by Doc, Owner, Founder, not the same guy as the other Doc
There’s several sets of Echo fighters in Smash Ultimate – Marth and Lucina, Roy and Chrom, Ryu and Ken, Peach and Daisy, Samus and Dark Samus, Pit and Dark Pit, Simon and Richter. Nintendo bills these fighters as being similar or the same as their original character, as if they’re a costume swap. Nintendo doesn’t play Smash, do they?
Originally, when Ultimate came out, we figured the echoes’ amiibo would be pretty similar to their base character. There were the small differences that we mostly overlooked, like the different angles on the Pits’ Side special, but for the most part we believed they were just clones. Turns out we were wrong.
One of the most interesting phenomena to come out of competitive amiibo recently is that Marth amiibo are now different than Lucina amiibo. Despite their only difference being sweetspots, Marth amiibo tend to do better when they’re a bit more aerial than Lucina – their sweetspots are pretty easy to hit on edgeguarded Forward and Back airs, so Marth can edgeguard easier. Lucina, meanwhile, stays grounded and only uses Forward smash and Down tilt, without ever adding on the aerial options that Marth uses.
Chrom and Roy might be the most interesting Echo difference (ignoring Ken and Ryu, which are basically different characters). Chrom has the option to use Up special out of shield, which is also a useful tactic in human play. Roy has no such luck – if you use this tactic with Roy, he’ll be vulnerable, and put him at a disadvantage. That’s actually a big deal – this means that Chrom has more onstage prowess and damage-building abilities than Roy does, despite Roy’s sweetspots being drastically stronger.
What may seem to be a small difference between Echoes is often a much larger difference in amiibo. Don’t just assume that because one amiibo has already had a declared “best” way to play, their Echo also has that same playstyle.
Amiibo Doctor 