Idle pose

One of Mario's idle poses in Ultimate

Idle poses (sometimes referred to as idle animations, and referred to as Wait internally in all games since Super Smash Bros. Melee) are minor, mainly nonconsequential animations that play at random if a character stands still for a length of time.

Though mostly aesthetic, idle poses can change the direction of the passive shields carried by Toon Link and Young Link, as well as Link prior to Super Smash Bros. 4, therefore affecting their ability to block projectiles.

Trivia

• In Ultimate, Bowser, Zero Suit Samus, Mega Man, Bowser Jr., Ridley, Incineroar, Joker, and Banjo & Kazooie are the only characters to make any sort of sound in their idle animations.
  • In Melee, this only applied to Bowser, while in Brawl, this was applied to Mario, Wario, Pit, and King Dedede.
  • Bowser (Melee and Ultimate) and Ridley are the only characters whose idle animation have them vocalize rather than using sound effects.
• Master Hand has an idle pose, but it is never seen in normal gameplay because the AI never allows enough time between his attacks. It can be seen if Master Hand is controlled by the player, either by using the Master Hand glitch in Melee or playing as him in Adventure Mode: World of Light in Ultimate; for his idle pose, he simply clenches his fist.
  • In SSB4, there is also a chance that Master Hand will stay still for a while while Crazy Hand attacks solo, resulting in him doing the idle pose.
• In Super Smash Bros. 4 and Ultimate, there is a chance that a character will instantly perform one of their idle poses once they climb on top of a ladder.
• Normally, idle poses will not play when a character is holding a small item, like a Capsule. There are some peculiarities with how this functions, however:
  • In Melee, Mewtwo can still perform any of its idle poses when holding an item, since it uses telekinesis to carry items rather than directly holding them.
  • In all games where he is featured, Sonic unclenches his fists when holding an item.
  • In Super Smash Bros. 4, Yoshi, Link, and Sheik will revert to their Super Smash Bros. Brawl idle animations if they hold an item. Dr. Mario, Lucas, and Roy will revert to the animation of their base character (Mario, Ness, and Marth respectively).
    • In Ultimate, Yoshi, Link, and Dr. Mario use their correct idle animations, but Sheik still reverts to her Brawl idle animation.
  • In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, there are multiple cases of characters using nonstandard idle animations while holding an item:
    • Fox, Luigi, Jigglypuff, Falco, Pit, Diddy Kong, and Wolf revert to their Brawl idle animations.
    • Mewtwo and Dark Pit revert to their Super Smash Bros. 4 idle animations (which in Dark Pit's case is the same as Pit's), and Daisy will perform Peach's idle animation.
    • Marth, Lucina, Roy, and Chrom all use Marth's Brawl idle animation.
    • Lucas will still revert to Ness's Brawl idle animation despite Ness not doing so.
    • Simon and Richter will perform the same alternative idle animation that neither normally possess.
    • Inkling Boy and female Byleth do not perform their altered idle animations.
    • Some characters that do not reuse previous animations still have nonstandard behavior while carrying an item: Bowser's lower jaw clips through his mouth, Toon Link reuses his facial expressions from SSB4, Mega Man does not look forward, and Kazuya's stance is altered.
    • Almost all characters do not blink when carrying an item, with the only ones to blink being Yoshi and Pyra.
    • Sora's stance changes entirely when holding an item, slinging the Keyblade over his shoulder while holding the item with his free hand, a reference to his Valor Form battle stance from Kingdom Hearts II.
• Some characters have an animation that actually is part of their regular standing animation, but are often mistaken for idle poses. Unlike idle poses, they play at regular intervals instead of randomly (and they can be seen in the character customization screen on both 3DS and Wii U versions, or by holding a item, where idle poses never play). Some examples include Daisy, Sheik and Roy.
  • In some cases, this animation is used to transition into the default idle animation, either from their previous one (in the case of Sheik) or their base character's (in the case of Daisy, Roy, and other clones). Other characters, such as Chrom, Dark Samus, Mythra and Mii Gunner (SSB4 only) have separate animations for this purpose.
• Lucina, Dark Pit and Ken are the only characters to share their default idle stance and idle poses with another character. Richter has a unique idle stance, but he has the same periodic idle poses as Simon.
  • Daisy, Dr. Mario, Roy, Inkling Boy, Richter, and female Byleth share the same initial frame of idle as their original counterparts despite having altered idle stances, likely so that their shared animations can transition seamlessly into their idle pose.
• While Bayonetta has two idle poses, only one of them appears under normal circumstances.
• Since Brawl, six characters have not had the traditional two idle poses, those being Peach, Zelda (prior to Ultimate), Jigglypuff, Pokémon Trainer (Brawl only), Byleth, and Steve. Peach has four, the most of any fighter; both Zelda and Pokémon Trainer had three before losing one in Ultimate, both characters are the only fighters to lose an idle pose; Jigglypuff and Byleth only have one (though in Byleth's case it differs between the male and female variants, effectively resulting in two); Steve does not have any idle poses at all. Jigglypuff technically did not have an idle pose before Ultimate, as its idle pose was simply part of its regular animation, but it has always had two identical idle poses programmed in.
• Steve is the only character in the series to lack idle poses in any game. While idle poses did not exist in Smash 64, and Donkey Kong, Link, Samus, Yoshi, Pikachu, Ness, Jigglypuff, the Ice Climbers, and Roy did not have any in Melee, they all did have idle poses from Brawl onward (or, in the case of Roy and Jigglypuff, Smash 4 onward and Ultimate, respectively).

References

Every idle pose in Smash 4