Marth (Super Smash Flash 2)

Marth is a veteran starter character in Super Smash Flash 2. He was announced along with and  at the McLeodGaming booth for Super Smash Flash 2 at APEX 2014. Unlike in the Super Smash Bros. series, he is the only character representative of the Fire Emblem universe. His sprites are custom-made and based on his appearance in , but with his hairstyle from recent games like in Ultimate. His moveset is taken directly from Brawl, as well as his voice clips.

Marth is ranked 21st on the current tier list, placing him in the A- tier. Marth has disjointed range, fast attacks, amazing combo ability, great ground mobility, and finishers in his tipped smash attacks, tipped up aerial,, and back aerial. Marth has a strong air game thanks to his fast, disjointed aerials. Marth is also a good edgeguarder, making it very difficult for his opponents to make it back to the stage.

However, Marth has below average weight, which makes him vulnerable to horizontal KOs. His recovery is very linear and it is difficult for him to sweetspot the ledge with Dolphin Slash, making it difficult for him to return to the stage without getting edge guarded. He has problems KOing his opponents if he is unable to properly connect with his tippers, as his attacks normally have below-average knockback. He has no projectiles of his own, thus forcing him to approach when fighting against defensive zoning characters. Marth is slightly taller than most other characters, making him an easier target. He requires precise spacing to be used to his full power.

Due to his popularity in the official Super Smash Bros. games, Marth has a large player base and fairly good representation in tournaments, occasionally leading to victory.

Attributes
Marth is a medium-light character who can be described as being emblematic of swordfighters: his playstyle revolves around spacing to keep opponents away, as well as dealing high damage and knockback, thanks to his unique "tipper" mechanic, in which many of his attacks are stronger at the Falchion's tip compared to the base. His grounded movement is above-average for a character of his weight class, and due to his tipper, he has a wide array of potent KO moves, mainly with his forward smash and forward tilt. This also extends to his air game, with quick aerials that can be formidable edgeguarding tools or KO options if the tipper is landed, giving Marth an amazing air game and edgeguarding game. Additionally, despite his tipper dealing the most damage and knockback, his sourspots can also serve as useful combo tools.

Marth also possesses an excellent grab and throw game, possessing one of the longest-reaching grabs in the game. His forward throw can chain grab most characters, while also being able to be followed up with a forward smash, if the opponent does not react, or can set up tech chases. His up throw can be followed up by up tilt or up air, depending on a character's accelerated falling speed, which can allow for some juggling. It can chain grab certain characters from 0% to mid percentages. His back throw sends opponents behind him where he might put them into unfavorable positions. His down throw can set up tech chases and, if used at the ledge, can set up some edge guarding situations.

His special moves give him an interesting variety of options for him to use. His neutral special, aptly named Shield Breaker, deals a good amount of shield damage, even if uncharged, and is useful for covering rolls and landings. His side special, Dancing Blade, can serve as a useful damage-racking tool, especially with the downward-angled hits, which can also deal extra shield damage due to their damage output. His up special, Dolphin Slash, is a potent out of shield option thanks to its quick startup, and decent damage and knockback output if tippered, which can make it a superb option for stage-spiking reckless edgeguarders. It also covers a good amount of vertical distance, which makes it a useful vertical recovery option. Lastly, his down special, Counter, can serve as a useful gimping tool due to its attack power (though its damage caps at 20%, making it unreliable for on-stage KOing).

However, Marth's main weakness is his below-average weight which allows him to be KO'd horizontally early or knocked off to far where he might not be able to recover. Also, despite having below-average weight, he is susceptible to combos due to being tall and being an above-average faller. His tall frame also makes him more susceptible to shield stabbing.

Arguably, his most prominent flaw is his reliance on his tippers and spacing to maximize his damage output. As his tippers deal the most damage and knockback, it gives Marth an extremely poor up-close game due to his sourspots' unimpressive damage and knockback output. Additionally, most of his non-tippered moves deal low shieldstun, which makes Marth very poor with attacking shields, and Shield Breaker is punishable if it misses. This tipper reliance also extends to his aerials, as they need to be sweetspotted to have decent KO potential, which give him a polarized KO game.

His main recovery move, Dolphin Slash, relies on momentum, and despite its good vertical distance, its horizontal distance is only mediocre at best, and has problems sweet spotting the ledge, which makes it easy to edgeguard against. Trying to sweet spot the ledge can leave him vulnerable to edgehogging, but trying to land on stage can leave him open to being knocked off-stage again. This forces players to mix up their recovery to avoid this. Additionally, while Dancing Blade can reposition Marth for safety, it cannot do this again if he is hit, and it does not reliably protect Marth most of the time unless he performs more inputs, which can lead to an SD if he goes too low.

Marth, as a sword-based character, also does not have a projectile or any means to deal with them, which gives him problems approaching characters with projectile-heavy playstyles, such as. Marth also has problems finishing his opponents off due to the majority of his finishers needing to be tippered, outside of Counter. Thus, a Marth player must have excellent spacing to land the tipper the majority of the time. Without excellent spacing, Marth will have to resort to edgeguarding, which can be inconsistent at best due to his tippers. Additionally, while Counter can serve as a defensive tool, it is very punishable if Marth is not hit during his counter frames and deals mediocre knockback at the 20% cap, making it unreliable at KOing.

Overall, Marth is a character who represents the archetype of swordfighters: players who use him rely on spacing to keep opponents away, while also dealing damage and knockback with his tippers.

Tier placement history
On the first tier list for v0.9b, Marth was 3rd of S tier on the tier list, showing off a strong start at the beginning of the metagame. For the second tier list of v0.9b, Marth dropped to 4th, still in S tier. However, for the third tier list for v0.9b, Marth dropped to 8th of A tier. This is most likely due to more characters being able to deal with Marth and mu experience against Marth allowed for him to be exploited more as the metagame went on.

Marth has been dropped to 12th of A tier on the first Beta tier list due to find weaknesses that can be exploited. However, on the second tier list of Beta, Marth has rose to the 3rd spot of the A+ tier list.

Trivia

 * In the initial release of SSF2 ' s v0.9a demo, an unfinished Marth file was included. This caused rumors and speculation about his inclusion in the upcoming v0.9b demo, which turned out to be true. This is also true for and, even though they came to the game on later dates.
 * Marth, along with, , , , , and are the only characters so far who wear their default costumes in Team Battle when they are on the blue team.
 * Marth's official artwork is based on his artwork from Mystery of the Emblem.