Board 8 > How would they do in a contest? Day 384 ft Balder, Liara T'Soni, Jim Raynor

(+) Yeah! (+)

This is a topic to rate the contest strength of potential newcomers in the current contest environment.

I will pick the characters to rate and discuss for each day from user nominations - whoever the 3 most nominated characters are at that time. If there are more than 3 I will pick randomly. You can nominate any number of characters at any time, but you cannot nominate the same character twice.

All characters who were present in the 2018 Character Battle will NOT be eligible. Otherwise you can nominate any character that has appeared in video games; even comic book characters. This will exclude real-life athletes who have only appeared in long running sports series, however I will accept those who have their own games such as Shaq. I will accept nominations for iconic gaming duos too, if there is a compelling reason for both characters to be linked (either co-starring in a game ala Banjo & Kazooie, or always appearing together like Callie & Marie from Splatoon).

Each day will have a separate topic, and nominations will carry over. As far as actually rating the character's contest strength; I ask that users rank a characters potential strength with one of the following qualifiers - LAW Fodder, Low Fodder, Mid Fodder, High Fodder, Fodder Line, Low Midcarder, Midcarder, High Midcarder, Near Elite, Elite, LAW Tier (capable of beating Link). I will average all the ratings given to a character to come up with their final ranking. I have included a highlighted entrant from Character Battle X on each tier of the strength rankings below, to provide a baseline for each.

Note that LAW Fodder is meant to be a tier reserved for the weakest possible characters to put into a contest. A character will only be placed there if at least 3/4ths of the voters for that day agree on the LAW Fodder rating, and no ratings above Low Fodder are given. If either of those conditions are not met, the character will not be eligible for the LAW Fodder tier.

Current Character Strength Rankings: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1P1AIhHywBiLd6VAMZMNEGX-HW2td8u1D0Iw_tzHsORw/edit?usp=sharing

Nomination List: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-KnSBDzppzPK5Ug1zmx8_x0bG4tqFDMPPH2k8J3s8sk/edit?usp=sharing

If you feel that a character has been over or under-ranked, or if a new development has come up that would affect their contest strength, you may nominate them for a re-ranking. You may nominate one character per day for this, and 3 votes are needed to get them on the slate. One character with 3 votes will come up for re-ranking today.

Re-ranking Nomination List: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1V6dx-tu-FD1rCxbX69eQwEzE7x1F6nNRNFochYHu1dc/edit?usp=sharing

Results from Day 383:

Gyarados (Pokemon) is Fodder Line
Butterfree (Pokemon) is High Fodder
Gabranth (Final Fantasy XII) is Mid Fodder

Re-Ranking Result:

Cortana (Halo) is now Low Fodder

Here is today's trio to rank:

Balder (Bayonetta)
Liara TSoni (Mass Effect)
Jim Raynor (Starcraft)

Today's Re-Ranking is:

Mr. Game & Watch (Game & Watch)

---

I think Low Fodder best fits all three new rankings today. Balder's a relevant Bayonetta character, sure, but that doesn't mean voters will actually care. Liara could be Mid, but I'm inherently skeptical about Mass Effect characters who weren't squad members in vanilla ME2 given how low the ceiling for a Mass Effect character in general currently is. Raynor is most obvious of all; even Kerrigan, StarCraft's standout character, tanks in these contests, let alone Generic McDude from StarCraft.

As for Mr. Game & Watch, my reranking nom covers the case for a higher placement for a character who has no reason to budge from 2013 pretty well, I'd say. At the same time, he's a clear step below the likes of Falco, Marth, Meta Knight, and King Dedede among characters who draw most of their popularity from Smash, so High Fodder seems right.

I'll also nominate Captain Olimar for reranking. Like Game & Watch, Olimar's 2013 result does not support our current conservatism; given how strong Shepard was back then, comfortably avoiding the doubling looks more like a Fodder Line performance than a Mid Fodder showing. Yes, there's possible excuses in the form of Shepard's match pic and a peachy draw for Olimar against two Western characters, but not enough to make up two whole tiers.

Finally, I'll third the BB-8 nomination, and note that Orochi shouldn't still be on the nominations list after we already ranked him.

---

Re-rank Olimar

---

Balder (Bayonetta) - Low fodder
Liara TSoni (Mass Effect) - Mid fodder

Mass Effect 1 isn't weak and she's a squadmate there, the ME2 DLC with her as a squadmate comes with Mass Effect Trilogy, and she's a squadmate in ME3 too. She's fairly prominent throughout the franchise and I think she's reasonably well-liked too.

Jim Raynor (Starcraft) - Low fodder

I think we underrated Kerrigan (her percentage on Crono wasn't that abysmal and absent the 4chan rally she would have likely beaten Missile) but Raynor is going to be weaker so he deserves low.

Mr. Game & Watch (Game & Watch) - High fodder

---

Nominate Min Min

---

Kerrigan was probably mid fodder in CB9, but she's definitely low now thanks to Blizzard's current reputation.

agree with axem's ratings.

Third re-ranking Olimar

---

Day 385 is up: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/78820734

---