This entire list is ordered except for RC and psykid, who are interchangeable. I put a black line to separate the broken from the balanced, even though almost all characters are pretty broken. The characters above the line are top tier.
Rationales: CBs: Crazy space control, pressure, combos, and kill confirms. The only person I know of who doesn't think he is AT LEAST top 3 is BSN. Difficult to play, potential not fully discovered yet. CE: Mobility, nair, kill power, everything you could possibly ask for in a character. Puffy: Nair is the best air-to-air in the game by far, can ToD the entire cast in some way, best edgeguarding in the game, did I mention nair. Metron: Metron is arguably one of the best characters in the game, but he is held back not by strength, but by both difficulty and lack of knowledge. The only things we KNOW about Metron come Igorex, who is only active on the cord. The rest is theory. He is also BY FAR the most difficult and tech-dependent character in the game. He has a frame-1 into death option and an infinite recovery. Cat: Cat has the best low profile in the game and surprisingly high reward on hit. Nair is super big and rewarding and NZ is a decent projectile. Not as strong as the top tiers, but able to hold his own. Psykid: Psykid and RC are interchangeable, but I personally believe Psykid is better because he has ToDs, great air moves, and great air movement. He is strong, but has significant flaws like a horrible recovery and weird physics. Semi-difficult to play. RC: High kill power, annoying projectile, and an actual reversal. The issue though is high end lag on some moves, worst taunt roll in the game, and reliance on only 2 starters. He is still pretty strong though, but not quite high tier. Mike: Mike is very underrated in my opinion, but not as good as those above him. He has a fast jab that decimates shields and strong kill options along with easy ladder combos on stages with platforms. His issues though are that he is prone to many combos (like eagle ToD) and that his main combo (jabstring) can sometimes be hard to do. Chrarth: Definitely very fun to play, but not that good. He has a great neutral, but he dies almost every time he is hit. He has a bad recovery, slow air movement, and weakness to combos though, and his defense is not very good so if you can get in he is at a major disadvantage. SG: My favorite character, but not a great one. He doesn't have fast moves and he is overly reliant on Nair, his best move. He is also super slow and is absolutely combo food. Despite this, however, he has broken combos and barrel, which offstage can lead to crazy edgeguards. If someone can play really well, he can be good. Spacedog: Spacedog has a decent neutral and an alright keepaway game, but he cannot kill. First, losing air lasers made his zoning a lot worse. Second, his only real kill options are edgeguards and dz, both of which are easy for many characters to avoid. Third, he is very prone to DI. Fourth, he has low reward on hit and can have a hard time racking up damage. Finally, he does not have strong SH aerials, and his overall air game is weak. Fast fall speed is more of a disadvantage than an advantage. Mariano: He only has one decent move, fz. Other than that he is complete trash. First, his main ender, uz, almost never hits correctly so he cannot consistently kill. Second, he lacks long range moves. Third, he has the worst projectile in the game, with no range or reward on hit. Fourth, he has high endlag on his moves. Finally, his infinite recovery does not help him much as it is still very predictable. He is not good. Pakkuman: You all know this one.
