Board 8 > How would they do in a contest? Day 346 ft Baby Bowser, Mona, Ivan Drago

(+) 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 345:

Carnage (Marvel) is Low Fodder
Parappa (Parappa the Rapper) is Low Fodder
Carmen Sandiego (Carmen Sandiego) is Low Fodder

Here is today's trio to rank:

Baby Bowser (SMW2: Yoshi's Island)
Mona (WarioWare)
Ivan Drago (Rocky)

Today's Re-Ranking is:

Meta Knight (Kirby series)

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High Fodder for Baby Bowser. Unlike Mario his baby version is more than an irritating crying machine - he's a scary brat who was used as the basis for Bowser Jr some years after Yoshi's Island. His boss fight in the game is also very memorable.

Mona is Low Fodder. She gets no points for being Wario's love interest, and Mona's Pizza is not nearly as popular as Ashley's Song. And again, the Warioware series isn't big on the site.

We ranked Rocky as low fodder, so Ivan Drago is definitely Low Fodder as well. He's nowhere close to law though, since Ivan is one of the best-known Soviet stereotype characters in any media. I must break you.

I never thought that Meta Knight was in need of a re-ranking in the first place; I say Fodder Line again. I don't think he'll get any anti-votes due to being busted in Smash Bros Brawl - Bayonetta was busted in WiiU and didn't seem to suffer at all in CBX for it. He's plenty popular in both Smash and the Kirby series, and appeals fans of both cute and badass characters.

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I guess mid fodder for Baby Bowser. Hes considered less irritating than Baby Mario but hes also less present in general and Bowsers got a much lower base strength to begin with. I...guess hes still got Bowser in his name and unlike Baby Peach or whatever theyve actually done things with him every now and then.

low fodder for the other two.

The reason I wanted Meta Knight re-ranked wasnt that i thought he was too high but rather too low. Even Dedede looked fodder-line-ish in 2018 and their respective 2008 results and my understanding of their relative popularity mean Meta-Knight should be easily stronger.

The problem with Meta Knight is that he kept getting stuck in SFF matches. Even there though he beat Wario and Peach in 2007 and did way better against Fox than Captain Falcon, to say nothing of Banjo. There were probably special reasons he held up better than those four did but Im real reluctant to think hes actually weaker than most of them directly rather than maybe just on a similar level when he actually has those results. His 2008 performance is also a weird situation but 40+% on Ryu is a solid, midcarder-worthy result. He outright won a vote-in poll that included Marth, Peach, and an Akuma with nothing in particular that should have notably held Akuma back. His 2010 result on Luigi is arguably a midcarder performance even with no SFF. Didnt do great in Rivalry Rumble but he doesnt really have a great rivalry so yeah. 2013 looked poor but Bowser has reason to SFF him harder than Luigi and in a 3-way format people were probably less comfortable throwing their vote to the weaker Nintendo character.

Meta Knight has never gotten very reliable or trustworthy looking circumstances but I think hes generally looked pretty good with what hes been given and low midcarder is more likely than being below that.

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Agree with Axem's rankings. As for the reranking, while it's close, I still think Fodder Line is appropriate for Meta Knight. Meta Knight was better than that back in the late 2000s, when he was the living symbol of Brawl hype, and then on into 2010, when Brawl was still super-popular, and he was top-tier in it. Now that he's become just another Smash Bros. character, I'm not convinced he's any stronger than King Dedede.

I'll also nominate CD-I Link for re-ranking. High-level joke characters like ? Block, L-Block, and Sandbag all seem to be right around the Fodder Line, but none of them has the extra appeal that comes with being Link in name and design.

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I will second Re-Ranking CD-i Link

Day 347 is up: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/78716917

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