Scar talks Lean Melee [2012YotF]

Let's not forget that often times people will play like ****ies and just hold block for dear life if you've be bombing them with the gentleman after every aerial.

Yeah it's a good trick to have in the ol' toolbelt. I'm familiar with the math, and obviously Smash doesn't have ridiculously large frame advantages to speak of -- that is to say I've done this enough times to know it's only for perfect execution.

I'll get to work on it though, I need to think about my go-to options a bit more in these situations. Good stuff.

Knee on shield > taunt

What if that was safe against shield grab? That would be the sickest mixup ever

Falcon would be broke as **** if that worked.

Also I love the brawl- trick where u can "charge" a falcon punch with ur taunt. Really its not much different than charging a dk punch

I... had no idea you could do that.

That sounds awesome even if it's in Brawl

O I just realized....Brawlminus

scar said:

edgeguarding is actually incredibly important. Shoutout to eggz for showing that so clearly in norcal a few weeks ago (watch the vids when they're posted).

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< 3

How long until staling makes it unsafe, Prof. SB?

What are the best ways to get a hold of fox or falco at 0%? cc ***** everything. stomp and grab are the two best options I think :/

space 'em out with aerials/gentleman to deal percent till you can get a grab/knock down

I hate gentlemen at low percent, it gets CC shined too much. But yeah all you can do what brook said.

Other thoughts:

*Thinking and winning is more fun than autopilot and losing. I've decided to think a LOT more while playing.
*Timing for tech chasing on the platform is more/less the same between missed tech and both tech rolls, so the real mixup seems to be "tech in place" vs "everything else."

And since I'm a grown-*** man now, here's how I do things:

Improvement Items
-Tech Chasing *STILL*
-Followups
-Speed
-Form
-Edgeguarding

Action Plan
-Choose days (or hours) to practice getting better at one thing at a time in friendlies
-Make sure to ignore win/loss and gauge success by improving what I'm working on

The above improvement items are gigantic LOL but I have a feeling that since I used to know a lot more than I do now, if I think hard enough I'll remember what I used to do and what the correct response is.

That sounds like you are also an instinctual player. You play by feel, correct? I mean once you experienced something it will be kept inside you.

Right now I'm just trying to consistently stay thinking while playing. I am so much better if I just flip autopilot off.

You got this, bro

That's such a good list.

Scar said:

Thinking and winning is more fun than autopilot and losing

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this times a million

Hahahaha
I kinda suspected it wasn't THAT broken but you made it sound pretty **** xD

Still, it means you can jab shield grab attempts even with fully staled knees so you can still play games with that

Tafokints had the honor of training with the Great One yesterday.

-Offense (Tech Chasing / Followups)
Getting better every time I play. I still need to calm down while tech-chasing... I get way too excited to bust out the People's Stomp (predict tech in place) and murder someone's stock. Followups have been good and fairly consistent, but I used to combo much better in my prime. I've noticed that it's boiling down to tech skill errors, the biggest one being the difference between l-cancel turnaround jump vs l-cancel turnaround dash jump.

-Speed
Again, not where it used to be... but this is definitely a lower priority right now.

-Edgeguarding
MUCH better. There's room for improvement of course but I've been experimenting with different new aggressive edgeguards and passive edgeguards and a lot of stuff has been working pretty well.

Here are some specific notes and observations:

Tech-Chasing Sheik
Mixups when tech-chasing Sheik are annoying. Waiting for spotdodge really doesn't work since tilts are just a better option for her. That way, if I run up and I know I'm late, I can't just wait for dodge and knee her in the face, so the mixup is a lot crazier.

Her good options are basically:
Tilt
Dodge/Roll
Grab

Compared to Fox/Falco whose good options are basically
Tilt/shine
Dodge

There are other options of course (and let me know if anyone has a better understanding of the mixups and options when late to regrab Sheik's roll), but it feels like Fox/Falco lose hard to late uair or a really well-spaced knee, while Sheik doesn't have to worry about it so much.

Melee
Also it's really easy for me to hate on the game, so I definitely have to get over the fact that it's got its flaws and commit to preparing for Genesis. It's harder to stay focused on the goal (go forth and ****) when I'm distracted by how stupid the different matchups are (Falcon basically loses to everyone, including pikachu where the matchup is like 95/5 on FD). Basically it's time to grow up and *finally* completely 100% stop thinking about whether the game is fair or not, because it isn't and it's stupid to think about.

The Utmost
Sometimes the utmost is actually better, like after a raptor boost at 70% (where knee won't kill) sometimes it's just better to whip out the uair and go for the knee if they DI in and the edgeguard if they DI anywhere else.

Edgeguarding Sheik
Messing up the edgeguard vs. Sheik sucks a whole lot so what I've been doing mostly is regular getup if she blows up on me, and just hug the ledge if the explosion is going to miss. Regular getup provides invincibility when she blows up, edgehogs any in optoins, and allows me to hit her if she went straight up. If she can't blow up on me I either edgehog or ruin her life if she lands on the stage. Am I missing anything? Is there a better way?

Approaching
So I haven't played in a few months but Falcon should still never approach, right?

ITT5.
San Jose.
This weekend.

JUST BRING IT.

A thing I do sometimes if I'm late on techchasing sheik is just run up and crouch, CC dtilt will work every once in a while against wake up tilt. That trick gets old fast though.

You can approach and still be safe. Being safe is more important than camping/approaching. It's easier to pressure people in close range. I guess you just have to pick your positions.

For example, you talk about sheik's tilts being better options when you are late to tech chase. So if you see players are eager to throw out f tilt you can easily get a free punish with good dash dance spacing. Just a thought. As for up tilt. . . . your better off trying to force them do dash attack than challenging that **** >_> Maybe spacing nair can beat it ...nah

alright scar heres what i got for you

on the utmost: i agree, but i would also consider the character. is it a falcon ditto? take the knee and then you have a more or less free edgeguard. falco is similar, with his shorter recovery. fox though, that guy can make it back with more up b options, him you might want to tag on the uair to put him further out.

i dont know if anybody else does this outside of messing around, but get a raptor boost under a plat at a decent % and full jump nair will work pretty well, delaying your strong hit until youre on your way down for optimal followup potential. i use it for peach and marth in these situations; when i know knee wont kill but i wont have time to jump up and do a falling uair, and works on fastfallers too if you get the opportunity

edgeguarding: ive long been a proponent of higher commitment edgeguarding, i think instead of covering as many options as possible, choose that one that theyll probably do and kill them when they do it (like when dehf upb'd down toward the ledge a hundred times at pound 4). go out and uair those space animals that up b down over and over again, you see some floaty use their jump go hit them and theyre as good as dead (especially marth)

im **** against sheik for the exact reasons you mentioned, the only consolation is you can opt out of techchasing for uthrow combos, but those shouldnt get you a knee against decent DI until like 70% anyway. if you figure anything out, let me know too

only thing on edgeguarding sheik is that if you want, you can try to read them and hit them back out without a jump if theyre gonna be really obvious. sheiks tend to do that since its so easy to react and get a free hit anyway, so sometimes you can get up early and get to where theyre gonna be, if the explosion cant get you. tinks fox showed me that you can really mess with sheiks by just hanging out by the edge and theyll generally be scared off of going towards it, and that gives you an awesome opportunity for a great hit

approaching: its not good, but i still think you cant get away with making it obvious you wont approach. do it every once in a while just so they prepare for it instead of just calmly approaching you, plus you can get a hit near an edge if theyre hanging out near it, and thats a sweet deal. if a fox is shooting lasers, act like youre dodging them then sprint at him and grab.

What I saw
Melee

Scar said:

It's harder to stay focused on the goal (go forth and ****) when I'm distracted by how stupid the different matchups are (Falcon basically loses to everyone, including pikachu where the matchup is like 95/5 on FD)

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What I read

DivinoKage said:

No character johns, only destruction

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As far as edgeguarding sheik goes, we talk about all these kinds of things in the Video Critique Thread, you should stop by sometime and help us out! Obviously you would be someone that people would listen to, and I'm sure your insight would really help.
But anyway

The best way we decided was refresh invinc like you're playing against a marth [drop down, jump up] and do that until she picks a direction/she's right on top of you. If she's right on top of you, your reactions are good. You need to hold the ledge while being invinc [like you would if you getup] and be ready to respond. If she's not right on top of you, follow the teleport and just ledgehop knee.

I am so hype for ITT5 tomorrow. Glad my carpal tunnel isn't being gay. yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

i just always ban fd vs pikachu, no reason to deal with that

@bigD good ****, but what about crews vs Pika? Impossible.

Also can you talk a little more about that fB stuff? vs Peach and Marth you're having success with fB fulljump nair, and then I guess into either grab or uair depending on DI? That sounds pretty cool and I think I've done it like a few times in the past but I've never really thought about it. Fulljump nair to tech chase on platforms is money though.

Also speaking of uthrow combos, can anyone remind me what's safe and what isn't? I know there are a ton of well-known unsafe followups on uthrow vs various characters.

Marth/Sheik? From what I remember, uthrow combos into uair at 30%, but I'm not sure what works vs in DI, and then uthrow knee finally combos at mid-late 70s
Jiggs/Peach? Peach can nair out of a lot, what %s can you actually combo uthrow uair? Dthrow nair? Is nair ever good vs Jiggs?

We should really have a list of guaranteed combos for dthrow and uthrow by %s / weight.

@0room lol it's a running joke homie. Also link to that other thread?

ok, imagine you hit a fb under a platform, or even a stomp if the situation is specific enough. theyre not high enough % for a knee to kill, and if you uair on the way up, i think they can DI away and get out of stun before you can catch up to them. if you go up there then uair on the way down, peach/marth might get out of the fb stun. so you full jump nair so you can hit both early enough to catch them in fb stun, and late enough to follow up after you land on the platform. you can follow up with a knee about as easily as a shffld nair, probably more so because you can fall lower than your starting height on the plat. i do it to fastfallers sometimes too, but thats at times when i think theyre going to land on the plat before i can knee, and its just an alternative to uairing from below the plat.

youre fulljump nairing and landing on the plat for a follow up, ive done it in falcon dittos to a runoff knee from the plat several times, its a lot easier than it sounds

crews vs pika? switch to samus and ftilt a lot while cc dsmashing, then just shoot standing missiles when theyre off the level. dk is alright too, both more viable than falcon on fd

dthrow nair is actually pretty bad vs anything but marth i think, but you can do that goofy magus **** and fulljump nair if youre feeling like having some fun

It actually sounds pretty easy/straightforward/awesome. Even double jump nair would probably work well to add to your mobility and allow you to control when you land with a bit more precision. I'm gonna try this for sure.

So yeah here's the kind of chart I want to fill out before Genesis:

Character
Percent, Throw, DI, Follow Up
% range
% range
% range

For example it would look something like this:


Sheik
Percent, Throw, DI, Follow Up,
0-30%, Dthrow, In, Regrab,
0-30%, Dthrow, Away, Tech Chase,
30%-50%, Uthrow, Away, Uair, Away, Regrab
50%-70%, Uthrow, Away, Uair,
70%-90%, Uthrow, Away, Knee,
90%+, Dthrow, In, Knee,
90%+, Dthrow, Away, Late Uair

We should probably have that for like every character over the next month or so. If we already do I don't know where it is, and that's a problem.

Anyone want to volunteer to work on it?

Scar said:

Melee
Also it's really easy for me to hate on the game, so I definitely have to get over the fact that it's got its flaws and commit to preparing for Genesis. It's harder to stay focused on the goal (go forth and ****) when I'm distracted by how stupid the different matchups are (Falcon basically loses to everyone, including pikachu where the matchup is like 95/5 on FD). Basically it's time to grow up and *finally* completely 100% stop thinking about whether the game is fair or not, because it isn't and it's stupid to think about.

Approaching
So I haven't played in a few months but Falcon should still never approach, right?

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a few things here:

falcon does have some really rough matches, and is for top tier play pretty much non-viable. I don't argue with that. but you can creatively sculpt your matches somewhat similar to how a low tier should and you can expect to make those match-ups look better than they are by acting as if most of your options suck, defaulting you to the safe ones. this gives you a stronger basic game, and falcon actually has a very strong one from his dynamics. you'll want to rely mostly on-

1. dashdance camping. oh my.
2. reliable grabs. since falcon does want to be predominantly camping, DD grabs aren't going to cut it anymore vs most opponents. big boys these days use heavy CC grabs, and falcon's weight helps here substantially.
3. don't throw out moves. yeah. just don't do it. you can be aggressive and pressure, but always aim to hit. always.
4. make sure to ban appropriate stages. you will gain SUCH a strong advantage if you're willing to ban things like FD vs pikachu and if you're familiar with weaker stages like FoD. make sure to properly exploit falcon's low kill potential on stages like YS and brinstar. i know it sounds obvious but a lot of players, even better ones, defeat themselves by being bad at specific stages.
5. stick to reliable follow-ups. there's nothing wrong with something simple like upthrow upair, you're still at an advantage, and usually there's no reason to over-extend when you can just hold your momentum. I'm NOT saying don't do crazy kill combos, that's what falcon is all about. just don't be darkrain on YS and kill yourself minimum 2 stock every match.
6. keep your priority strong. if you feel like your moves are constantly losing trades, there's a very good chance you're being outplayed. yes, upair under people all day if they jump too much. falcon's moves aren't the best, but they're definitely competitive with the other best characters.

a few other things:

- falcon has a bad recovery. so does everyone else at this point. the game has been out long enough. put hitboxes between them and the stage until they die. 4 times.
- you can outplay a lot of your bad matches if you focus. except falco. and cactuar's fox. falco vs falcon is ****ing stupid. you'd be better off learning a pocket peach for CPs or something. gay bird in capris. cactuar's fox is mostly your fault (you as in scar, specifically you).
- if you get depressed at the tournament, don't feel so bad. at least you're not playing brawl.

generally i think that by playing textbook and doing what you're supposed to, when you're supposed to, and carrying the weight of your activity on the character's strengths (fast, heavy, electric) you will at the very least not lose to yourself, which is better than...almost everybody. bad habits are bad.

my opinions:

falcon's recovery is extremely mid tier with platforms:

Essential (platform) recovery tricks:

1. the edgecancel
2. the baby pull-back on up-b and then go for the edge while they whiff (people still suck i guess)
3. fast fall through the platform and they hit where you would have landed on the platform
4. after fast falling through plats all day, LAND on the platform and do an amsah tech when they hit you
5. don't falcon kick like a scrub when you are too close to the stage or you will simply get hit guaranteed 100%, up-ing in a not so good spot is infinitely better than guaranteed getting hit

fd is bad, **** that stage i'd rather play on yoshis first stage vs fox

falcon can semi-approach if you hit shield properly, overshoot n-air on shield, overshoot weak knee but its progressively unreliable the better the fox gets (or any top tier pretty much)

but it's great as a mix-up

otherwise falcons approach is pretty bad in theory

sometimes i do some tricky gimmick movements rarely like fastliketrees marth where you run past, duck to cancel the run and do something kooky

@walt, its tilt dependent but if they f-tilt you can crouch cancel last second and grab extremely fast to counter it

up-tilt is a different story since the 2nd hitbox --> 1st hitbox gap is almost nonexistant

UPTHROW dropzone is really good and most people don't expect it/ DI as properly as they could

always **** them up on right side of rock stage on pokemon stadium it is REALLY easy to tech chase there

if you hit/throw them onto the way right part of the stage they literally cannot go anywhere and are confined to that spot, you have a 100% chance to get them with a stomp

left side is very easy too, just short hop no fastfall knee and the weird inwards gap pops them up for more comboing unless they tech

if they land in the middle-right part of rock their tech roll right will get shortened by the extreme right part of the stage (the white part)

so when you play on pokemon, you MUST **** on rock stage vs good spacies, don't fight in the pit either, if you do get caught in the pit, hold shield and c-stick up to hopefully jump out immediately if they make a small mistake

only downfall is if the fox is a ****say and camps

fire stage is horrid but put yourself in between the tree and the opponent so if u get hit at 200% you can tech the tree.

If you are a pimp you can tech the tree, immediately fast fall and up-air and **** them

other stages are alright


==

know your opponents capabilities, if they are weak vs a certain strat then abuse it

-rollling like a noob and they don't punish

-empty hop (great mix-up but some foxes i have played can react in time sadly) to grab

-side-b after up-smash/d-smash whiff (the ISAI)

==

gimmicks are both good and bad

bad cuz normally they won't work vs competent players if you do them too much

good cuz its another option in your arsenal

I shouldve died today, but i somehow escaped un-harmed.

Got in a car wreck, ****in back left tire **** out and to make a short story shorter, i was soon doing 2 flips in my car. The roof above the drivers seat got crushed down by the ground, but the rolling of the car had already pulled me down and out of the way.

Got away with a sore neck.....and one less car.

Moral of the story is smoke more weed/drink more alch and play more melee....while u still can.

Oh ****, glad you're ok man.

Damn dude O_O