He’s one of the most controversial fighters in the series, and for good reason. Here’s why we should ban Hero from competitive Smash for good.

The hero from the Dragon Quest series was introduced in late July, 2019, but before he hit the competitive scene, worries about his down special spells were buzzing amongst the community. The most compelling cases to ban Hero from competitive Smash in the latest title for the Nintendo Switch make sense, even if you don’t think he’s overpowered.

Meta Knight remains the only character majorly banned from any Smash Bros. title, with his juggling and flying skills making the Kirby series anti-hero a no-go at professional competitions for Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

Bayonetta and Cloud were definitely broken in Smash 4, but their introductions in the last bit of Smash 4‘s life gave them a bit of a pass. They were both nerfed in Smash Ultimate, no longer making them so much of a threat in competitive play.

A lot of the Smash Ultimate broken characters are subjective. They may not always be top-tier, but that probably comes more down to character matchups rather than the character actually being broken.

The Hero, however, does not fall into a subjective category. We need to ban Hero from competitive Smash (South Australia already has), and here’s why.

Critical hit

The ban Hero brigade has largely been led by South Australia’s recent ban. They state that “RNG permeates every element of Hero’s design, from spell selection to random critical hits and hocus pocus effects. While randomness has to varying degrees always been present in competitive games and other Smash games, Hero is so dependent on randomness that it cannot be ‘played around’ or accounted for in competitive play.”

In perhaps the most compelling point in their decision, South Australia’s Smash community states that their “argument is similar to the reason why items are banned in competitive play.” The logic is all there because when fighting games lean more toward RNG, less skill is required to win.

Is Hero considered OP? According to the South Australian ban, that isn’t quite the issue at hand here. “We want to emphasise that this ban is not because hero is too strong,” they state, “but because he is anti-competitive.” Anti-competitive here relates to how Hero can either be the worst or best character in any given match-up, depending on both his critical hits and what random spells populate in his down-special menu (not to mention all that Hocus Pocus presents).

Critical hits belong in RPGs, not fighting games. Professional players train to be able to react to weak and strong hitboxes of moves, all of which have consistent damage. When that precise math goes out the window, there is literally no way for professionals to train for Hero’s randomness.

Spells of the World

A major con to having Hero available for play in international tournaments is that of major language barriers. Japanese and English are some of the most common languages that Smash players speak, but without a consistent means of understanding what the spells on the down special menu mean, the entirety of what is meant to be Hero’s weakness flies out the window.

Related: Smash fans from around the world react to Hero’s release

Per the nature of his gameplay style, Hero’s spells list is visible to all players in the match. He can linger on a certain spell as a bait, or continue resetting the menu until he hits a spell that he likes. It is almost balanced in that you can anticipate moves such as Magic Burst and Kamikazee before they happen (but it’s not like you can do much to block either, especially offstage).

It’s not feasible for players to learn all of Hero’s spells in every language that Smash is played in. If players can’t understand the spells Hero is using, they are immediately at a massive disadvantage that is both unfair and broken.

Patch him back into the fray

The inability for an opponent to be able to read Hero’s spells is cause for great concern. The balancing element of his “tells” are immediately gone. The solution floating around is that of including small, universal icons for the spells. This would both make the spells easily understandable for the player choosing the cast, while also allowing players that speak any language to understand what spell is being chosen.

Past the spell icons, I honestly cannot think of a way to feasibly nerf Hero’s spells as an overall concept. While the aforementioned Kamikazee, Hocus Pocus, and Magic Burst, along with Whack and Thwack (at higher percents), have the potential to be broken, their randomness simply cannot be removed without changing the way the Hero is played. Literally, axing all of his down special spells is the only solution here, and that is fairly extreme.

Do you think the community should ban Hero from competitive ‘Smash’?