Highest Priority Move

From
deep within
the heart of the
forest, nature's lord
of leaf and wind races,
rushing, dodging,
hiding,
here.
Run.​

Shiftry bends over slightly to lean down to the ground, snickering to himself. As his laughter becomes increasingly maniacal, he spins around once, retrieves a Deku Nut-sized acorn while facing away from the screen, and throws it forcefully down at his feet. The seed explodes, emitting hundreds of tiny leaves in a fan shape around Shiftry. This effectively renders him invisible within a small (1.5x Bowser's size) area until the leaves begin to thin out, some blowing away in the wind but most just plain disappearing. During the two seconds the leaves stick around, Shiftry can move freely. Afterward, a pile of leaves remains on the stage, crisp, crunchy, and the size of a Battlefield platform. This leaf pile can be thinned out, like all those to come, and has a default stamina of 5%. More on that later.

It takes Shiftry four seconds to generate another potent Seed Bomb; if he throws one before this timer runs out the animation remains identical up until the point the bomb hits the ground - the flimsy seed cracks in two and feebly shoots one leaf into the air, which drifts into Shiftry's sheepish face. Like many moves, Shiftry will briefly flash white when he is ready to throw another seed bomb.​

Impatiently prancing back and forth, Shiftry fans his arms up, forward, both at once in a very disorganized fashion. The resulting force creates a powerful, localized windstorm, which churns in place as Shiftry makes it increasingly stronger. Nearby opponents can be sucked in. The input can be charged for up to a second and a half, at which point it stops increasing in size and force. Shiftry can, however, keep it intact until letting go of the input, and even push it back and forth with the control stick, bouncing along with his windy playmate at a pace slightly below his standard walking speed. When B is released, he gives it one final push, slapping it with his right fan to launch it forward up to three-quarters the length of Final Destination.

The windstorm is definitely a wind hitbox, incapable of doing damage on its own - even if its knockback is nothing to laugh at. However, get some leaves in it and it quickly becomes a whirling terror, harbinger of a thousand paper cuts. At the absolute maximum, easily attainable with a moderate sized cover, it is possible to rack up 5% a second with this attack. Unfortunately, the leaves quickly get thrown out of the tornado, at the rate of 1% a second - unless you can suck up more leaf piles, adding an additional 1% to the DPS, or floating leaves, adding 2%. Either way, once the leaves stop dealing damage, the opponent is in a perfect place to punish. Consider releasing them early.​

Shiftry lowers his fans to his side before spinning them around himself rapidly, creating a whirlwind which carries him upward the same distance as Fox's recovery. Much like the Side Special, this does no damage unless there are any leaves nearby. However, one of this move's side effects is the tendency to BRING leaves nearby. When used on the ground, Shiftry does not actually recover unless the input is double-tapped. Instead, he stays on the ground while the whirlwind spins around himself, capable of pulling in all leaf piles within the diameter of Final Destination. Naturally, the ones towards the outer reach get pulled in much more slowly. The whirlwind has the same effect as the Side Special's leaf-filled barrage, except it does not dissipate all leaves at its end - instead leaving all that would have been launched suspended in midair, drifting to the ground shortly afterward.​

Taking on a glossy sheen of red, Shiftry fumes and gnashes his teeth, looking more like a feral beast than his usual semi-composed demeanor. He's momentarily immobile, but after about a half of a second he can move about freely. For the next two seconds, he is unable to attack outside of standards and aerials, but he does not take knockback - only damage. When the two seconds are over, he flails about like a madman, dealing an innumerable amount of attacks which - all in all - do twice the amount of damage that he took, with a logical amount of knockback for the amount of damage dealt. Shiftry cannot cancel out of this move by crouching like most of them - in fact, if he is under leaves at the time the timer runs out, will burst out of and scatter them everywhere. No matter how much damage is collected, Shiftry has an additional second and a half of ending lag in which he catches his breath, making this incredibly punishable. If the move does connect, this lag is halved.​

Back and forth, back and forth, Shiftry hits once with the broad side of his left hand-leaf and follows up with a slap from his right, with a concentrated look on his face. This is slower than most multi-hit pummels, dealing 3% - no stun - per hit, but has the added effect of flipping opponents to face the opposite direction on each hit much like Mario's cape. It is, however, incapable of reflecting projectiles. Low starting and ending lag make this a viable counterattack, so long as it is used an odd number of times... wouldn't want to turn the opponent right back in his face!​

Swinging upwards with one arm, Shiftry summons a burst of razor-sharp leaves which fly upwards, dealing 10% and light upwards knockback. The leaves settle into a comfortable pile shortly afterward. This move executes fairly quickly, and leaves you with a quick getaway if it fails.​

Shiftry puffs out of existence for a moment, leaving behind a shadowy afterimage as he does so. A split second afterwards, he reappears, facing the camera, and does a slashing motion upwards with the sharp edge of his leaf. This deals 11% close to the ground, but tapers off to 6% at the maximum height of the hitbox. It's possible to delay this move by up to a quarter of a second by holding the A button down.​

Shiftry lifts his head up from his crouch, raising up from the leaves if necessary, and fires out two or three seeds somewhat smaller than the ones from his Neutral Special. The seeds can travel about half FD's length before they realize that gravity exists, at which point they begins to drop. They deals 2-3% each and set knockback slightly above flinching. After a fair amount of ending lag, he's ready to fire another batch.​

Forewarning - this attack requires a bit of finesse to pull off, but it dramatically opens up his mobility options. When A is first pressed, Shiftry's eyes flash once, and he disappears if you immediately let go of the button. You can, however, keep holding it to delay when the attack is released, although he's locked into running the same direction until you do. Once he disappears in a puff of purely aesthetic leaves, he will reappear in 3/4 of a second by default, slashing with the leaves on his arms to deal 12% of slicing damage. During the time he's invisible, he continues to run in a straight line at a constant speed. He can launch the attack early at any time by pressing A, can jump, and even halt motion altogether by pressing in the opposite direction. Like all of his attacks, if Shiftry is running over leaves, he can dive into them with a crouch to jump out of the move early. There's a bit of a cooldown on the move, three seconds, in which Shiftry does not disappear but instead does the final attack for a slightly weaker 8%.

It is also possible to use this move while Bide is active, allowing Shiftry greater freedom and a slight extension on the timer. If the timer runs out while he's invisible, he still reappears in the normal amount of time, but launches his counterattack instead of the standard slash.​

It's notable that Shiftry has the same charging pose for all three of his Smashes. Why's that, you ask? For this move specifically! Shiftry enters a stance in which he bends at the knee slightly, holding one hand-leaf in front of himself and the other behind his head, twisting up to increase his overall tension level. When this charge is released on this attack in particular, Shiftry falls over awkwardly, losing his balance before landing on his face. He lands in prone, growling quietly.

Wait, wait, what just happened there? Well, turns out that this is more of a counterattack than anything. You see, if Shiftry is hit by an attack while charging, he blocks the attack with one hand, cackles, then curls his other leaf into a ball and punches the foe right in the face, dealing anywhere from 19-28% damage with a helping of some hefty knockback.​

Again, this move's charge pose is identical to the Forward Smash. When it is released, though, Shiftry raises both arms into the sky, shouting "SHIFTRY!" Depending on charge, leaves erupt from the ground over an area identical to Shiftry's width to twice the size of a Battlefield platform. They deal about 12% as they fly up, reaching about Ganondorf's height regardless of charge. Shiftry recovers a short amount of time after execution, but with enough lag for a speedy character to dash under the leaves and counterattack. Naturally, the area the attack covers is left in leaves after the deed is done.​

When the charge on this move is released, Shiftry vanishes momentarily before reappearing a Bowser width towards either the left or right, defaulting to the direction he was facing but changeable via control stick. He then dashes between the two possible points identically to the Pokeball Weavile. After 1-3 dashes, depending on charge, Shiftry skids to a halt. Each dash does 12-16%, knocks the opponent away a fair distance, and unsettles the leaves beneath him.​

Gnashing his teeth, Shiftry presses Z or R twice and does a barrel roll, spinning around twice with his arms extended. This creates a multi-hit hitbox very similar to Falco's which does 10%, and can suck up leaves to do an additional 5%.​

Shiftry pulls back both of his arms before thrusting them diagonally downwards in front of himself, launching a quick puff of air (more powerful at close range, just like a real one) and pushing himself up just enough to make up for the execution lag on the attack. This can be used for obvious gimping purposes, and also to push leaf piles around. Of course, the small distance recovered only works once per air session.​

Giving the finger to the laws of momentum, Shiftry quickly jumps off of a particularly dense pocket of nothing, hurtling backwards about the distance of a battlefield platform. He maintains an effective spotdodge throughout, during which he is able to laglessly cancel into any other move he can use in midair.​

Turning to face upward, Shiftry pokes his sharp nose into the sky to deal 7% and weak upward knockback in a quick motion. This can very easily be used to juggle.​

Shiftry lets out a bloodcurdling screech before diving downwards, arms outstretched and mouth gaping open. This, of course, takes him to 1.3x his usual fastfall speed. If he encounters any opponent, he grabs onto them with his frontal leaves before pinching them between his legs in a grab hitbox. From here, he can slap them back and forth and occasionally bite them, dealing hits of 2, 3, and 5% If he and the opponent land on the ground in the middle of this, or if he lands on them from the air, this turns into a standard grab with a shared timer from before - no cheap resets!​

With both hand-leaves, Shiftry grabs the opponent by the throat or similar area. He has a fairly large reach with this grab, but there’s something of a sweetspot. If they are just barely within reach, they'll be able to escape the leaves curling around them with a quick crouch.​

Shiftry gives his opponent a good licking with a suddenly Gastly-sized tongue. This covers them in a sticky resin to which leaves will stick, a status which lasts five seconds plus two more for each additional lick they are given. While covered in resin, they pick up any leaves that are blowing around in midair. Eventually they can be covered by them entirely, making it difficult to make out the form of the person hidden underneath. While this doesn't do any damage or hinder them in any way, they do spread leaves around as they walk and run, dropping them off at whatever rate makes sense to you, the reader.​

A wind rushes around Shiftry and the foe, carrying a concentrated stream of leaves in a figure eight. After this quick flourish, Shiftry directs it to slash diagonally up to the left or right, depending on the input, dealing 13% with knockback that kills at 180%. The leaves then settle down to cover a given area. If he and the foe happen to be standing on top of leaves at the time, they will be blown in the direction of the throw much like in the FAir, spreading them further and thinner.​

Shiftry bashes his head into the opponent in order to stun them momentarily, dealing 5%, before making a powerful upwards scooping motion on either side of his foe. This sends a powerful burst of wind upwards, carrying the enemy with it and dealing an additional 4%. The damage is buffed by 4% if this is done while standing on a pile of leaves, and the knockback also undergoes a slight increase.​

Apparently deciding he didn't need to throw his opponent after all, Shiftry dumps them unceremoniously onto the ground in front of him and kicks some dirt into their face with a sneer, dealing 8% from dirt and fall combined. He then turns away from them and crosses his arms sternly, eyes closed. At this point, Shiftry adopts this position as his new idle stance until he moves next. He is capable of charging a smash without breaking the pose.​

The camera zooms in on Shiftry as he gestures first to the left, then the right, then spins in place and jumps upward, shouting "Shiiiiiiif-TREE!" After it pans back out, we see comically exaggerated winds blowing across the entire screen, with bundles of dense leaf pockets three times Bowser's size scattered around within. Everyone except for Shiftry is pushed from one side of the screen to the other, the leaf pockets serving as areas of effect which deal 15% per second and have an even stronger pull. This lasts for ten seconds, the first four seconds of which Shiftry is invincible, locked into the pose. After the attack is over, every platform of the stage is left covered in leaves.​

Shiftry is a very touch and go character, able to vanish from the fray at a whim and reappear in an instant. He has multiple options to get himself through nearly any defense, extensive dodging methods, and more counters than you could shake a stick at. In addition, his leafy airboxes make him excel in multi-hit attacks, neatly building up damage over the course of a brawl. He does not need to use finesse with spreading his leaves, as they are likely to move all over the stage even during a casual match. With a bit of foresight and cunning, Shiftry can become a very unpredictable opponent.

Shiftry's most immediate appeal is his ability to drop under cover of leaves at a given moment. He has no end of ways to spread them around and thin them out to cover a greater area, and should generally try to stay on top of them or near them as often as possible. FTilt executes the quickest of his various leaf creation tools, and is the most difficult to punish. Its low area is offset by its speed, and when used rhythmically allows Shiftry to automatically position himself by simple walking. However, unlike USmash and NSpecial, Razor Leaf does not instantly create leaves on the ground, instead leaving them to drift down of their own accord. As such, it would be best to use it while the opponent is either far away or directly in the area of effect. Although the Neutral Special is on a cooldown timer, and an invaluable getaway tool, it is far better to use it to spread leaves around than to hold onto the move and never touch it. The Up Smash creates the greatest overall area, but its high execution time makes it difficult to use to its full potential. As such, it’s necessary to mix this up with Sucker Punch, the FSmash, to discourage the foe from interrupting the attack.

Once the leaves have been formed, potentially spread around by FAir, FSpecial, USpecial, or what have you, visibility becomes the exception rather than the rule. Suddenly, Shiftry is capable of vanishing from sight even mid-attack, and mix-up strategies become increasingly more complex. With the ability to hide his animations while concealed, Shiftry can cook a Bide until its last second, then pop out from under the leaves to absorb an attack meant for someone else. Bullet Seed, which leaves Shiftry below the reach of all projectiles save perhaps an expertly angled Pikmin or peanut, can easily be used to bait almost any opponent into the leaves. If they’re the type to set up their own defenses and wait you out, Fake Out and Quick Attack (Dash and BAir) can quickly get you behind almost anything they can throw up. Once the distance has been closed, one way or another, you have no end of fast-activating attacks to throw out
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