Engine Changes

Input Buffer

Reduced Tap Buffer from 9 frames to 6 frames.

Crouch

It is now possible to crouch during the following states:

• Dash
• Run
• Run Brake/Skid

Jump Squat

All jump squats have been increased from 3 to 4 frames (except for Kazuya, who is unchanged). Up Smash is no longer prioritized when attempting to perform a buffered Up Air.

Jumping

Jumping no longer has accelerated rising momentum, matching the momentum from previous games.

Falling

Actions that put you into the normal falling animation will instead use the unique double jump fall animation if you are out of jumps.

Fast Falling

Fast Falling is no longer canceled by performing an Aerial or Special.

Shield

Shield Mechanics

• Shield Pushback was also increased by roughly 1.3x.
  • Shield Pushback while Parrying was reduced to 0.
• Shield Release frames were reduced from 11 frames to 5.
• It is impossible to shield for 11 frames after the start of Shield Release (6 frames after you're actionable from Shield Release).
• The natural Shield HP decrease was increased from 0.15 HP/frame to 0.18 HP/frame.
• Shields can no longer be tilted.
• Shield Lock (Siheld + Special or Shield + Shield) has been removed.
• Shield shrinks while losing HP, however a more transparent shield will always be there to show how much space your shield covers.
  • Instead of the above, Yoshi's Shield still fades to black, but it stops before turning black completely.
• It is no longer possible to Shield Break yourself by holding Shield. Your shield can only break if the opponent breaks it.

Actions Into Shield

• It is now possible to Shield during Dash and Back Dash (Ryu/Ken/Terry/Kazuya).

Actions Out of Shield

Out-of-Shield options have been significantly changed.

• It is now possible to perform a Platform Drop like in previous games.
  • It is also possible to perform a Platform Drop while in Shield Lock.
• You can no longer directly perform actions out of shield. Performing any action while holding Shield will instead force a Shield Drop first, and then buffer the action.
  • Spotdodges, Rolls, and Platform Dropping can still be directly performed.
  • In addition, Grab, Dash Grab, and Turn Grab can still be performed directly while putting up Shield. Performing Grab otherwise will force a Shield Drop first.
• Using the C-Stick will drop shield and perform whatever the C-Stick is bound to.
  • Performing angled Tilts or Smash Attacks will require moving the left stick up or down after inputting the C-Stick horizontally.

Parries

• Parrying has been moved to Shield Startup instead of Shield Release.
• The Parry window was reduced from 5 to 3 frames.
  • The Parry window is increased to 6 frames if Shield is held during a Parry.
• Parries can only be buffered if the Shield button was pressed for less than 5 frames, otherwise you will shield normally.
  • This does not apply if Shield is held during a parry.

Grab

• The Grab Lockout Timer no longer exists.
• Grab-techs are now active throughout the entire startup of grab, not just while the grab box is currently active.
• All non-standard Grabs can no longer be grab-teched.
• It is now possible to buffer Dash and Pivot Grabs.

Spot Dodge

• Removed Spot Dodge Canceling.
• All Spot Dodges have a base FAF of 27.
• All Spot Dodges have intangibility from frames 3 to 18.
• All Spot Dodges stale at the same rate.
• On the last frame of invulnerability, Spot Dodge can be canceled into a fully-staled roll with frame 1 intangibility.

Directional Air Dodge

See Air Dash

Ledge Slipoffs

It is now possible to slip off of ledges during the following states:

• Dash
• Back Dash (Ryu/Ken/Terry/Kazuya)
• Normal/Light/Air Dodge Landing
• Special Fall/Freefall Landing
• Taunt

Hitstop

• Electric-property moves only deal extra hitstop to the opponent.

Knockback

• The spinning knockback animation no longer is randomly applied, instead being applied at a consistent character weight + 33 damage threshold, meant to signify average kill percent.
• Balloon Knockback has been reworked.
  • Balloon Knockback now applies based on Launch Speed instead of total Hitstun frames.
  • Maximum Balloon Knockback magitude has been reduced (6 > 4), making it have less of, but still a noticable effect.
• Hitstun Canceling was removed.
• Removes the raised lower blast zone when getting spiked.

Directional Influence

• Directional Influence has been increased (9.74 degrees / 0.17 radians > 12.0321 degrees / 0.21 radians).
• Launch Speed Influence has been removed.
• The DI Guide Line has been removed.

Teching

• The tap tech window has been increased from 12 to 20.
• The tap window now applies to all states where it is possible tech.
• Untechables no longer exist except for on moves where it is purposefully impossible to tech.

Ledges

Ledges have been reworked.

• The 2 frames it takes to reach a ledge have been removed.
  • This also removes 2-Framing.
• The entire cast has had their ledge grab boxes adjusted to remove the phenomenon known as "Magnet Hands".
• Certain characters have had new ledge grab boxes added to certain moves.

Tethers

• All tethers have had their reel-in speed cut in half.
• All tethers now grab the ledge the frame before their respective hitbox activates, if they don't already. This applies to:
  • Samus (Grapple Beam)
  • Young Link (Hookshot)
  • Lucas (Rope Snake)
  • Toon Link (Hookshot)
  • Joker (Grappling Hook)
  • Byleth (Sword of the Creator)
  • Min Min (ARM Hook)
• Tether's attack framedata and ledge grab boxes as a whole have been untouched for now.

Ledge Intangibility

• Dropping from ledge no longer clears your intangibility.
• Intangibility gets cleared if you are no longer in the falling or jumping states.

In addition, the Ledge Intangibility formula has been changed:

This means an immediate ledge grab, from something like a ledge trump for example, at 0% will give you 30 invulnerable frames to work with. At maximum, from being off stage for 5 seconds and being at 0%, you will have 60 invulnerable frames to work with. While this seems like a lot, this scenario is very unlikely.

On the other hand, being at around 120% and immediately grabbing the ledge will give the minimum 11 frames of invulnerability, which should be enough to go for an immediate edge guard, but not much else.

Stale-Move Negation

Staling has been overhauled. The queue has been effectively shortened from 9 to 7, Freshness Bonus was removed, and many values have been reworked.
The values shown in the following table are multipliers to the move's base damage that get added during damage calculation.
If a move is in multiple places in the Stale Move list, all slots are added together.

1v1 Damage Multiplier

Removed.

Rage

Removed.

Attack Canceling

Removed.

Sliding Normals

All grounded normals (Jab, Tilts, Smash Attacks) will carry your momentum from your previous action.

• The exception is Forward Smash, which will not carry momentum if performed during the initial frames of Dash.

Jab

Only Neutral Attack inputs will be valid when performing Jab combos. Pressing Tilts, Smash attacks, etc. will not count as a Jab input.

Aerials

• Pressing Jump and Attack at the same time no longer forces a short hop aerial.
• Short Hop Aerials no longer deal less damage than usual.
• Aerial Landing Lag is increased by 4 frames if you generated a hitbox and did not connect with anything. This does not apply to moves that only generate projectiles. For example:
  • Mario presses Neutral Air.
    • If Mario lands before a hitbox is generated, he takes 8 frames of landing lag.
    • If Mario generates a hitbox, does not hit anything, and lands, he takes 12 frames of landing lag.
    • If Mario hits a fighter or a Shield before landing, he takes 8 frames of landing lag.
  • Mega Man presses Up Air.
    • Because Mega Man does not generate a hitbox that's directly connected to him, he will always take 20 frames of landing lag.

Respawning

Instead of already being in your idle animation, characters now start laying down, only to get up before the platform stops moving. (Did you know this was a thing in Smash 64?)

In addition, it is now possible to Taunt while on the respawn platform.

• Due to… surprising complexity, Sora’s Up Taunt will not produce any effects.