More a personal preference than anything, but it would be nice if the late hitboxes of down air were stronger.

It's a giant robot falling on you, and it only does 4%? Not particularly worth using, especially when the move has considerable landing lag.

Oh, and maybe increase the hitbox size of nair just a tiiiiiiny bit to match the sprites a little better.


Not much else to add at the moment, apart from the fact that this character is damn fun.

The character doesn't seem like he can be balanced but, let's try i guess xD ( He's cool tho )
To start i'd say Fair's kill power is too strong, that needs to be nerfed.

Alright, so what I have for balance so far is:

Specific:
-Increase damage on D-air
-Increase hitbox for N-air
-Decrease knockback from F-air
-Decrease cooldown from F-special to D-special
-Decrease vertical movement from U-special slightly

General:
-Increase damage generally.
-Increase hitboxes generally.
-Increase combo potential, especially with aerials.

I'll try to patch that as soon as I can.

EDIT: Additional things added from external feedback.

Hi. I actually didn't have a problem with aerial combo potential so I'm surprised that's there. If dair is turned into a harder hitting move it should probably be slowed down a bit. Right now its another filler combo extension. He has very little range on the ground, which is probably intentional, but it might feel more impactful if he steps forwards during Fsmash, for instance.

Is it intended that needing to kill the ice block needs to be manually destroyed to use it again? Using side special while standing near the ice block could immediately destroy it for reuse, a bit like kragg rethrowing stone blocks.

Down special could have a use outside of pulling the ice block, such as a pseudoshine, or a pulling windbox, or a momentum brake. To be honest I'm not sure I'm using it right. It probably has more potential than I'm seeing.

In general I think he feels really good to play. He feels responsive and usually has diverse options. I've only played against cpus so far, and expect he may get juggled hard given his size, but I wouldn't call that a problem.

Just as a comment, his edgeguarding is excellent and a lot of fun, particularly double aerials off stage, though his recovery isn't high enough to make that very safe.

I find dair inconsistent. I can't tell when it will do a big hit vs a tiny poke. If other people agree maybe it could have a startup period and then always do a big hit.

In addition to what I said about Fstrong, things like jumping during Ustrong or having more exaggerated animations (wind up/follow through) could feel better. That's a lot of work though.

Fspecial seems like a really good projectile, but it's stopped from being used by the need of destroying it before using it again. I personally would make it so when you use it having already a block in the stage it is destroyed and the new one created. So it isn't so spammable i would put a cooldown of ~1sec on the move.

Dspecial, doesn't have an use outside of taking back the block, but you can't use the hitbox to extend a combo one while you do the first because of the long duration of the move and the little stun. I would maybe reduce the startup and make it jump cancellable so it can be used for more things and it's less unsafe.

Nspecial can only be used in my opinion to stop approachs from the front and maybe start a combo. This shouldn't start a combo, just put your opponent in a situation where they think it will happen so you can punish their bad decisions. Maybe you could add more endlag to the move the more missiles used. Also, you can't make a wall with them because when you double jump and use all, the first goes pretty high and the next ones goes so low your opponent can simply walk on a platform between them. Maybe reducing the time between shoots could make this situation a bit more dangerous for the opponent so they can't approach for free. Or instead of all this, you cound make the air version air-dodge-cancellable so you can use it in a short hop to approach with it or retreat covering a bit of space.

Also, the hurtboxes should be painted in green instead of red. This way it's easier to see both the hitboxes and the hurtboxes.

Thanks for the next round of feedback. Here's what I can gather:

-Have the F-special somehow reset the ice block. I can have it throw the ice block again.
-Have the F-Air hitbox angled up instead of down.
-Make the N-Special have a longer cooldown the more missiles used. Also make the N-Special able to be cancelled to an air dodge.
-Give a bit of momentum to F-Strong and U-Strong.
-Give the D-Special more general usage. Maybe by giving it less ground friction, less of a cooldown, and making it jump-cancellable.
-Increase the D-Air's sweetspot.
-Recolor hurtboxes to green.

nerf the up special, it's spammable.

While it might be a bit strong if fixed, I noticed Duff's jab combo doesn't work unless it's spaced properly; if Duff's up close the first hit doesn't lead into the second hit well, and by the time the second hit comes out often the opponent's already rolled away.

D-Air also seems a bit wonky, hurtbox wise. Once Duff hits the ground, it seems to grab two different hurtbox sprites and flips between them over and over, which makes the move feel both safer than it should half the time, and also less safe the rest of the time during recovery. It's weird.

I really like this character, and appreciate all the changes you've made in response to feedback.

I have some thoughts on the latest version, but they're more personal preferences than observed problems.

All of the aerials are useful for extending combos, but none of them act as an impactful finisher. Opponents with good recoveries can survive most offstage aerials even at 100%+
Maybe make give back air a more dangerous angle, particularly since fair is so much more forgiving now. If any aerial was made slower and harder hitting, I think dair fits best. When a whale bodyslams someone I expect it to feel like either a ganon dair or bowser dspecial.

I like rethrowing fspecial, but I think I'd normalize the attack to be the same as a regular fspecial (rather than much lower to the ground). The decreased distance makes it usually a better idea to destroy and rethrow, I think. If possible, it may also feel better to be able to rethrow within a radius of the block, instead of only while next to and facing it.

I haven't experienced problems with uspecial spam. Is it not very punishable?

I still haven't found a good time to use dspecial, but Im probably not making use of most of his potential.

I believe an fspecial block, placed well, can overhang the ledge and make recovery much more difficult.

Thanks for all your effort. Looking forward to whatever you do next.

I spent some time with uspecial, and while I wouldn't call it a problem, its definitely a strong part of the kit I hadn't used before. Since it can kill towards the edges at 100+%, it qualifies for the aerial finisher I was asking for. If that isn't your intention for it, I think I'd nerf its size rather than speed or knockback. I like that it has aerial kill potential, and his recovery does not need any nerfs.
I still believe in my suggestions for bair and dair, but care less now that I have an option.

On dspecial, what if it pulled the block 1.5 - 2x as fast? I think the problem may be that it doesn't work fast enough to be threatening before they've hit you and cancelled it.
Just a thought, what if you could cancel fspecial into dspecial to immediately change the blocks direction?

Hey, thanks for the reply! D-special, if held down, used to be mega busted, actually. If you hold it down, it used to destroy projectiles and be really hard to get inside. I intended it to be a combo-starter, but the hitstun and knockback make it hard. I think that adding another hitbox at the beginning that does more hitstun and damage might work.

I think dspecial could only have an initial shine hitbox and then only act as a pull, particularly if it had more threatening kb / direction or the increased block speed I mentioned.

Partly I'm thinking of ways he could be less homogeneous. Right now he's mostly fast, consistent combo tools (which I love), strong occasional projectiles, and some good generic strongs. That's not little, but it isn't as much variety as the core rivals cast. If I were to make changes, I'd put some focus on making the moves in his kit feel less interchangeable.

Reiterating, though, that I personally think it could be called final at any point now. It has much better flow than most custom chars.

Does he have really low KB growth compared to average? A 150% opponent feels almost the same for most attacks, besides finishers.

I feel like his combo power is so much for his kill power (uspecial and uair kill pretty early near the blastzones, where he can take you to fairly easy). I would nerf his combo potential and enhace the zoning tools:
*Maybe adding knockback scaling or di multiplier to uair to make it harder to combo into itself and having to leave the combo before or having to look out for di mixups to extend it.
*Fair can kill pretty early characters with a medium weight of the base roster at the ledge, so i would fix the knockback value so it always sends the same distance and can be used as a "get-off-me" tool instead of a "jank-kill-move".
*The grounded moves are good to play footsies and put back the opponent, so they are perfectly fine as they are.

If the idea for Dspecial was to be a combo starter, you could make it as you said: a first hitbox that deals damage and can be inmediately jump-cancelled if it hits, which is much more rewarding to hit than to use it randomly, and a second hitbox that is active while you're pressing the button, only destroys projectiles, but doesn't deal knockback or damage to players.

Fspecial is fairly good now: can be used to recovery high, push back opponents. The only problem is the distance you have be from the block to rethrow it. You have to have the block almost in your feet to move it. I would add a some more of range to the check of the block, or making the block move in the angle of the attack that hit it, like kragg's shards, and be only breakeable with missiles or enemy attacks. This could make the attacks blend more together and help his zoning.

Uspecial, altough decent for recovery, can be kind of stupid when using it to end a combo in the stage, and then being able to use it to keep jugglingthe opponent, and maybe kill them. I would make it have more landing lag or some cooldown when touching the ground.

Lastly, his Jab is so fast that if you whiff it you buffer the second part, and you can get punished with a parry by that. I think it should be fixed, unless it was intentional.

Thanks for hearing our balance ideas.