Board 8 > How would they do in a contest? Day 388 ft Barack Obama, Cody, Samurai Goroh

(+) 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 387:

Archer (Fate/stay night) is Low Fodder
Nebula (Marvel) is Low Fodder
BB-8 (Star Wars) is Low Fodder

Here is today's trio to rank:

Barack Obama (Madden NFL)
Cody Travers (Final Fight/Street Fighter)
Samurai Goroh (F-Zero)

Today's Re-Ranking is:

Tom Nook (Animal Crossing)

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Re-rank Inkling

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Obama...uhh.....Low Fodder? Man I don't know how you rank that dude.

Mid Fodder for Cody. Street Fighter, Final Fight, Capcom, etc. fans generally like him. He's a couple tiers under the really decent non-Ryu SF guys like Ken and Chun-Li but he can get votes.

Goroh would be Low Fodder. Because of his long-standing role as an Assist Trophy in Smash and him one of the original F-Zero characters, I suspect he would be the best non-Falcon F-Zero character. He's also a Samurai. Still, F-Zero doesn't add up to much.

Tom Nook with AC's current standing.is probably High Fodder, though I don't quite feel courageous enough to say he's any higher than that.

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Barack Obama (Madden NFL) - Mid fodder

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/4895-who-do-you-most-want-to-win-todays-us-presidential-election

I...don't know what to think of putting a still-current, relevant (if out of office) real life politician in a contest but with results like that maybe he's not terrible?

Cody Travers (Final Fight/Street Fighter) - Low fodder

this is way way worse than I would ever have predicted FF to do:
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/2789-whats-your-all-time-favorite-beat-em-up-series

Not entirely sure what if anything to make of that in light of Haggar and Poison actually looking not worthless. I guess those two are kind of wild and out there enough to possibly transcend their game a bit but I don't see Cody doing the same or doing much at all to attract voters who don't care about Final Fight or the fighting games he's playable in.

Samurai Goroh (F-Zero) - Low fodder

Tom Nook - High fodder

Looking on par with Meta Knight and co. is probably not happening, but in a post-New Horizons world, he's certainly got more going for him than previously. Thinking I'm a no on Villager moving up beyond high fodder too, if that occurs to anyone? Isabelle's miserable 2018 makes me a little doubtful of how much that Smash inclusion is worth. We'd also probably be looking at a 2021 character battle at the earliest which is a lot of time for the franchise to cool a little.

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Obama: Low Fodder - He's still a not-universally-beloved real-life person trying to get somewhere in a video game character contest, plus RacistFAQs >_>

Cody: Low Fodder - Besides that absolutely hilarious 13-year-old poll Axem dug up, Haggar didn't even look good in 2013. He got near-tripled by Jill, barely placing above the Red Bird in the process, and then Jill turned around and got near-tripled by Mega Man. Spinning those results as Capcom SFF is the only way Haggar comes out retaining a shred of dignity, as the series' standout character. I can believe Cody's Street Fighter exposure puts him on par with Haggar, but he'd need to be clearly better to reach Mid Fodder.

Goroh: Low Fodder

Nook: Fodder Line - This is pretty much the exact same argument I used for reranking: Nook already looked like High Fodder, advantageous match circumstances or no, and then New Horizons happened to give its mascot a special boost. Also, we're ranking these characters based on what we expect would happen today, so while I'm also opposed to bumping Villager, I have no problem with reflecting Nook's current relevance.

I'll also nominate Jimi Hendrix for reranking, by means of a comparison. Both Hendrix and John Lennon are primarily 60s musicians who died in tragic circumstances before their time, and Lennon is clearly the bigger and more relevant name from a GameFAQs perspective. Yet Hendrix is the one we have above Low Fodder, and he's the one whose ranking looks off to me in light of the whole 'real-life person in a video game character contest' thing.

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Low Fodder for Obama - I can't see an ex-president as recent as him doing too well in a contest, and from what I've seen people are pretty divided on how well he did during his term.

Cody I saw is Mid Fodder. He was never that special of a character during his Final Fight days, but his Street Fighter incarnation made him a fan-favorite among the fanbase. Based on the performance of SFV (a game with notably bad reception) in GOTD2, there still seems to be a sizable SF fanbase left on the site.

Agree with Low Fodder for Samurai Goroh.

I will say High Fodder for Tom Nook. His CB9 performance wasn't bad, but I don't think he will boost that much from it based on New Horizons. He might have turned in a worse performance had he been in CBX, judging by Isabelle bombing in it.

second re-ranking of Jimi Hendrix. I think it is primarily classic rock fans who know and respect him and anyone else will have no incentive to vote for him.

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Day 389 is up: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/78829657

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