Pit or Dark pit : A rundown of the differences

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    I see a frequent missconception from non Pit mains : thinking than Dark Pit is the strickly better Pit. I know where this mainly comes from, hun hun. I have discussed with  other Pits mains, I now want to break down the difference of those two characters and clear the missconception.

Note : Kill percents were tested against Mario on Battlefield (training mode). DI is off, that means an opponent will die later in real games. Percents values are mainly here to compare both Pits.
Smash jargon (by Shabacka).

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    Before I go into explaining how the differences affect the character, let's see what the differences are  :
    Arrows. DPit's arrows deal one more percent and travel faster. Pit's arrows have more range and more importantly are much more controllable. This trade off is definitly in Pit's favor. 1% is meaningless but the control on the arrow opens so many options and makes Pit's neutral and edge guard much better.

    FTilt, Pit's FTilit has 25 more Base Knock back. That means it kills around 30% earlier (sweetspot : Pit 120% Dark Pit : 150%) There is a reset DPit can do that Pit cannot because of that difference of knockback, but that's really minor. Pit has the better FTilt.

    Side B :

Pit (everywhere)	DPit (edge of the stage)	DPit (other side of stage)
140	80	160

     DPit's kills at crazy number (60% earlier at the edge of the stage).
 DPit's side B sets up for Edge guarding when Pit's side B sets ups for juggling. Which goes into DPit's favor since edge guarding is a much more valuable situation as the Pits can go deep to intercept opponent's recovery and it can be rewarded by taking the whole stock.
 Finally Dark Pit's have electrical effect. Though not very important.
     The only advantage Pit's have over Dark Pit's is since it kills of the top, it will kill at the same percent no matter where you are on the stage (and kills earlier on platformes). But DPit's has so much more Knockback that the kill percent in which Pit's kills is pretty much the same than DPit's from the other side of the stage (just 20% later for DPit from the other side of the stage).
    DPit's side B is the better one on pretty much every points.

    Those are all the differences.  Overall, both Pits play exactly the same, so you can easily switch between each of them.

    The choice between Pit and Dark Pit is on how much you value Pit's arrows' utility plus better FTilt against DPit's hammer's kill power.

    Let's start with DPit's side B. Why it is over estimated. Let's see it's frame data (both Pit's side Bs have the same frame data) : it's hitbox starts frame 18 at least (16 for the iner detecter to start + 2  frames after detection + travel time) with super armor starting frame 11. That means any move will outspeed it and it is possible to shield on reaction unless you are right next to the opponent (19 frames bar). You just cannot throw it on neutral.
   And when it misses, expect to be punished : It has 46 frames of cooldown if it touches a shield (-37 frames on shield*), and 48 if it doesn't touch anything. Basically, Your opponent has time to drop shield and throw his most powerful smash.

    Don't get me wrong, DPit's side B is a strong option : the killing power is incredible, it is DPit's kill move with the longest range and at high percent you can start trading hitbox  and take the lion's share with side B's super armor.
But this is not Mario's Usmash. It is not the number 1 kill option.
To use Side B successfully, you have to play around it : condition and read your opponent to land the side B.

Now let's see the advantage Pit has over Dark Pit.
     Let's quickly talk about FTilt. Sweetspot FTilt is a kill move.  It is extremly good to space with him or catch get up options. Having one kill option kill 30% earlier is nothing to sneez at.

    Then let's see Pit's arrows. Most people overlook them because arrows are very tough to use and there aren't many pro pit in the highlight to show what happens when utilized fully.
    Arrows give you a better neutral as you can jump and curve the arrow down. Jump arrow is great since aerial arrows have 16 frames less lag than grounded arrows.
   They also give a much better edge guarding potential. You can annoy recoveries with charging time (fox, falco, you can trade an arrow with Ness's UpB1** to seal a stock). You can rack up damage safely while the opponent is offstage.
    But, and this is where it becomes interestng, you can catch people's double jump. It is very complicate and partially random, but if you manage to do so, it can become very ugly for the opponent.
    Here is a good example : Earth catches Cloud's double jump and forces him to upB which wastes his limit. This changes the course of the Neutral for the rest of the stock.
    Worst, some characters that rely too much on their double jump willl simply die from that arrow. In the case where their upB still let them recover, they became much more predictable now that they lost their double jump option. You just have to go off stage to gimp them with an aerial or Orbitars.
    Addionals options Pit's arrows bring (or enhance) : preventting your opponent from edge guarding you when you are knocked off stage, more combos (upthrow > arrow),  juggling from high distance, playing around reflectors (curve the arrow up then back to land on the opponent, if it is reflected it will return going up)...

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    To conclude, Pit and Dark Pit shine at different things.

If you play more aggresif, your opponent frequently leaves himself exposed or you can condition him to create opportunities, pick Dark Pit.
If you play more defensive and your opponent is very prudent, prefer Pit.

     But the higher you go into ranking, the less players will get caught by sideB and Pit's solid options will take over DPit's sideB's variance.

    But as both characters are extremly close, you can vary depending on the character and playstyle of your opponent.

Big thanks to Justice and Pit's discord chat for their help.
If you want to join the Pit Discussion, come to Discord chat and Smashboard forum.

Ps : For those wondering why Earth (number 1 Pit in the world) prefers Pit, here is his answer on ask.fm x) )

*calculated by Spacejam

**
Ness' UpB1 is the first part of UpB (the thunder projectile), UpB2 is the second part after Ness had hit himself with the projectile.