Hero's Shield

[Cloud Cleaver]

As we all know, our verdant hero bears a shield, strapped to his right forearm. However, like the shields of their Melee predecessors, it seems to me that this protective device is highly underused. As a Link mainer in Melee, I used his targe constantly to protect myself from non-rapid fire projectiles, especially Samus' missiles and charge shots. While Tink's is a bit hard to use, I think it's well worth the time to master, especially considering Brawl's campiness and Toon Link's already great proficiency at camping. Crouching was an effective shielding technique in Melee, but Tink's shield is so small that it often doesn't work in Brawl. Many projectiles just skip over it and hit him in the face. However, standing up leaves him vulnerable in that his shield will occasionally be lowered. The solution? Stand up right before the projectile hits. Since matchups are so crucial nowadays, I'll be checking what characters' projectiles can be crouch-blocked and what characters' need to be stand-blocked.

[sasukebowser]

This is why you crouch,get up, crouch, get up quickly in succession.
If you don't do that, your not playing right.

[TLMarth]

This is why you crouch,get up, crouch, get up quickly in succession.
If you don't do that, your not playing right.

That reminds me of, in air hockey, blocking the goal by rapidly moving the "hitter"(what's it called?) back and forth. Or foo's ball.

[Cloud Cleaver]

In both cases, you've only got a 50% chance of stopping the projectile. No matter how fast you move, you're not in two places at once.

[sasukebowser]

No.
It takes time for the animation that makes you vulnerable to happen.
If you want to block something while standing: crouch, and get up when you want to block it.
If you want to block it while crouching: just crouch.