Up-Strong needs a nerf, it can kill uncharged at 55%. It may just be me, but that is probably a bit too strong.

Wait, you nerfed it, I didn't read the patch notes.

Down Special seems to be kinda useless...
It eats your meter, heals your opponent, and has no damage or knockback what so ever.

Originally posted by Connordragon07:

Wait, you nerfed it, I didn't read the patch notes.

I was right in the middle of nerfing it right as you posted it. 👍

Originally posted by Kykio:

Down Special seems to be kinda useless...
It eats your meter, heals your opponent, and has no damage or knockback what so ever.

It's mostly useful for getting yourself out of the Disadvantage defeatist state, and if you have a super high % you can be cheeky and instantly get them up to that and try and get an early kill on them.

[Some movement redundancy]
d-tilt, f-tilt, f-strong and dash-attack all send Archen forward. I like what you did with dash-attack canceling into dash thus also into itself.
> To add even more variety you could change some more properties, like setting AG_OFF_LEDGE to 1 in one of those attack. If done on f-strong it'll make it high risk high reward for edge-guarding. If done on d-tilt it might increase the move's combo potential of off platforms.

Originally posted by Kykio:

Down Special seems to be kinda useless...
It eats your meter, heals your opponent, and has no damage or knockback what so ever.

If you have more damage than your opponent, Endeavor (Archen's d-special) will equal the opponent's damage to yours before slowly healing the opponent back to his true percents (it does not erase the damage taken while healing).

[Endeavor]
> It does have knockback although I wish it had some more. Being able to kill off the top with a "useless" move, after a hard-earned ladder sounds like insane disrespect (especially since another u-air would have done the job better)
> The meter isn't as straight forward as it could've been. It could have 5 stage instead of 6 and go up one stage every 10%
> Having a move that deals damage to yourself would allow cheesy people to fish for a more effective endeavor (adding super armor that increase damage taken would also work). Thanks to defeatist it can act as a great nerf for an existing move, u-strong looks like a worthy candidate.
> Being still able to use ancient power during the lengthy ending lag will emphasize preemptive placements of boulders to use as cover

So
The meter, seems to be a crit/power increase meter, but i believe it should be harder to fill or easier to deplete, putting it on a shorter timer or drain (or lose some amount) after K.O would be a nice balance

(Just a little moveset nitpick of personal care): But maybe switching neutral special and Up special {Yes its dumb, and really opinionated but I just want to try it}

The only immediate change that comes to mind is slightly reducing the endlag to up tilt, especially on hit.

First impressions on the character! (Full constructive criticism. If you get discouraged, read the last sentence first instead)

~~~~~~Things I like~~~~~~

Down tilt - Moves me forward, feels good, makes me have some combo potential, while still being long enough to be punished if I use it wrong.

Up tilt - Combos into itself, feels like Pikachu in melee, nice. They just need to DI out, and you get going.

Up Special - Feels like a Yoshi egg. I love that, makes me want to snipe people. The control of it feels a bit float-y though? That might just be a ROA thing though.

Jab - Wonderful. Two jabs, doesn't send them far, they can DI if they want, a great option.

~~~~~~Things I'm Content On~~~~~~

Up Smash - Strong, but long end lag. Doesn't kill too early, assuming you know how to DI, that's nice. The "getting caught in the beginning and getting frozen into the final blast" part? Eeeh, feels stale, don't know what it is.

Up Air - Strong, nothing exciting. Nothing bad though.

Side Special - Infinite Recovery option, that's nice. It's slow down on hit is a bit jarring, stops the match a bit too long. I did find an issue where if someone came out after me while I used it, and I hit them, I'm dead. I hit them with my side b, and Archen flies right back out, and into the pit, just to die. It's not a lot of fun getting punished for hitting someone with an attack. Maybe if the exit was jump cancel able? Gain one jump after hitting someone? That would be really neat.

Forward Tilt - Hits the target. Sometimes I find myself using it outside of a jab combo just to get them away. Pretty good.

~~~~~~Things I'm not too excited about?~~~~~~

Forward Air - The forward air is just too good, I slap people around, and I have no real worries using it, other than it's not huge behind me. Knock back is better than most moves that speed, so I find myself using it often.

Back Air - I can't find myself ever using it. Its range doesn't justify me giving up my forward air for it, it's not good at connecting both hits, and the knock back is minimal, even at higher percentages. I wish the two hits would connect better. Right now, it adds nothing interesting to his kit, and feels like a throw in move just to deal damage.

Neutral Air - His second worst move, IMO. No knock back, easy to DI in, low damage, poor combo potential, due to hits minimal hit stun, The only thing it has going for it is it's MEDIUM sized hit box. Not even that large. I find myself getting my butt beat if I use it, just because they can neutral air back and just win.

Down Air - It knocks them up. Into me. It only combos into my neutral air, which I'd rather die than use (Cause I'll die if I use it). It also doesn't move me at all, maybe slow my momentum down? I find myself never using this move. Worst move in his kit IMO. Ideas? It could spike, it could pogo Archen, or maybe change it entirely, make him rake them behind him and down, give him some cool combo potential.

Neutral special - Combo'd with up B, awesome. By itself? It's nice putting something there that hits the target, but it's boring as a move without adding the up special to it. I know you can jump on it, but man, it's really hard to jump on with how teeny tiny it is.

Down Smash - It's a GOOD option, don't get me wrong... But the hit box feels like it goes away super fast, and I'm left with the image of a rock, and major vulnerability. Maybe if it blew up after, or just fell down, to keep me from getting obliterated the second I use it. It's not quite large enough to make me want to use it when I have a bad guess on which side they are on me.

Down Special - Endeavor is a REALLY awesome mechanic. I love it. But it's oh so easy to punish. I use it, and suddenly, I just give them a free hit. I can't turn it into my favor with such a long end box. Hitting it or not, I'm stuck in that animation, and the target is just as close either way. It's really scary to use, and not worth it with someone that has a half decent neutral air, or someone with air kill moves like Wrastor (Side smash me in the air, I'm dead) It's SO close, but just not worth to use yet.

As a character, here's what I think
He has great upward combos, getting people up and smacking them around up there, and sweeping them around, but his ground game sucks. His close combat game also sucks, I feel like if they get too close in, I'm done for. I can't get them back out and away from me. He feels a bit like Pikachu and Yoshi, ~~My two FAVORITE characters~~ and I think you should stick with that feel. Maybe look at the characters for inspiration on what to do from here?

----

Archen feels really well rounded out, but far from something I'd use to fight any of the main cast in say... an online battle for rank. This is just my measly opinion.

You know my twitter if you ever want some play testing done, and want live feedback and what not. I love playing the character, and might try to get good at the game again, just so I can dominate as the best bird!

Last note. Don't take the criticism as something you did wrong. Balancing a character in a roster of characters is impossibly hard. Most of my opinions could be really far off, who knows. I'd love some feedback on my feedback if you have any!

Quick note edits on my comment, cause I'm bad.

Neutral air - I now know why I hate it so much... Only the last hit has knock back, but it's so long, that the last hit doesn't even come out till a short hop is long gone. You can only use it effectively far in the air. Short hops are essential in these types of games, so having good options with the short hops is good.

METER!!! - This is the best thing ever. BUT, it's hard to understand. It's defeatist. It makes sense at first... You hit them, you get more meter, and if maxed, you can kill. You get hit a lot, you lose meter, and suck.
It's less intuitive where... You kill them... you win... you lose a ton of meter, and go into blue... or you die, and you go into red...Percentages are odd in these games, maybe make it more based off of damage you do vs receive, and have a set short timer on it before it resets to 0. You hit full blue? Bam, 10-20 seconds, you're stuck in there. After? It resets. You get a kill? You're winning. Boom, 10-20 seconds set red, then resets to 0. Make it blink and everything, that way we know what's happening at all times.

So if they land on top of you, you can spam nSpecial (stealth rock?) super fast and just rack up damage. Not a whole lot, but doing 4 in a row over and over again can really add up over time. I dunno what a good fix for this would be, but I felt the need to point it out.

Love the idea behind downspecial, but it might be a bit too punishable on-hit, especially for a move that is supposed to be used when you're at high percent.

As Nose has said previously, if someone in on top of your or just close enough you can spam Neutral Special to rack up damage quickly, To top it off it also works as a Combo Starter, it's kinda disgusting.