If you have not read the breakdowns of previous seasons, please be sure to check them out below:
C-Tier tournaments, the lowest ranked tournament, will be represented through the top 8 placements. Next up the scale would be B-Tiers, where we will take the top 16, and then for A-Tiers, we will take the top 32. Finally for S-Tiers, the tournaments with the highest accolades and tournament entrants, we will be taking the results of the top 64.
A player must win a single game with a character for the result to count. If a player pulls out a character in a set but does not win a single game with that character, then the character is not counted. Also consider that character data is dependent on data recording from tournament and event runners and may be incomplete. Let's take a look at the results.
The image above showcases each character’s “placement percentage.” A placement percentage signifies the share of all counted tournament results for the PGRUv3 time period in which a character successfully placed, based on the rules laid down earlier. As you can see, of the 82 unique characters in the game, 44 accounted for at least 1.0% of results, the highest amount ever in all of Ultimate’s meta.
ROB tops the roster for the fourth season in a row. However, compared to the last 3 seasons (including the unofficial Post-Lockdown period covering the second half of 2021 through Let's Make Big Moves 2022), it is by a very small margin. ROB barely holds the lead, now with only a 0.05% difference over the original offline number 1, Wolf.
Two new faces appear in the top 10 for the first time offline. Both Steve and Cloud had notoriously strong results during the WWR seasons, and are now making their offline top 10 debuts at 7th and 9th respectfully.
The strength of the Fighter Pass 2 characters remains a hot topic within the community. Here we see that both Pyra/Mythra and Steve are currently sitting as the strongest from the pass, each securing a Top 10 spot. Min Min, Kazuya, and Sephiroth are not far behind, though, all landing spots throughout the top 20. While Sora may be farther away from his DLC brethren, he still is capturing over 1% of results throughout the meta.
Here we see the biggest changes between the last offline season and the first PGRU season in 2 years. While the two time periods are different in size, we can still see some notable changes happening in the meta.
Outside of that, Corrin, Luigi, Shulk, and Inkling all saw increases across all 3 categories. While not in the top 10 for rank increases, Steve is also another notable character who has shown improvement. Steve had the highest overall percentage increase, catapulting his share of results up to the top 10. Steve also had the second highest increase in unique players getting results, right behind Kazuya.
The character that seemed to be hit the hardest in this past season was Ness. While Ness did not top the board for losses in each category, he was among the bottom five in all three. This is a similar trend to what was seen in Smash for Wii U’s meta, where Ness started as a strong threat, but over time as the meta developed and DLC matchups proliferated, his results share started to trend downwards.
Other characters who saw drops in all three categories are Pikachu and Zero Suit Samus. ROB, who has been the meta defining character for the past 4 combined offline and online seasons, may still be on top. However, ROB lost the highest percent of results, making the gap between it and the rest of top 5 that much closer, and given this trend, ROB could finally fall out of the top spot next season.
Here we see a breakdown of the results in each tier, including which characters have the highest amount of results, and their peak performances in each tier.
Because the season is on the shorter side, the tier breakdowns don’t have the highest abundance of data. S and A tiers notably have the smallest amount, which is why they might have a higher variety of characters who were not in the top 10 overall. In S Tier tournaments, ROB was the most prominent character in the top 64s of each supermajor. 7 out of the overall top 10 take up spots, and it is most notably where Steve, a character of recent contention, has shown the most success. This is also the only tier of tournaments where Mario, Olimar, and Pokemon Trainer see high placement rates.
Roy and Pyra/Mythra share the number one spot for A tiers, with Pyra/Mythra having a higher secondary/pocket rate. Only 6 out of the overall top 10 characters are here, with this serving as Sephiroth, Lucina, Wario, and Fox’s only notable category.
Pyra/Mythra takes the lead in the B tier by a solid margin over the overall number 1, ROB. Once again, only 7 out of the overall top 10 make it on the list, with Samus, Luigi, and Shulk all being unique cases for this tier.
Lastly in C tier, Wolf absolutely dominates this category with almost a 2% lead over number two, Snake. Interestingly enough, this is the only tier Wolf makes the top 10 in, even though Wolf has the overall number 2 spot. This tier has the highest number of the overall top 10 present, with 8 of them filling the top 8 slots. Sonic and Peach make out the last two.
This chart showcases the correlation between a character's placement percentage and the amount of players who have contributed to that character's results. Historically, there are usually pretty large outliers on these graphs, but this season is relatively tame. Characters who are above the line tend to make results from having a large unique group of players, while character under the line get their results from the smaller pool of players who are consistently performing
Above the line, the characters that seem to stand out the most are Steve, Joker, Diddy Kong, and Chrom. As noted earlier, Steve had the second largest increase in unique players, which has brought him a higher share of results. Diddy Kong and Joker are two other characters who are quite popular across top and high level play. While Joker may not see as much top level representation, Joker’s international regional results showcase that the character is still incredibly popular and well represented. Lastly, Chrom does not have many consistent performers, but still has an active enough playerbase to drive the character above 1% of results, even if a solid portion of the character's usage is as a secondary or pocket.
This showcases the players who have contributed the largest amount of results in this season.
A new segment for this series of articles is looking at the combined results since the final balance of ultimate. Here is the current placement percentage after adding in the PGRU v3 results.
Even though ROB has been the number one character for both Post-Lockdown and PGRUv3, when taking the results since the final patch in October (and the addition of February tournaments that were not apart of the Post-Lockdown article), ROB is surprisingly usurped by not just one, but two characters. Wolf comes out on top as the number 1 character with the highest percentage of results, with Palutena following right behind as number 2. In total, 46 characters have maintained over 1% of results, which is more than half the cast.
Lastly, here is a look at peak major results since the final patch of every character in the game. Note: Dark Samus, Daisy, Richter, and Dark Pit utilize the same result as their echo fighter counterparts. Also, ties were given to whoever hit the peak first. This will change in future articles to the most recent result. Even after this article is posted, this has shifted greatly due to some of the majors that have already occurred. New threats consistently arise in the competitive scene, bringing their characters to new heights.
There you have it, folks. The PGRU v3 era may be Smash Ultimate’s shortest competitive scene, but it has been filled with diverse winners and characters. See you all next time at the end of PGRU v4!
, we have a list of tournaments that could be potential tier equivalents, and will be utilizing the various tournaments below to determine our data. 
and Tea 
and Midwest player Skar 
. The other is Steve, who has multiple event winners. There is acola 
taking GENESIS 8, Light 
taking MomoCon 2022, and Yoshidora 
taking Maesuma TOP#8.
in the US, HIKARU 
, Shuton 
