Daily Match-up Discussion

[Thor]

If bowser uses his armor right, falco can't hurt him much.

This is true of literally every Bowser MU.

It doesn't stop me from winning most of the matches I play with Bowser as Falco, because Bowser is delicious combo food for Falco (At low percents, Falco's reflector will hit him with the outward hitbox, then suck him in with the inward hitbox, which then easily links into utilt or a smash attack that can usually then be followed up with an aerial).

Glyph I don't think Falco-D3 is as bad as some say (it may be even - I'd need to do a lot of theorycrafting and think about it to explain why I think this) and I'm pretty sure Falco wins or is even in Falco-Bowser. At the same time, Falco needs a lot of MU knowledge as compared to some other characters (in my opinion, Captain Falcon's raw (in neutral) knee, Raptor Boost, and Falcon Kick -> dair -> stuff combos can let him beat his way through an unfamiliar MU with relative ease, some characters excepted of course).

 

[Bashdemears]

^ too add on to that I think there's few occasions where anyone has to change their gameplam based on the MU.

The only times I can think of is anyone having to wewve through Waddle Dees and playing against jiggs

 

[NEWB]

Zelda forces you to change your gameplan. I would say having to deal with a good sonic does too.

Toon link can change your gameplan if you can't remove arrows.

 

[Tybis]

ZSS does have jab and utilt as panic options, but utilt is not safe on shield and jab isn't either (I think). Her best option OoS is either jab, utilt, or uair I believe.

I personally use Dash attack and Dtilt OoS since they transition into combos very easily.

She has trouble against IC's because a lot of her grab-game doesn't work since you can only grab one char at a time, and she can get out-spammed by Icebergs so she pretty much HAS to try to go in. She does get an added strength with her SideB; it can catch the climbers more easily since the hitlag will keep the hitbox around longer on hit, making it hard for both of the climbers to avoid it, so be wary of that. Nana can help you edgeguard her tether recovery occasionally if you've set it up, and it's usually very effective (and accidental ).

Stagewise; with platforms, she's got very safe upB/Usmash pokes and a few other tricks. With few platforms (FD) she can rely more heavily on SideB, grab, and paralyzer to space really hard.
I THINK stages with prominent slopes mess her up, such as Metal Cavern? IDK she's pretty well at adapting.

Does Falco even have a bad MU in this game

Honestly, I'm unsure, asides from maybe DDD. He just kinda inherited his... lack of bad matchups from vBrawl I guess. I'd think Mario/Pit go even with him AT LEAST, since they can deal with lasers and can screw up his recovery. Kirby might not care about getting spammed since he can pancake and shoot Final Cutters off. Are IC's still unfavorable for him in Minus? How bout Pika or Lucario?

 

[Thor]

Honestly, I'm unsure, asides from maybe DDD. He just kinda inherited his... lack of bad matchups from vBrawl I guess. I'd think Mario/Pit go even with him AT LEAST, since they can deal with lasers and can screw up his recovery. Kirby might not care about getting spammed since he can pancake and shoot Final Cutters off. Are IC's still unfavorable for him in Minus? How bout Pika or Lucario?

Part of Falco's moveset is makes this kind of true is that nothing on Falco is inherently polarizing/ridiculously good on him aside from things we all see as staples - lasers and dair [dair makes the Captain Falcon MU much easier for him, since he can actually dair directly in front of CF's aerial side+B and hit him out of it - doesn't even need to be above the good Captain for that]. And I suppose jab and maybe reflector. His gatling combo may also be problematic, as is the JC on Phantasm, but removing the JC wouldn't exactly balance out a lot of his MUs. His great recovery also does much to aid him, but I'd hate to see a massive recovery nerf to balance him... [maybe a firebird with less protection, but I'm tired of Falco's wings being clipped in every Smash game - I like to see that this bird is able to fly].

Mario can be annoying - I'd say it's probably even, but getting caped is rarely a problem from personal experience. As for Pit, you CAN shoot arrows into Falco but he can recover in awkward positions or usually jump around the arrows, and if he can survive one arrow with a quick meteor cancel he'll usually get a firebird off that will get him on the ledge or on stage.

Kirby is a frustrating MU because he can duck a lot of Falco's standard tools, and Kirby WOULD win by a lot if he could duck jab [thank god for jab still hitting a crouching Kirby...].

ICs actually feel really easy for Falco in my opinion - he can laser and side+b as safely or more safely compared to vBrawl, and his dair -> jab is now safe on shield, unlike in vBrawl, so approaching is no longer a problem for Falco [plus no zero-death grabs], and Falco's reflector can give ICs hell... the AI is also not great at meteor cancelling, so dair is a viable option to KO Nana at low percents, which weakens the ICs considerably.

Pikachu not having the CG means this MU can't be as bad as vBrawl - Falco CAN work around Thunder [it's inconvenient but not unbeatable] and I think Falco can mess up Pikachu's bair approach rather well. It could very well be even but I sincerely doubt Pikachu wins it.

Lucario is a tough case - I THINK Falco can play it so it's even, but Falco can't early KOs on Lucario besides dair (or well-placed fsmashes near the edge of stages), so Lucario will often power up. That said, Falco can actually deal with double team ok, and he's got other tools to deal with Lucario's stuff. I am not convinced as of now that Falco wins that MU - I think it's either even or Lucario favor.

Marth is not fun for Falco either, but I wouldn't say Marth wins it.

 

[Thor]

A while back, I recall Falco's Up-B having a long startup time, leaving him a sitting duck in the air, vulnerable to Spikes. Is that still in, or was Fire Bird's startup sped up? I forget.

Random idea: Perhaps tapping Up-B could make Falco do the full-length recovery with no fire (maybe even no hitbox at all), and holding B could make him use a variant of Fire Bird that has the usual GFX and attack power (more than usual, even?) but only travels the distance it did in vBrawl.

"Personally, I prefer the air" or "Personally, I prefer FIRE", your choice: Tap or Hold. Recover or Attack.

That would be an idea I don't like for a variety of reasons I won't discuss right now. But you said a while back you hated him always saying "Personally, I prefer FIRE!" and some others pointed out how vulernable he was, so they sped startup back up. He can still be meteored out of it though.

 

[Thor]

Good memory! Yeah, I didn't like him saying that so often -- even "You're not worth the trouble" on Star KO gets old after a while -- but I think Falco needs a bigger weakness. He's too good all-around currently, with very few unfavorable matchups.

If not making his recovery more vulnerable, what else could be a weakness for Falco?

His [in neutral] air game is already rather substandard in my opinion - kicking reflector does little and most of his other stuff is outranged - if he's facing backward, he has bair, but he has to kick reflector for any range while forward, which is very obvious [as is bair] and therefore can be spaced around. His combo game is also generally harder to use than most of the cast - you get nothing off of ftilt, you have to hope they miss a tech off utilt/dtilt usually, and reflector generally gives Falco nothing as well. If you don't get early dash attack you can't gatling off of it, and contrary to what owo does, jab doesn't set up for anything but jab3 if you yourself mash jab [owo with fake combos]. His uair gives him a little, and his aerials are ok combo starters, but nearly all of them have mediocre range. Falco COULD also be slightly weaker in terms of KO power, but that would just be annoying since he's already only averageish.

I think his fair chains are silly - I'd like to see fair toned down a little, but bair having a bit more KBG. I've also said I think if Reflector only did 1%/2% on the way out it would probably be a lot more tolerable to most people on the boards. They could tone down the priority on Fire Bird, but not even Captain Falcon is as unprotected as to have zero hitboxes when recovering [those hugboxes].

For what it's worth, I think they need to adjust raptor boost to have more favorable [range-wise] activation hitboxes in air - if Falco is directly in front of Captain Falcon and Falco uses dair and Falcon uses raptor boost, Falco hits Falcon without being meteored. Even if Falco is a little too low, it can trade instead of being beaten. I think Falco should be able to spike from above [dive like a Falco and reign terror below, or whatever], but not directly in front of Falcon [which he can't do to 'Dorf], and I think that's an issue that should be changed.

 

[owo]

[owo with fake combos]

dam I've been exposed

 

[Thor]

dam I've been exposed

I found it out when I realized I could mash jab and avoid every followup you had AND hit you except if you used jab2 quickly (because that links properly). That may just be Falco dittos though [i.e., it make actually be a real combo on DK, but it doesn't work on other frame 1 jabs].

Falco's combo game would actually be good, but highly technical, if those jab cancelled Gatlings worked. As is, it's sub-par. Dair is good enough to kind of make up for this, and lasers more than makes up for the rest [SHDL -> Running usmash is a great KO option at mid-range/up close]. Phantasm helps too [turns out dthrow is good - very low percent you get nothing with good DI, but slightly higher and you get gatling, mid-ish you get Phantasm, mid high you get phantasm aerial, and high percents you get phantasm usmash. And you can always just shoot lasers out of it. It's better than I realized - yay experimenting! @Kienamaru [and other mods] please don't mess much, if at all, with dthrow - the more time I have to play this game the more I realize why some stuff was done so long ago. Some stuff is still nonsensical or I don't like though (Sonic dair is like the opposite - learned about it and realized how much I don't like it).]

 

[Kien]

Noted

 

[Baby_Sneak]

but falco can cancel the reflector with a jab though

 

[Thor]

but falco can cancel the reflector with a jab though

Not sure what you are saying this about? If it's about reflector's relative unsafety if someone baits it and jumps it, jab has like zero vertical range - if it does devs can remove that to make reflector more manageable.

Nerfs to Falco I would be okay with:

Reflector being cut to 1/2% damage output on the way out [that's over half of it gone] - even if it shuts down 10 different approaches and you eat a laser each time, that's like 40% - most characters can have zero-death's you twice by then. And if you shield the lasers/avoid them, or successfully avoid reflector even ONCE, you're in and can combo him, and he's rather comboable, even if he can try to mash jump with relative impunity.

Jab having less vertical range (upward, not downward), if it has enough to actually protect Falco from above after reflector, because that would be silly. It probably doesn't, but if this is what Sneak is talking about, it should be fixed.

Re-adding the "Personally, I prefer FIRE!" animation in - while I don't LIKE nerfing Falco's recovery very much, I A) think that him saying that is awesome, and B) think it would tone down his recovery in a reasonable way - the birdie can fly, but you can clip his wings if you can get down there to take him out [or he has to recover way down, which opens him up to edgehogging that will then allow one to gimp him this way or punish his on-stage landing because it's much easier to see coming]. This would mean Falco can't fire bird right next to the stage, go like a foot, and be on the ledge, which pretty much no one can do anything about unless another Falco spaces a dair perfectly [I've done it to Gold_TSG twice and had it doen to me by him once - only time I've ever been hit out of startup since they removed the extended animation.]

There might be more - I'd love suggestions before implementation to hear ideas and provide feedback, whether you listen to it or not. And I would guess owo feels the same.

If people thought uthrow was a problem, or camping with lasers is/was, slow lasers would shift them back to an approach tool that makes uthrow really bad, but I don't know if people want this (in my opinion it also indirectly, very slightly buffs bthrow, although if people know how to DI lasers then not really). I don't know if that's a buff or nerf though - it does give him much safer approaches against characters without reflectors.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

No, I was trying to say that because of the reflectors cancel ability, it helps Falco out a lot in the neutral game, where you said he struggles in iirc.

 

[Momurderer]

Hey was wondering if anyone had any advice for a Ganon Vs Toon Link matchup. As Ganon I have a hard time getting in close. The arrows, bombs, and boomerang are hard to get past. Also, in 4.0 would Ganon's stage wide ground stomp get rid of grounded arrows? Or are they considered floating objects? It would help if it got rid of them.

I usually throw a Gandouken to give me some cover when I try to approach while TL has four arrows set, bombs flying, and rang going out. Then either try to weave in with short hops and fAir or slide in with a grounded downB or something. Fsmash works well for clearing arrows but seems risky to do unless I absolutely know I have enough time to pull it off without being punished.

I actually picked up Dedede as my second just because I thought he had the best answer to TL traps and shiz in the form of four wandering waddles. And he kind of does. Maybe we can discuss some of your main's answers to Toon Link and all his BS. Haha, I just have one person to play minus with and he mains TL and frankly he's become just an annoying character for me to fight but still a fun annoying. I've spent the majority of my minus career having all the things thrown at me and would like hear how everyone else deals with that kind of stuff.

 

[Thor]

Hey was wondering if anyone had any advice for a Ganon Vs Toon Link matchup. As Ganon I have a hard time getting in close. The arrows, bombs, and boomerang are hard to get past. Also, in 4.0 would Ganon's stage wide ground stomp get rid of grounded arrows? Or are they considered floating objects? It would help if it got rid of them.

I usually throw a Gandouken to give me some cover when I try to approach while TL has four arrows set, bombs flying, and rang going out. Then either try to weave in with short hops and fAir or slide in with a grounded downB or something. Fsmash works well for clearing arrows but seems risky to do unless I absolutely know I have enough time to pull it off without being punished.

I actually picked up Dedede as my second just because I thought he had the best answer to TL traps and shiz in the form of four wandering waddles. And he kind of does. Maybe we can discuss some of your main's answers to Toon Link and all his BS. Haha, I just have one person to play minus with and he mains TL and frankly he's become just an annoying character for me to fight but still a fun annoying. I've spent the majority of my minus career having all the things thrown at me and would like hear how everyone else deals with that kind of stuff.

Ganondorf can dtilt arrows to clear them [safer than fsmash], but I don't know how much that helps. Have you attempted Wizard Kicking over them? [Something tells me this fails too, either gets clanked or Ganondorf gets hit, but I'll ask.] You may be able to shorthop side+B over a bunch at the mid-range as well in order to grab TL and start something.

This is one of Ganondorf's harder matchups. Being able to catch bombs would help you some. If you are good at powershielding, you can walk up to arrows and powershield them [or should be able to] and can also run at him when he's throwing a boomerang and powershield it. This seems slow but closing off TL's space is very important whenever you can.

 

[Neville]

Gold is gonna have a field day. Or an aneurysm. One or the other.

 

[Thor]

Gold is gonna have a field day. Or an aneurysm. One or the other.

If you're referring to bumping old threads, this thread is being used for its original, intended purpose, without trying to respond to some ancient comment, and he's avoided making a new thread [which is the alternative], so I don't see how there could be a problem...

 

[Neville]

Dude brought this thread back to life so hard Glitch should change his username to The Necromancer.

 

[Momurderer]

Ganondorf can dtilt arrows to clear them [safer than fsmash], but I don't know how much that helps. Have you attempted Wizard Kicking over them? [Something tells me this fails too, either gets clanked or Ganondorf gets hit, but I'll ask.] You may be able to shorthop side+B over a bunch at the mid-range as well in order to grab TL and start something.

This is one of Ganondorf's harder matchups. Being able to catch bombs would help you some. If you are good at powershielding, you can walk up to arrows and powershield them [or should be able to] and can also run at him when he's throwing a boomerang and powershield it. This seems slow but closing off TL's space is very important whenever you can.

Thanks for the advice. From my memory Wizarding Kicking doesn't go over to0 well for dealing with arrows. It's been a while since I tried this match up cus it scares me. I'm not very good at catching bombs and it's something I should probably get good at.

I hope it's ok that I posted in this thread. It wasn't closed and after reading through it over the past week I thought it was a good thread with lots of nice advice for specific match ups. And I'm bored waiting for 4.0.

 

[NKArthur]

Can we talk about Zelda vs. Tink?
A good zelda player might be able to hit the far hitboxes of her attacks to avoid tink from camping. Also she has side-b that can force tink to approach more. Also, neutral-b can reflect the traps in the ground, bombs and boomerang.
But in close game tink has alot of good tools, and great grabs, and his D-Air can destroy zelda easily.
What do you all think about this MU? 50-50 or advantage to someone?

 

[teapartycthulu]

But Toon Link only has an advantage when it becomes close quarters. Toon Link doesn't really have anything to force Zelda to approach, but he might be able to punish the lag of Nayru's Love when she goes to reflect. Zelda shouldn't force Toon Link to approach because she excels at walling out opponents. If she spaces well, she can definitely protect from a punish.

Zelda have ranged KO options, but you kind of have to build a lot of percent to be able to use them. If you can knock them offstage, she has a very good edgeguard. Toon Link is kind of the same, but he doesn't need a lot of percent to KO.

I think it's slightly in favor of Toon Link. I think it's kind of a Melee Fox v. Jiggs situations. Jiggs can try to wall out Fox, and if it protects itself well, is nearly impenetrable. But if Fox can get an opening and punish, he has a great punish and can KO.