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Season Four Rankings: #30 – 21

By SBS — March 18, 2020

Giga Bowser is yet another New York player making his first appearance on the Rivals Top 50. Giga had a solid start to the year, placing 13th at TAPS 2 and 17th at Smash N Splash 5, taking down Dos Rogers. Fast forward to September where things really intensified, Giga placed 13th at Glitch 7 and 4th at TAPS 3, scoring wins against Danzello, Lucius, Starbos, and Lord Bagel. As the highest ranked Sylvanos main this year, Giga Bowser’s constant work pushing the character’s metagame and helping his fellow community members has certainly paid off!

Yesdefinitely attended a slew of events this season, bringing his unique flavor of Orcane from California to New York. Yesdef has been a player on the rise for quite some time, and has found his stride in Season 4’s second leg. Yesdef placed 13th at the season’s most stacked events in Heat Wave 3 and Genesis 7, taking down the likes of Jesier, Prime, Shotti, and Nexplosion along the way. Yesdef leaped ahead 16 spots from the Season 3 rankings, and rightfully so. After watching his set with MSB at Genesis 7, it’s clear that this upwards trend is bound to continue in Season 5.

Long foretold to be one of the best to ever wield a shovel, O-Gazm makes his Top 50 debut with appearances at CREST and Heat Wave 3. After his 5th place at CREST, the rumors proved to be true. O-Gazm was able to defeat Sparx21 and Dunk on his path of shovelry and we hope to see his energetic personality next season!

Bullets is another BC player widely considered to be a master of his character. Bullets placed 7th place at both CREST and EVO 2019, beating a star studded cast of yesdefinitely, AZCards, and Lattim to do it. Bullets’ only losses this season were to top caliber players, and we believe that he would be much higher on the rankings this year had he gotten another chance to prove himself. We expect his diligent training with players such as Blue and DolphinBrick to break through the glass ceiling and take him to new heights in Season 5.

Akashi jumped up a whopping 18 ranks this season with semi sporadic moments of greatness. He made his first RCS top 8 at EVO 2019 by defeating Stroder and Shovel King, LBO. Akashi was able to score yet another RCS top 8 at Glitch 7, earning a huge upset over FullStream. While his consistency is still in the making, Akashi’s peaks and drive to attend as many events as possible point to a player on the rise with much in store for Season 5.

Relatively consistent out of region, and a monster in New York, PrimeTime was able to place 17th or higher at all four RCS events they attended while taking 5th and 2nd at TAPS 2 and TAPS 3 respectively. Prime’s notable wins include Tapscott, Hatz, Starbos, Giga Bowser, ZeeBee, and O-Gazm. Their explosive playstyle and incredibly vocal cheering light up events whenever they’re in the crowd.

Primarily an online warrior, Kobra made his way out to Super Smash Con 2019, proving his worth by taking down five of this year’s Top 50 competitors, including MSB to place 4th. Kobra’s other impressive event this year was the December Online RCS, where he placed 5th with wins against Levin, Giga Bowser, and DolphinBrick. Kobra’s first appearance on the Rivals Top 50 will undoubtedly be outdone in Season 5, assuming we get to see him come out to more events in 2020!

An AZ Etalus with wins and losses all over the map this season. Chompers is a true character loyalist, pushing the Etalus meta to its limits. Chompers took 3rd place at EVO 2019 by upsetting both FullStream and SBS. His resume doesn’t stop there, 5th place at Overgrown with wins on Proux.EXE, Dos Rogers, and Protagify made Chompers an early favorite to explode in Season 4. He almost did just that at Elevate, just barely falling to Lord Bagel and Cake Assault in game 5 thrillers. His patient neutral and exponentially evolving punish game continue to take him and his character to levels the community hasn’t seen.

Another AZ champion returns to the Top 50 with gusto. While his local activity has been on the decline, Danny still finds chances to unleash his natural talent when it really counts. Danny placed 4th at both Overgrown and EVO 2019, securing victories against the likes of Stroder, Dos Rogers, Tapscott, Proux.EXE, Dunk, Akashi, and SBS. Late season, Danny was able to attend Heat Wave 3 and Genesis 7, securing a comfortable 17th place for his efforts. We hope to see Danny at more events in Season 5, and more AZ Rivals locals in 2020!

Seggo may not have many events under his belt this season; however, his local appearance at Smash N Splash 5 sported victories over several upper echelon players. Seggo was able to topple Forrest, ZeeBee, and MSB to place 5th at the first RCS event of the year. Rounding out his incredible run at Smash N Splash, Seggo placed 9th in the July online RCS with victories over TurtleBox and Penguin. Seggo has been dominant as of late in his local scene, utilizing an arsenal of characters to secure 1st on the Wisconsin/Illinois PR.

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Season Four Rankings: #40 – 31

By SBS — March 17, 2020

Dunk! The Backwards Kragg! An inadvertent character loyalist, Dunk is truly one of the most unique players on the market. While this season may not have been as kind to him as Season 3, Dunk still was able to find his way to an impressive 9th place at EVO 2019 and 25th place at Heat Wave 3, taking down players like Akashi and Plastic Dinos along the way. Dunk recently found his way to Arizona, where he’s quickly become one of the State’s most challenging opponents.

Nevereatcars returns to the Top 50 after a short departure in Season 3. Cars is an OG West Coast Maypul loyalist known for his love of her fast paced neutral and punish game. His playstyle speaks for itself with an arsenal of innovative tether punishes and deep blastzone reads. Cars traveled to exclusively West Coast events this year while earning wins against the likes of yesdefinitely, Spook, Akashi, and more!

Lucius had a slow burn this season, picking up steam to an epic showing at The Big House 9, where he placed 4th by eliminating FullStream. Lucius has also made quite the splash in Smash Ultimate as of late and his expanded skill set in the platform fighter genre has paid dividends with a win on Windows and 9th place at our off-season event, Frostbite 2020. Lucius has the potential to leap his way up the list in Season 5.

Levin makes his first appearance on the Rivals Top 50, touting a 25th place at Smash N Splash 5 and 9th place at Super Smash Con 2019 with an impressive win over PrimeTime. Levin has been an active member of the community for years; but, only recently started attending RCS majors. His confidence in Zetterburn and positive mentality towards improvement stands out among the rest. We hope to see Levin travel more in Season 5!

CheesyPotato has been an online monster for years now. This year, Cheesy made it out to TAPS 2 and Glitch 7, bringing her online prowess to the local communities. Cheesy placed 13th at Glitch, dropping sets to Windows and Lattim, and 5th at TAPS 2, losing only to ZeeBee while having to DQ in losers. In addition to her lan successes, Cheesy made sure to remind us of her roots by securing a fantastic 2nd place in the December Online RCS.

If there was a “most improved” award, Plastic Dinos would most certainly be a contender. Dinos’ sharp improvement is evident in his Top 50 events and has been cataloged over the course of Season 4 at the AZRivals locals. In the course of a year, Dinos has become an Academy mentor, the owner of Clairen-cord, and a key figurehead in the AZRivals scene. Obviously we expect big things from Plastic Dinos in Season 5! Till then, you can find him working hard at improving the community one step at a time.

Calm, collected, and methodical, TurtleBox has been a Top 50 staple since Season 1. TBox made it out to the season’s two most stacked events, placing 13th at Heat Wave 3 and 17th at Genesis 7. While he has taken a step back from competitive play he has retained his consistency and terrifying edgeguards. We wish TBox the best in his retirement and not-so-secretly hope the competitive bug brings him out to at least one event in Season 5!

One of the biggest wild cards on the Top 50, Stroder placed 13th at every event he attended this season besides Genesis 7. Stroder’s peak event this season was Heat Wave 3, where he was able to score back to back upsets over Dunk and MSB. While his jump in rankings from Season 3 are nothing to scoff at, Rivals is only Stroder’s second focus, you may know him from the Smash Ultimate PGR v1 and his consistent dominance over the AZ Smash scene. His ability to balance Smash and Rivals at such a high level of play is unmatched and we love his passionate presence at our events.

Kruz is yet another new addition to the Top 50, attending 3 events including COST, Elevate, and Heat Wave 3. Kruz’s second place finish at COST was certainly impressive; however, no one was prepared for his monumental upset over CakeAssault at Elevate, earning him Top 8 at the most stacked GRL event of the year. From there Kruz bested Akashi at Heat Wave 3, but faltered in a set against Junuh, keeping him out of top 32 at Heat Wave 3. Kruz promises to be a top contender going into Season 5, as anyone seeing his name in their bracket path will certainly know they’re in for the match of their life.

Starbos splashed into Season 4 with upsets over Adi and EU top player, Slimepuffen at Super Smash Con 2019 for a 9th place finish. From there, he never really looked back, placing 13th at Glitch 7 and achieving his first Top 8 at TAPS 3, besting players such as Nexplosion and Akashi along the way. Starbos also attended Frostbite 2020 during our offseason, where he was able to snag a second Top 8 finish in a row. His unique punish game and movement intensive play has only refined itself with time as he joins the ranks as one of the best Orcane players in the world.

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Season Four Rankings: #50 – 41

By SBS — March 16, 2020

Jorane is a Canadian legend who has been a staple of the Rivals Top 50 since season 1. While he has not been able to travel as much, his Absa still strikes fear into new players and veterans alike. After a long hiatus Jorane traveled to CREST and Genesis 7 this year and proved he’s still a threat by taking down Stroder and collecting an impressive 25th place at the season finale.

Nexplosion is another Absa player known for his breakneck aggression approach to the character. Nexplosion was incredibly active this season, attending seven different events and traveling cross-country on multiple occasions. After an impressive showing at Genesis 7 and showcasing some incredible sets with Hatz, DolphinBrick, and Kobra throughout the year, it’s no secret that Nex is a rising star moving into season 5!

Before Dos took a year break from competitive Rivals, he traveled to Overgrown and Smash N Splash 5 with impressive results. While Dos may have been absent competitively for a good portion of season 4, he remains a prominent figure head and teacher in the Rivals Academy, the Ranno character discord, and the official Rivals of Aether discord. We eagerly await his explosive return in season 5.

Another newcomer to our top 50 players, Junuh is an Arizona Wrastor/Kragg co-main who has proven his ability to thrive in high stress environments. Junuh collected a few outstanding wins over Chompers at Overgrown and Kruz at Heat Wave 3. Junuh placed 25th at Heat Wave and has proven that he can take down any player when the time is right.

This New York Zetterburn is a player with a taste for upsets. What Danzello lacks in consistency, he makes up for in his resilience. Along his incredibly active season 4, Danzello tallied wins against Stroder and Dam Danny, while placing 9th at the most stacked Grassroots League tournament of the year, Elevate. Danzello has evolved into a constant demon to his local scene with several wins over MSB. Keep an eye out for Danzello, he’s sure to SHINE his way to the top.

Colorado tournament organizer, Spook, makes his first appearance on the Rivals Top 50 with consistent placements at some of the most stacked tournaments of the year. In addition to his top level Etalus play, Spook played a key role running Elevate in Colorado Springs, which successfully hosted some of the best talent Rivals has to offer!

The SoCal hero, Proux.EXE returns to the Top 50 with impressive feats including an upset over Stroder and 25th placement at Heat Wave 3. Proux’s innovative punish game is awe inspiring at times, with blazing fast reactions putting him in the mix with some of the best players in the world. Proux has recently branched out to the other members of the fire tribe, with sporadic showings throughout the season. We expect to see this character mastery evolve over the next year while becoming a powerful new addition to the Arizona scene.

It’s hard to keep an old school legend off of the Top 50, even if they happen to be retired. AZCards placed third in the July Online RCS and made his way out to EVO and CREST, placing 9th at both and proving that fundamentals don’t die easily. AZ’s shift in focus makes seeing him, and his now trademark Sylvanos, at events even more special. We wish him the best and sincerely hope to spend some time at future events with one of the most kind players in the community.

Another Ranno slings his way onto Top 50 for the first time! Known for his unique usage of ranno side special, Kaaeru showed consistency and had an impressive breakout tournament at Super Smash Con, scoring a huge upset over Backpack and placing 13th. Kaaeru has already shown evidence of riding this momentum in season 5 after placing 13th in our off-season event, Frostbite 2020!

Formally known as SCUM, Marx makes his first of what promises to be many appearances on the Rivals Top 50. His first tournament was around the release of our beloved guest character, Shovel Knight, where he bested his first Top 50 player. Marx’s season 4 continued in much of the same manner, achieving top 8 at Super Smash Con by defeating Danzello, Kaaeru, and Levin among others. Marx’s skyrocket towards success could be indicative of a very exciting future!

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Season Four Top 50 – Introduction

By SBS — March 9, 2020

Each year we look back on the previous competitive season and the players who influenced our scene by creating a Top 50 Players list. Season 4 (March 2019 – January 2020) saw a lot of growth, with competitive community-run events popping up across the country. We are incredibly excited to witness this community beyond our typical RCS events sprouting up before our eyes!

Before we delve into the rankings this year, here’s an introduction on how the list was formed along with our events list and hidden bosses.

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Rivals Rankings Season Four Top 50

Player Qualifications

During season 3 we saw events like Cold Snap and TAPS lead the Grassroots community down an exciting path, but ultimately decided not to count them towards Top 50. As we unveiled the Season 3 Top 50, we shared this announcement:

“It’s worth noting that excitingly, more Rivals-only events are beginning to become large enough, competitive enough, and diverse enough to entertain this list encompassing events outside of the RCS. Our ranking council did hold a discussion on this but ultimately decided to wait until next season to begin including them.”

Now that Season 4 is here we’ve expanded outside of only including RCS events by popular request. For the Season 4 rankings, we only considered players with 2 or more events from the list below. All players considered had to have attended at least one offline RCS event and had to be based in the North American (NA) region to be included in the Rivals Top 50.

Methodology

This year, we brought back the panel system from Season 3, ranking players based on a combination of their best wins/worst losses and their placements at eligible events.

Whether the event took place offline or online was also taken into consideration. Online events are always a contentious piece of the puzzle for our top 50 rankings, and this year we’ve continued the trend of placing importance heavily on offline results. Exceptional players that only competed online have been included, but may appear lower on the list due to lack of offline results. Keep in mind this is not intended to disrespect their skill, but rather our concession that we’re unable to place them accurately in the context of the full season’s events and offline finals.

Once this ranking system was completed, a council made additional adjustments to the order based on head-to-head results, activity, and other data. This group consisted of Menace13, MSB, Renzo, SBS, and Sparx21.

Hidden Bosses

Players given the title of Hidden Boss were recognized by the panel as major threats to tournaments this season that just didn’t quite meet the requirements to be ranked.

Adi, gracefulknight, Kenneth, Wai

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Patch 1.4.21 Notes

By George — March 2, 2020

  • Hitboxes that hit on their last active frame will no longer disappear during hitpause.
  • Most projectiles now have their hitboxes visible in training mode.
  • Red team will always start the match on the left side of the stage.
  • Waveland is now jump-cancellable on frame 4 for all characters (was previously frame 6 for heavy characters).
  • Fixed a bug that allowed players to crouch in the air for 1 frame, restoring their airdodge.
  • Strong Attack mechanics adjusted to work consistently regardless of control scheme.
    • Strong Attack is now always a 3-frame input. Previously was a 6-frame input with a joystick and a 4-frame input with keyboard/dpad.

  • Fstrong hit 1 SDI multiplier adjusted from x1 > x0 (so the 2nd hit connects more consistently when the move is used at the ledge).
  • Uspecial final hit knockback increased from 7+.5 > 8+.6.

  • Nair bounce no longer restores double jump, walljump, and airdodge.
  • Uspecial can now be canceled with a walljump anytime Orcane isn’t moving upward.
  • Bubbles now clear the opponent’s airdodge buffer if they were grounded, so missing a parry doesn’t buffer an airdodge.

  • Ftilt hits 1 and 2 angle flipper adjusted from 4 (Horizontal knockback sends toward the center of the hitbox) > 9 (Sends toward the center of the hitbox).
  • Ftilt hits 1 and 2 are now untechable.
  • Nair animation updated.
  • Nair hit 2 hitstun modifier decreased from x1.0 > x0.8.
  • Nair endlag increased from 6 > 8 (9 > 12 on whiff).
  • Time between nair hits decreased from 12 > 8.
  • Uair center hit angle adjusted from 80 > 75.
  • Uair center hit KB scaling increased from .3 > .4.
  • Nspecial endlag increased from 11 > 16.
  • Double jumping right after using Fspecial while it’s on cooldown will no longer use all of your double jumps.

  • Jab 1 and Jab 2 animations have new recovery frames.
    • Kragg no longer leaves his arm extended for the entire duration of Jab 1’s recovery.
  • When a player leaves a falling pillar, it will continue to fall for the next 20 frames.
  • Fspecial is no longer locked out of turning for 8 frames when the rolling animation starts over.
  • Fspecial jump cancel timer no longer counts down while in hitpause (values adjusted so that the cancel window feels the same as before).
  • Uspecial pillar will only rise to the minimum height if started more than 80px below it.
    • Normal Uspecial raises you up by 80px. Previously, if you were 1px below the minimum pillar height, it would raise you 1px instead of 80px.
  • Rock Uthrow and Dthrow can now be reversed.

  • Ftilt endlag decreased from 10 > 8 (15 > 12 on whiff).
  • Utilt endlag decreased from 12 > 10 (18 > 15 on whiff).
  • Utilt hits 1 and 2 angle flipper adjusted from 4 (Horizontal knockback sends toward the center of the hitbox) > 9 (Sends toward the center of the hitbox).
  • Utilt hits 1 and 2 are now untechable and cannot cause a ground bounce.

  • Lily will no longer try to attack enemies whose hurtboxes aren’t touching her (unless they’re invincible, in which case she will activate the same as previous versions).
  • Lily can no longer eat a seed on the frame it is created (this prevents Lily from eating seeds that would otherwise mark a player between Maypul and Lily).
  • Hitting players immediately after they’re wrapped by Lily will no longer result in no knockback.
  • Parrying will no longer remove Maypul’s mark if the Maypul is on the same team as the parrying player.
    • This also applies to Clairen’s Dspecial.

  • Parrying Absa’s Fspecial will force her into parry stun even if she is no longer in the attack’s animation.
  • Parrying another character’s Fspecial projectile will no longer prevent Absa from creating a cloud with Nspecial.
  • Uspecial both hits knockback scaling decreased from .2 > .15 (slightly reduces the frame advantage on hit against grounded opponents).

  • Fspecial’s cooldown can no longer be avoided if the move is interrupted.

  • Spirit Flame will no longer target players in the respawn state.

  • Jab endlag decreased from 14 > 12 (21 > 18 on whiff).
  • Uair tipper hitbox shrunk by 2px on the bottom (to remove the 1px of tipper sticking out from under the sourspot).
  • Aerial Fspecial recovery frames before cancel window starts increased from 18 > 20.
  • Aerial Fspecial’s recovery will now only be cancellable on whiff if the recovery window starts on the ground.
  • Fspecial walljump window is now always halfway through the endlag window, instead of being later on whiff.
  • Uspecial part 2 pratland time decreased from 18 > 15.

  • Fstrong final hit hit lockout increased from 0 > 10.
  • Fair sweetspot angle adjusted from 45 > 40.
  • Bair priority swapped (tip has highest priority, base has lowest).
  • Bair sweetspot shrunk 14px outward horizontally.
  • Bair endlag decreased from 25 > 20.
  • Bair sweetspot damage increased from 12 > 16.
  • Fspecial damage increased from 6 > 8.
  • Hurtbox fixed when cancelling Uspecial into Taunt.
  • Fspecial cancel timer no longer counts down while in hitpause.
    • Values adjusted, but this shortens the cancel window by 5 frames when hitting a flower, since the flower only deals half hitpause.

  • Fair hits 1 and 2 no longer force flinch.
  • Fair hits 1 and 2 damage increased from 2 > 3.
  • Dair hits 1 and 2 damage increased from 2 > 3.
  • Dspecial will now correctly fall off of Forsburn’s clone when using Uspecial.

  • Bair hits 1 and 2 damage increased from 2 > 3.
  • Bair final hit damage decreased from 6 > 4.
  • Holding up immediately when Dstrong leaves the ground makes Shovel Knight jump higher.

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