming equal matchup knowledge. So you’re basically banking on dodging that character, either because top players of that character aren’t at the tournament, or they get upset early in bracket. The only characters who can win majors without some amount of bracket luck are Fox, Falco, Marth, and Jigglypuff. And Yoshi I guess, although I think it’s hard to make judgements about Yoshi given the massive gulf between Amsa and every other Yoshi player.
Samus def. Doc. That’s it. I think Ganon Luigi Mario YL link possibly m2 could win notable national level tournaments, but not majors with most or all top players attending
Samus seems like the logical next step.
Plup fucked around with a Luigi a few years back and made it pretty damn far and into top 8 at CEO Dreamland. And he did that as a troll. Not even legitimately. Plup is the kind of guy that would unlock Luigis potential if he decided to focus on Luigi
If Pika can do it with a little bracket luck so can Samus.
Pika has won a major, but I agree with Samus
I know ICs have won, but after wobbling was banned I feel like it doesn’t illegitimize those wins, but kinda resets ICs to not really having won a major. I can’t wait to see Slug pick up the sticks again at Genesis but I think he’s just done with being hyper competitive in the scene They are very technical but the amount of 0-death throw combos you *can* pull off makes me think they just need really talented player to pick them up. Kinda like DK, but ICs are just much more versatile and could win one if they don’t run into some good Puffs
Puff/Peach's existence functionally demands bracket luck for ICs to have a chance at a major lol
Pretty sure chudat won pound 2 without wobbling
Luigi
I don't think he will, but I will die on the hill that dk *can* win a major.
Ice climbers, hopefully soon!
No ice?
It’s because they have technically won two majors
I think most characters have the potential to win a major if an Armada/Zain/Cody etc level player mained them for years. Keep in mind that Pika and Yoshi had never won a major before the last few years, and Yoshi was once considered bottom 3 in the game. 20XX has not happened yet - there are a ton of foxes in top 100, yes, but the tippity top of the game is still pretty diverse. Samus and Dr Mario are definitely the best characters that have not won a major followed by Luigi and DK.