The hype train for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate lasted a long time, thanks to the announcement of DLC. It would be because of this that many Nintendo streams would be watched with hopes of information on whom the next character would be. Of course, you can hardly talk about Smash Ultimate’s DLC without bringing up The Game Awards 2018, where many were taken aback by Nintendo’s surprise announcement of who the first DLC character would be before the game released that following night. That character would happen to be Persona 5’s Joker.
Being Smash Ultimate’s original DLC character (if you exclude Piranha Plant), Joker is insane in many ways. There aren’t a lot of things you can do outside of skill that can beat him, but there definitely are measures you can take to make the fight a bit easier for you. Read on to figure out what you can do to win against him.
Joker’s Strengths
Joker’s primary strength lies in his unique mechanic, Rebellion Gauge. As Joker takes damage (especially throughout the use of his Down-B), his meter will fill up, and he’ll automatically summon Arsene, his Persona. Arsene provides a buff in damage, launch power, and range to all of his offensive moves, with some of them receiving considerable changes in functionality. His DAir, for example, changes from a downward swiping move to a powerful spike. His Down-B also changes to an attack that can counter enemy attacks and reflect projectiles.
Arsene offers even more versatility than his kit already has. His Neutral-B, in which he wields a gun, is a mid-ranged projectile functioning as a movement option and an edgeguarding tool thanks to the many ways it can be used. Another example is his Up-B without Arsene, a tether grab that allows for recovery mixups offstage and combo extensions in advantage. All of these tools aid in Joker’s ability to apply nonstop pressure on his opponents.
Finally, there’s Joker’s mobility and frame data. Joker gets around really well, thanks to his ground and aerial speed being quite fast. Despite being a tall character, his hurtbox is smaller than usual, thanks to the nature in which he moves around. This pairs really well with the low startup and endlag on his moves, making it very hard to punish him for most of his attacks.
Joker’s Weaknesses
Joker’s most notable weakness is his normal power and damage output. Without Arsene to assist him, a lot of his moves are very weak and have low knockback. This is good for pulling off combos but bad for netting the kill when he needs to. His Smash attacks have good kill power, but they’re all not very safe, meaning Joker generally struggles to take stocks. This makes Joker even more of a struggle to play, thanks to the precision required to do what he is capable of.
Next is his recovery, not being the best. His Up-B being a tether means that he can get gimped by any attack or projectile as he’s pulling himself back to the stage. He can still use mix-ups with it, but that requires he has a jump on hand; if he gets hit away from the stage in the middle of it, he’s pretty much done for. His recovery isn’t much better with Arsene activated, as it changes into a rising move without a hitbox that you can react to. The invincibility on startup is nice but doesn’t really help when you can wait at the ledge to attack him.
Strategy & Counterplay
What’s most important when it comes to fighting Joker is knowing how to play around Arsene. You can make him go away faster by damaging Joker, but that requires confrontation, which can result in you getting killed from his sheer damage output. However, Arsene also goes away over time. It’s up to you to strike a balance between camping him out and confronting him to rack on the damage. While resorting only to camping him out may be the best option, his mobility will ensure that you’ll eventually get tagged.
That being said, he’s still a major threat without Arsene due to his combos and the ways he can tack on damage bit by bit. This will mostly come from throws, especially at lower percents, so you’ll need to do your best to stay mobile and elusive. It becomes harder for Joker to execute his combos when he has to work off of stray hits rather than confirms out of throws and reads. Of course, you should be careful in the air since the multi-hit nature of his attacks makes you susceptible to drag-down combos.
Good/Bad Matchups
Joker’s tools make him a threat to a vast majority of the cast. Those he has a notably easier time beating are those that he can combo easily, which makes his lack of power a non-issue. Those would be heavy characters like King Dedede, King K. Rool, Bowser, and Donkey Kong. He also does better against characters that are generally slower, as well as those with more exploitable recoveries to take advantage of. These are more of the same characters, as well as Byleth, Incineroar, Corrin, and Ganondorf.
The matchups Joker loses are few and far between. These mostly consist of characters that are hard to hit due to their hitboxes being smaller than usual, like Greninja, Inkling, Squirtle, and Sonic. He also has a harder time against characters that can keep him out of range, usually with mid-range projectiles or superior disjointed attacks. Mega Man, Min Min, R.O.B., and Lucina.