Bandana Dee (SSF2)

Bandana Dee is a newcomer starter character in Super Smash Flash 2, who was revealed during the stream of the third day at Super Smash Con 2016. Like, Bandana Dee hails from Masahiro Sakurai's series of the same name. Like, Bandana Dee is a character who previously made an debutting appearance as an Assist Trophy. Bandana Dee possesses custom-made sprites that are made primarily by Steven, basically originates from his appearance since Kirby's Return to Dream Land, with a few sprites being heavily edited from Kirby Super Star Ultra. His appearance and moveset are mostly inspired by his appearance as a playable character in Kirby's Return to Dream Land, carrying a spear as his primary weapon. His moveset also references both regular Waddle Dees and Waddle Doos, carrying a parasol and a beam rod. His bandana dons the emblem of King Dedede, indicating his affiliation towards him. The designs for his sprite are based on his appearances in Kirby's Return to Dream Land and Kirby Super Star Ultra, with some added touches.

Bandana Dee is currently ranked at 40th of D+ on the current tier list, relegating him at the top of D tier (also known as low-mid tier). Bandana Dee possesses tremendous KO power in multiple of his moves; including all of his smash attacks, aerials, throws, as well as for his formidable special moves, Beam Whip/Wave Beam, Waddle Copter and Parasol Drill/Parasol Dive. Bandana Dee's most extra-ordinary strengths include his oppressive combo game; with great combo starters in multiple of his attacks (ex. his neutral aerial, down aerial, forward throw, up throw, down throw), and Bandana Dee also sports a quality grab and throw game; with one of the longest-reaching set of grabs in the game that extends the distance of his body too, and sports a very useful set of throws that possess unique properties (forward throw has high utility for sacrifical KOs; allowing him to achieve early KOs), and are all capable of chain-grabbing, and can set-up combos or even KO confirms and finishers. He also possesses a decent edgeguarding game, three midair jumps, and a great spike in his down aerial. Lastly, his side special, Spear Throw, traps the opponent onto the ground in a helpless condition for a relatively long period, allowing Bandana Dee to easily finish the opponent off or even follow-up potential with one of his powerful KOing options. His up special, Waddle Copter, functions as an incredible horizontal recovering tool; which allows him to easily weave at any direction chosen to make soft landings. As a result, he possesses one of the best horizontal recoveries in the game.

However, Bandana Dee drastically suffers from a severe lack of KO power; with his primary KO moves being hard to land, due to moderate startup and often relying on hard reads to pick up the KO and net a stock, which possesses similarities to. As expected by a small-sized lightweight, he is also harmed by low mobility, especially in the air, where his low air speed and midair-jumping heights make him one of the slowest characters there; only after and. He also struggles greatly with his skimpy endurance: Bandana Dee is tied with and  for being portrayed as the third-lightest character in the game. This is also worsened by his extreme floatieness; combined with one of the most abysmal vertical recoveries in the game, which relies on his double-jumps and low-distanced recovery makes him incredibly easy to KO as early as 35%. Though several of his attacks are multi-hits, some of them have significantly hampered utility; due to not connecting reliably into the final hit.

Bandana Dee possesses a negligible playerbase. As such, Bandana Dee entirely fails to sport any respective players that uses him in online tournaments, however, he has a fairly decent representation in online tournaments. Overall, Bandana Dee's strengths are completely underestimated by his outweighing drawbacks, placing him at the top of low mid-tier.

Attributes
Bandana Dee is overall a unique character; he is a slow, floaty featherweight character, similarly to ; however, unlike, his spear gives him a massive disjoint. This allows him to relatively compensate for his slow vertical and horizontal mobility (especially in the air) by effectively spacing out foes with long-reaching tilts and aerials. As a clone of, they both share the same attributes and mobilities, with a few exceptions: he has three midair jumps instead of five, albeit very short-distanced and gain lower height; he also has higher gravity, reduced air friction and air speed; with the latter being the 2nd-slowest in the game. Although his jumping height is marginally higher than 's, he also sports a lower short hop. Lastly, they both share among the lowest crouch and the same size with, as well as the same weight with , both being on par with him for being the third-lightest in the game. Bandana Dee also possesses a decent horizontal recovery move in his up special, Waddle Copter.

Overall, Bandana Dee is notable for being a objectively unorthodox fighter who utilizes magic and his spear as his most primary weapon. These grant him a staple asset: fantastic melee range, high KO power and drastical knockback. His jab, for example, is the 6th-strongest in the game (after, , and ), launching the opponents at a semi-spike stream, KOing a handful of the cast reliably below 150% by the ledge. Bandana Dee possesses a tremendous grounded game. His tilts possesses decent range and deal high knockback (all of which can KO reliably under 100%, with none being particularly slow). His smash attacks have lingering hitboxes, fabulous range, high power and good knockback, and all of which possess low startup and ending lag, and can all KO approximately under 100%. His dash attack is notorious for launching out multiple swings with his spear, with the final hit dealing great knockback to KO at high precents while also being an incredible anti-juggling tool at low-to-mid precents, possesses remarkable range, given Bandana Dee's small size, similarily to, , , , , , and ; it possesses the interesting trait of completely causing Bandana Dee to jump, causing him to fall off the platforms.

His aerial game is quite formidable, while also being ranked as a formidably fantastic edgeguarder in the game. He possesses three midair jumps that gain decent amount of height, which is coupled with Bandana Dee's decent aerial mobility. His neutral aerial is a strong multi-hit aerial that can hit up to four times, and the final hit is strengthened enough to KO as early as 100% in mid-air. His forward aerial sends out trails of sparking magic that possesses remarkable range and high knockback to KO as early as 100% by the ledge, allowing Bandana Dee to take stocks incredibly early. His back aerial is Bandana Dee's strongest and fastest aerial, a powerful backward-arcing sex kick; an effective KOing option successfully under 100%, a component of the wall of pain techniques, possesses remarkably long range, and is also a significant anti-airing and anti-juggling tool, with the latter being potential at low-to-mid precents. His up aerial is Bandana Dee's second-strongest and second-fastest aerial, it possesses good range to give it effective reach, being able to KO as early as under 90%. His down aerial boasts a powerful spike at the final hit, being able to KO reliably under low precents while easily gimping characters with fragile recoveries, like, or even himself.

Bandana Dee's most prominent strength is his formidable combo game. He provides very potent combo starters in dash attack, up tilt, down tilt, down throw, and up throw. He can continue his combos with his good aerials, and finish or break a combo with a back aerial or Waddle Copter. This gives him a versatile combo game that allows him to string together attacks for lots of damage. He also has solid frame-data on most of his attacks; with examples of swift moves being up tilt, Waddle Copter, and back aerial, two of which are good finishers.

Bandana Dee possesses a versatile grab and throw game: his down throw is a solid combo starter that can chain-grab fast-fallers at low percents until at 45%, and is notable for being Bandana Dee's strongest throw; being able to KO a handful of the cast at around 100% (and Bandana Dee noticeably becomes intangible during the initial frames, thus making him less vulnerable), while up throw is strengthened enough to become a viable KO throw at higher precents, killing at around 130%. His up throw can reliably start aerial combos at low-to-mid percents, and forward throw can start combos at low percents and can force a sacrificial KO by the ledge; similarily to. His back throw is guaranteed to place the opponent into a bad position; by either forcing them to recover low (which can easily lead into a down aerial) or forcing them into a tech-chase scenario. His back and forward throws are also capable of KOing opponents at higher precents by the ledge, and back throw also semi-spikes at higher precents. Lastly, his grabbing range is also surprisingly one of the highest in the game, extending the distance of his entire body. He also possesses a very fast pummel, and can therefore rack up damage quickly while resetting his stale moves.

Bandana Dee's special moveset gives him a variety of options to utilize: Beam Whip, his standard special move, can function as an interruption tool, and it can be charged to become Wave Beam, a quick-progressing projectile that is very useful for gimping characters with fragile recoveries. His side special, Spear Throw, can function as a useful gimping tool as well, and pins the opponent in-place for a short while, allowing Bandana Dee to follow up. Waddle Copter, his up special, is a respectably powerful attack, and can be utilized to provide impressive horizontal recovery. Finally, his down special, Parasol Drill, can function as a mobility and approaching option, and deals respectable knockback to KO reliably under a high precentage. Bandana Dee is also not without his powerful KO moves. Bandana Dee possesses tremendous KO power in multiple of his moves; including all of his smash attacks, aerials, throws, as well as for his formidable special moves, Beam Whip/Wave Beam, Waddle Copter and Parasol Drill/Parasol Dive.

However, Bandana Dee does not cease to exist without his fair plethora of exploitable flaws. As expected from Bandana Dee being a clone of, while he shares the same particular attributes above, he shares the same weight (but he is actually even lighter than ) simultaneously. He is on par with and  for being portrayed as the third-lightest character in the game. Because of this, he has a unimpressive endurance; which is further combined with his 5th-lowest gravity and the 2nd-slowest air speed, giving him not only extremely poor vertical endurance, but also among the worst horizontal endurance than the other fighters of a similar weight class; due to has abysmal recovery. Next to this, as expected by a small-sized lightweight, he is also harmed by low mobility, especially in the air: where his 2nd-slowest air speed and fairly low midair-jumping heights make him one of the slowest characters there; only after and. As a result, Bandana Dee is very suspectible to being knocked out as early as 35% by a sufficently powerful attack; such as a charged-up smash attack, and is prone to getting easily outpaced by speedy characters (ex., , , and ).

Bandana Dee's primary drawback is his deprived KO potential; despite possessing several solid combo breakers and finishers, he struggles to acheive early KOs, as none of his mighty-powerful moves have KO potential on middleweights under 100%, and his primary KO moves either are hard to land (back aerial and Waddle Copter), are slow/laggy (smash attacks), or simply aren't reliable KO finishers until at very high percents (all of his throws), with his strongest throw (down throw) failing to KO middleweights and fast-fallers until well past 195%. Although his grab and throw and combo games are one of the most outstanding in the game at low-to-mid percents, this truly becomes at high percents, as Bandana Dee fails to reliably receive KO confirms without platforms at any percent, despite possessing a myriad of combo starters. This lack of KO potential can force Bandana Dee to rely on hard reads or edgeguarding to take a stock; however, the latter is performed extremely risky by his recovery, or lack there-of. Additionally, while Bandana Dee possesses surprisingly incredible range for a character of his small size, Bandana Dee still possesses overall shorter range than a handful of the cast, like, and , , ,  and , which makes him prone to getting easily kept at bay and outspaced by most of the cast who possesses better range than Bandana Dee.

Bandana Dee special moves are also drastically simple to counteract if greeted with the proper reaction (while also being fairly laggy themselves); Beam Whip by itself is very fragile; it lacks any utility outside of interrupting approaches, and Wave Beam can be easily avoided, absorbed and reflected. Spear Throw is also out-of-reliableness, its overall distance is among the shortest (even shorter than short-reaching rolls), and the opponents can easily escape the pin, making it unreliable for follow-ups; and it deals overall terribly lackluster knockback for a side special by its kind, failing to KO reliably well past 300% by both variations. Waddle Copter is also easily avoided by its short range; and it can be extremely fragile on characters with a high weight (ex. ) or falling speed (ex. . Lastly, the aerial version of Parasol Drill, Parasol Dive, is much weaker than the grounded version, making it less reliable for KOing, despite its downward-launching trajectory and powerful meteor smashes, and the grounded version can be easily avoided as well.

His recovery is also on the situational side of the cast. As a player would expect from a theoretically effective horizontal recovery, Bandana Dee's recovery is very linear and very easily predicted; his 2nd-slowest air speed and his 5th-slowest falling speed on par with and, while improving his aerial mobility, gives him difficulties landing and making it back to the stage quickly, his mid-aerial jumps are short-distanced and short-heightened, and despite Waddle Copter's decent horizontal distance, it is one of the worst vertical recoveries in the game and easy to intercept, meaning his vertical recovery among the worst in the game. Combined with Bandana Dee's complete vulnerableness and Waddle Copter's drastically short range, his recovery is among the easiest to gimp, as the move grants Bandana Dee negligible height. Bandana Dee also possesses a mediocre defensive playstyle; despite among the fastest set of rolls, they gain among the shortest distance. His sidestep, while among the fastest, gains among the shortest period of intangibility and decent endlag, which is shared with his air dodge.

In the end, Bandana Dee is an unorthodox-mediocre glass cannon, a fighter with fair myriad of strengths, but is also drastically held back by his lack of mobility, defensive playstyle, recovery, and KO potential. He can function well with a bait-and punish playstyle, as his effective KOing attacks deal good knockback and are very useful for punishing. He can also play defensively and zone out opponents with his Wave Beam, Spear Throw, and long-ranged attacks throughout his playstyle, and stall with his multiple mid-aerial jumps. Regardless, Bandana Dee's underestimated and outweighing cons effectively overshadow his pros, and his pros are not strengthened enough to outweigh them all. Therefore, Bandana Dee is upsettingly ranked at the top of low mid-tier throughout the updates of the game, failing to perform any leaps throughout the tier list at all.

Trivia

 * During his reveal at Super Smash Con 2016, Bandana Dee was initially shown with a traditional costume; which depicted Bandana Dee possessing a green face, blue skin, the same-colored cheeks, pink eyes, the same-colored bandana with a light-blue symbol resembling his current model, and a purple and indigo spear. Recently, it was later scrapped before SSF2 Beta's release.
 * Prior to Beta 1.2.5, Bandana Dee was portrayed as a true "silent character" in the game, along with, , , , , , and , although Bandana Dee does utilize and retain particular sound-effects in his taunt and Star KO that originate from the -series.
 * Bandana Dee,, and are the only three fighters to have originally made a traditional appearance as an item.
 * Bandana Dee,, , and are currently the only four fighters so far to equip their default costumes in when they are on the red team during Team Battle.