Discuss Black Mage specific gameplay here.

First impressions: Haste feels kind of strange this time around due to using Meteor's animation. I don't know if that's intentional or not.

I like the new speed of the attack itself, though.

And the new animation/function on his Super Down Smash makes it a lot easier to plan around this time.

It seems he's recieved a bit of a nerf in the arial department. His down Arial doesn't seem to make him bounce anymore, he still goes straight down.

Black Mage seems to be overall worse. Not by too much, but enough to notice. His D-Air doesn't spike as hard on either hit, and he just feels overall more sluggish. At least his D-Throw is a more reliable chaingrab now. I'll have to play with him more for further testing.

Poor Black Mage.

Fair got nerfed, haste got nerfed, dair got nerfed. His three best options are now very questionable.

There are some improvements (a lot of them). His ground speed has been improved a lot. Meteor is faster in the air, ftilt is faster and stronger, and dsmash has some use. He still has his powerful options from 9a, with bair and uair strings. I think bair is stronger too.

However, I'm overall disappointed with how he turned out. He's going to be a LOT harder to use. His punish game has really been hit with the nerf hammer, but at least his approaches are easier and he still retains his strong throw game.

Black Mage being nerfed is really confusing to me, because he was already lower-tier...

Fair is unchanged

It's probably affected by the new physics, though.

You can still get EZPZ fair -> fair combos...arguably easier tbh since now the entire cast is bigger

.....his nair does about 20% if not DI'd, and it can be combo'ed into multiple times Basically a guarenteed 30+% if you can't escape.
Whether this is good or bad, I dunno.
I guess it's good for him, but it seems a bit too much for a character to have at first glance. Especially since (last time I checked) his dthrow does 20%, and it can be chain grabbed.
His dair is really awesome now, I can actually see how to sweetspot the weird ghostwithdagger...thing.
So, great job on him!....right?

As someone who's trying to learn black mage, can I get some basic ideas on what his gameplan is? Here's what i've gotten so far-

Stop- useless except for projectile reflection, or if you can get a charge(best time seems to be after KO or maybe a small one at spawn?). I still need to test what sort of punish you can get off common charge levels.

Haste- combo/punish fodder due to the down time.(i'm surprised at how much worse it is this version).

Meteor- seems better in air than on the ground? Great approach/pressure tool in that case, ok zoning on ground?

Teleport- My main thought's were 1. It's awful for recovering against an opponent, but awesome for getting back after aggressive edge guarding. Kinda screwed if you get knocked off, but can really commit to chasing/gimping if you get them. 2. Maybe some mild gimmicks with grounded tp into haste/followup on platform levels.

A/Ftilt/Dtilt/Utilt- all decent spacing tools with significant knockback.

Dsmash- Almost completely worthless? It seems atrocious in basically every category. Am I missing something? New charged form is meh(better, but still meh), since I feel like you're better off just charging a stop.

Fsmash- Pretty bad. The charge seems predictable and takes forever and the regular has tremendous windup for really eh payoff. I

Usmash- The absolute worst supercharge as far as I can tell(i've never figured out a way to land this besides high stop levels), but the normal smash is actually very very good, and seems like his go to kill move.

Nair- surprising damage potential. Good close quarters option.

Fair- feels worse with the new engine, but still easily one of his best options and main combo tools(I think?).

Bair- Another awesome move. Reminds me of pits bair.

Uair- It does what it needs to, but seems kinda meh.

Dair- Feels a LOT worse. Its more in line with other sweet spot moves where if you miss the sweet spot you get very little, but unlike those moves the payoff isn't instant, or even guaranteed. I also have yet to figure out a way to combo into it at all which really hurts. Thankfully the hitbox is huge, but one of my main strats pre b version was chasing and looking for good dair's to kill, or landing a dair into throw to setup the second spike. Neither seems very good now.

Dash- Seems really really bad(and did it get worse in the new patch?)

Throws- Forward was mostly to setup the second dair hit, down seems good, back feels pretty garbage, up might have combo potential, but i've yet to be able to do much.

Combos- i'm having input issues(can't shorthop easily with my current setup for some reason), so I've yet to really find anything outside of stop and shorthop fairs. I'm guessing theres more?

So yeah that's basically my breakdown as is. I feel really awkward because his air game seems to say "get in there" but almost all of his specials are mid/long range tools, and the awful smashes(besides up) doesn't help. Anyone care to share some basic strategy?

Do NOT underestimate Stop. Even charge level II is enough to chain into one of his Super Smash attacks.

Can I ask how? They seem to get more than enough time to punish on 2. It only seems to combo on 4+.

Huh... It must've changed between versions

But making a charge when the opponent is recovering or dying is still very practical. Sometimes one shot is all you need.

You probably already knew the charge Stop and Pseudo-Wavedash anyways but hopefully this helps

Also if anyone else wants to offer some BM tips, tricks, and combos i'd gladly appreciate it too, always looking to improve