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SINGLES Lucario Match-Ups and Directory! Mario will brb saving a princess

RT

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Toon Link:

Before I start, I want to state that almost ALL TLs have different playstyles. You can compare all of the notable ones, like Chip, Hyro, Jerm, Quivo, Santi, etc. and they all play differently. Therefore, it is important to understand that your TL encounters may vary from what you will read. I've only managed to play Jerm and Quivo (and Santi for like one match). :)

What moves or tactics should we watch out for?
-Zair. This is probably the number one thing people will have trouble dealing with. Comes out fast, can be done out of his airdodge, autocancels upon landing, can lead into combos/grabs, can be used for retreating, can be used for spacing, can be used to annoy...I could go on forever. It's definitely a versatile move overall. And the worst part is, our fair can never challenge it. If you want to be successful in this matchup, you must learn how to space and get around this move. Even if you powershield it, you must react fast since the move autocancels upon landing. Also, watch out for a TL tethered to the edge. He can re-tether multiple times and force Lucario to land on the stage.

-Bombs. This is yet another obstacle most players will have trouble getting past. You can't attack bombs or they might blow up. They can be used to block Aura Sphere. They can be used for shield pressure and can lead into combos, such as bomb thrown down->uair. Learn to z-catch them or avoid them altogether.

-Arrows. Yes, a third spammable move! Arrows can be used to annoy and distract from a far distance. They have a decent amount of hitstun. Fortunately, you can cancel them with fair and Aura Sphere! From my experience, TLs don't use this move very much, but it's still something to watch out for.

-Boomerang. Holy ****, are you kidding me? Another spam move?! Boomerangs are meant for pressure and to annoy. They don't have a lot of knockback, but they can setup into combos. Can be canceled by fair, Aura Sphere, etc. Remember, it will always return to TL, so if it misses you the first time, it might hit you on the returning trip...

-Usmash. This is one of TL's very few reliable kill moves. Comes out pretty fast, requires hitting with the sweetspot. Getting hit with the "sour" back part means far less knockback. Once you get towards higher percents, be wary of this move.

-Dsmash. If you see a TL waiting on a slope, please do not approach blindly. Doing so will get you killed at near 0 percents. :ohwell:

-Dair. This move can spike with the initial frames after it comes out. Otherwise, TL will bounce off of you and can hit you twice if he follows your DI. Most TLs will not try to spike you with this move unless they are sure it will hit, because missing results in instant death due to the stall then fall attribute. Basically one giant hitbox below him until he either hits the ground or you/your shield/something. You can challenge it with uair, but you must space the aura burst on uair it perfectly.

-Uair. Another one of TL's main kill moves. Essentially a sex kick that sends you up and has pretty good knockback. Since Toon Link has pretty decent vertical jumps, he can reach far into the sky with this move. It can outlast pretty much everyone's airdodge, so don't airdodge if you see a TL below you. You can challenge it with dair if you feel risky. Also, you can use Lucario's dair to stall yourself so that you don't fall into the uair.

-Bair. A good damage racker and self-comboing move, if the TL follows your DI. If you don't have your double jump, prepare to take lots of damage...

-Nair. A good get-away-from-me aerial. Comes out pretty fast and hits on both sides of TL but not simultaneously.

-Spotdodge. It's pretty amazing. If a TL spotdodges and you miss with your attack, expect a punish...

-Grounded UpB. Most TLs don't do this anymore, because you can SDI out and punish almost immediately. Jerm and Quivo learned the hard way by playing me...but you'll still see some TLs do it occasionally OOS.

-Grab. It has deceptive range. Have someone purposely miss with it and notice the length of the hookshot. Then have someone grab you with it at its absolute maximum range. Yeah, makes no sense. Fortunately, TLs know not to grab unless they can combo into it. A missed grab equals a free punish *coughFSMASHcough*.

What moves or tactics should we try to enforce in this match up?
-With his spam game and overall ability to play keep away, this match is about patience. TL is a momentum character. Getting frustrated will lead to a mistake, and this will get you killed. Don't spam fsmash, because a TL can just jump and zair you. Aura Sphere can be used to disrupt a TL's momentum for a small bit, but don't rely on it. Once you get an Aura boost, the matchup should be more manageable.

Do you feel Lucario has an advantage in any particular scenario of this matchup?
-I think the matchup is somewhat even. Depending on how the TL plays it could range from 55:45 to 45:55.

Do you feel the opponent can shut down aspects of Lucario's game?
-Retreaing zair beats out all of Lucario's aerials. TL has a lot of projectiles that can really bog down Lucario's approach, especially bombs. This matchup is about spacing and just outlasting the TL.

Counterpicks? What to avoid and what to enforce?
-Starter. Avoid FD because it encourages TL's hit-and-run game. Yoshi's is a good choice, TLs tend to hate this stage. I would avoid PS1 because of its low ceiling.
-Counterpick. Anything with a high ceiling would be good against a TL because of his reliance on vertical kills. Jungle Japes and Pictochat are the best choices. Frigate is also an okay choice because of the high ceiling and the lack of an edge on the right side. Definitely avoid small stages with low vertical ceilings, like Halberd, Corneria, Rainbow Cruise, etc.

I might add stuff if I feel it is necessary.
 

phi1ny3

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lol it doesn't like me resizing the picture on Photobucket.

Also, TL uair is so mean, I hate whenever they do get the chance to use it, the lingering secondary hitbox is still really ridiculously killable.
 

F1ZZ

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lol it doesn't like me resizing the picture on Photobucket.

Also, TL uair is so mean, I hate whenever they do get the chance to use it, the lingering secondary hitbox is still really ridiculously killable.
Phil I know what you mean. My brother mains Toon Link and able 50% of his kills are by Uair. :mad:
 

TheJerm

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Stop spilling so much info RT.. jeez, wtf, traitor. =]

Also, fair is SO good against us TLs.. trust me.. it stops our zairing
 

HyperEnergy

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Alrighty, time to talk about Pit. Rockettrainer already explained most of the matchup so I'll just add onto what he said.


What moves or tactics should we watch out for?

Arrows first and foremost. They're fast, annoying and can be aimed many ways. And matches usually start with you as far away from your opponent as possible. Fortunately, we do have many ways of avoiding Pit's arrows.

You can walk and shield/powershield, roll, airdodge, clank with fairs/nairs for when you land, reverse double team, and AS will out prioritize uncharged arrows when fully charged or half charged at high percents. BAS will at least clank with arrows, but Pit can fire his arrows faster, so don't use those.

Also, be careful about rolling; it only works if Pit mindlessly spams arrows.

This is just for regular arrows though, Pit still has the ability to loop his arrows and hit us from behind. I often see people posting about how tricks like these are just gimmicks and can't be used in real matches, but don't listen to that. Pit's arrow looping is effective because your job as a player is to keep yourself focused on your opponent. So while you have your eyes glued to Pit, his arrows are free to hit you in your blind spots. And if Pit is spaced properly and you get hit by a looped arrow, he is free to land an aerial on you. Avoid this by learning the timing and use retreating airdodges or shielding depending on where pit is.

Pit can also loop up to four arrows at once, although he doesn't usually get the chance to fire more than 3 in a normal match. Although if he does manage this, you now have multiple arrows to worry about. Pit's arrow rain is beastly when done correctly.

Pit also has the ability to loop his arrows so that they travel parallel to the ground. This means he can run towards you while covered by his arrows. If you don't get out of the way, he gets a free attack/grab on you.

And finally, Pit can and will use multiple arrows when trying to get back to the stage. Expect one arrow from each of his second jumps. If you intend to chase Pit off the stage make sure you aren't too close to him and avoid arrows by going above/below them or fairing them.

One more small note about arrows, if you're trying to approach Pit facing backwards, one hit from his arrows will change your direction which is usually not good.

Onto Pit's fsmash, it has two hits, comes out in frame 5, and doesn't have much ending lag either. If you shield Pit's fsmash you will usually get pushed too far back to attempt a shield grab if you get hit by the second hit. You can grab him after the first hit though.

Downsmash is also pretty fast and powerful. But this smash is easier to punish on block because it has slightly larger ending lag and less shield push.

Another thing to be aware of is his ftilt. It is slower than the fsmash, but has a deceptive amount of range that extends slightly past the sword.

And yeah, Pit's mirror shield comes out fast. It starts reflecting on frame 5 I think, and frames 1-4 give him super armor and will reflect non-projectile attacks including up B attacks. I can't remember if Lucario's up B also gets reflected this way, but I will go test it later. Mirror shield also does act as a shield as well. Attacks that hit the shield will merely push Pit away from you so grab him out of mirror shield instead.

Pit's side B comes out more slowly than down B, but it works great as a shield pressuring tool. If your shield gets caught in side B, your best bet is to roll. I have also shield grabbed Pit out of his side B sometimes, but I'm sure this requires precise timing so don't count on this.

At any rate, if Pit uses his reflectors incorrectly it's usually a free hit for you.

What moves or tactics should we try to enforce in this match up?

If a Pit starts gliding toward you on stage, you can anticipate his position and knock him out of the glide with an upsmash. I find upsmash extremely useful against the characters that can glide, too bad it's nearly useless everywhere else.

If you can get him off the stage you suddenly have a huge advantage. Lucario is one of the better gimping characters in the game and Pit is easily gimped (well not really that easily). Fairs do a good job at keeping him off the stage and bairs are pretty good too. If Pit starts shooting arrows haphazardly, you can land a bair. Try not to go above Pit however; 9 times out of 10 his uair will beat our dair because of its speed.

Now Pit's up B, wings of icarus has a bunch of uses. It can basically get him back to the stafe from anywhere. There are a bunch of important things to know about it though.
-Hitting Pit out of WoI makes him lose all his jumps and he cannot use up B again. Pit users will try to avoid letting this happen like they avoid mosquitoes.
-If you hit Pit during the startup of WoI, he does NOT lose his jumps and up B.
-The startup has a windpush effect similar to GaW's uair, although much weaker. It can still be used to push away enemies and projectiles.
-If pit goes through the entire animation of WoI he will go into fall special mode. If he uses an attack before it ends, he is free to do anything afterward aside from jumps and another up B.
-If Pit uses WoI twice in a row with a short amount of time in between (a few seconds I believe), the amount of time he will be able to use WoI will be drastically decreased.
-Pit can touch the ground while in WoI mode and will gain all his jumps and up B as long as he doesn't go into fall special. This means he can chase you pretty far off the map and still make it back to the stage.
-When started in the air, WoI will cause Pit to fall down a bit at first. If close to the bottom blast zone, Pit will die.
-Pit will also gain a momentum boost when activating WoI in the direction that he is already moving in. So if Pit is moving to the right as fast as he can in the air and activates WoI, he will be traveling faster to the right than if he were to have activated WoI while not moving and then moving to the right.

Pit can do many things with WoI. If he's high above you, he can activate WoI and reach the ground pretty fast. He can also imitate a wavedash with his WoI which makes it a pretty good spacing tool.

Do you feel Lucario has an advantage in any particular scenario of this matchup?

His fsmash outranges Pit's smashes. Dair stalling can be used to bait Pit's ground attacks.

And although Pit has very disjointed aerial attacks, they don't protect him very well diagonally-below. This means fairs/uairs are useful against him. And bair usually outranges him.

Do you feel the opponent can shut down aspects of Lucario's game?

Pit has a fast projectile and 2 reflectors. Lucario won't get to use AS often. Pit also beats Lucario in close range pretty easily. Luc never wants to be there ever.

And if Pit is hanging on the ledge, DO NOT GET NEAR HIM. His uair has hit me from below the edge more times than I can count. It hits a lot more horizontally than you would think it would.

Counterpicks? What to avoid and what to enforce?

Final D and Smashville, strike em. They not only make it easier for him to spam arrows but they make it easy for him to glide/WoI under the stage. Especially smashville.

If you can, try to go on Battlefield or Yoshi's. Yoshi's prevents him from going under the stage while also helping your recovery. Pit can still go under the stage in battlefield, but sometimes he can get caught on the wall in the middle. Lylat is so-so against Pit.

As for counterpicks, I like Halberd and Pokemon Stadium here. Halberd gives him little room to move and the walls on the deck make it easy to gimp him if he recovers low. PS keeps changing which usually means he can't camp that well. It also has a wall under the stage that prevents pit from going under (at least I think it was like that).


Good Lord that was a lot.
 

QUIVO

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Rolling towards the zair really helps the first few times. It messes with TL's spacing and you can punish it pretty well.

TL can catch on though and just bair after he zairs, so mix it up.

RT is the only person I can't up B against much since he knows how to SDI. It works against almost everyone else
 

RT

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Stop spilling so much info RT.. jeez, wtf, traitor. =]

Also, fair is SO good against us TLs.. trust me.. it stops our zairing
Rolling towards the zair really helps the first few times. It messes with TL's spacing and you can punish it pretty well.

TL can catch on though and just bair after he zairs, so mix it up.

RT is the only person I can't up B against much since he knows how to SDI. It works against almost everyone else
Lol, I'm only posting useful for now. If I find myself hating the Lucario boards again, I'll simply disappear again. It's that simple. :)

Also, I did put a disclaimer. No two TLs play alike. I think playing the both of you has taught me that, lol! ;)
 

Timbers

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it's..kinda easy to SDI toon's uB. Just play this game expecting to SDI every multihit move in this game and counter with dairs.
 

phi1ny3

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Isn't TL upB more often going to be used as an attack in the air instead of the ground? I could be wrong, but I hear it's more useful in the air.
Oh, and most of pit's aerials are actually a bit on the slow side, even bair/uair comes out on frame 9 or more (only nair comes out on frame 4 I believe). We pretty much outspeed him in the air with fair overall, something I stressed the last time we discussed Pit.
It's pretty even though, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was slightly in our favor, 55:45 as far as I'm concerned, but I hate MU numbers.
Every time I've taken a Pit to YI (I don't play Pit too often, but I have) and play smart (space well because fsmash is easy to DI out of if you are too far away when the first hit comes, and bair is telegraphed to an extent) it's rediculous how long you live on the stage.
 

RT

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It is more useful in the air than on the ground. But some TLs might try to use it OOS, since lost of characters have good UpB moves OOS. Except Lucario...
 

manhunter098

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If a Toon link EVER uses a grounded up-b against you, I am fairly certain you can DI out of it and punish him. Aerial up b is decent, if you get struck by it its rather difficult to get out, though it is possible.
 

MJG

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A grounded Up B is usually to get the opponent of your back or it will be used to when toonlinks get up instead of using a get up attack after something like Snake/ GnWs down throw (Not GnW so much since most people can tech it fairly easy now)

For lucarios, toonlinks might use Up B as an attempt to punish rolls and what not.

Lucario mains might already know this but our bombs will stop a fully charged Aurua Sphere (or whatever the move is called).
 

phi1ny3

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Enough of the upB, let's talk about stuff like bair, projectiles, and TL planking! It's a bit different from other chars planking, I hear (bomb throw and such). As well as projectiles.
 

RT

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Bombs: It can absorb pretty much every move you throw at it and can limit approaches. It can be used to start combos and lead into an uair finisher. Not a lot of knockback, but used mostly to do damage, to distract opponents, and just makes it dangerous to attack TL while he is holding one. There can be two out at a time. Definitely the best out of all of TL's projectiles.

Arrow: They have okay priority but can be canceled by many moves, including Lucario's fair, ftilt, Aura Sphere, etc. Mostly used to annoy and distract. Retreating arrows can be decently spammed. Probably the least used out of all the projectiles. Can be charged.

Boomerang: It's a boomerang. You throw it, and it comes back. It's almost as big as TL...anyways, it's basically a hitbox that leaves TL's body and eventually returns to him unless it is canceled/reflected. So if you airdodge/spotdodge it, be prepared for its return trip! Aura Sphere can cancel and eventually override it, and I'm sure other moves can too. It has okay knockback but returning ones can lead into combos.
 

#HBC | Red Ryu

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I know nothing about fighting Pits, Toon Link on the other hand I do have some knowledge about.

Toon Link's main killer on the ground is Usmash. It is easier to approach a TL using Zair for spacing, he doesn't have the range that Samus or Link's Zair have that can keep them safer. Toon Link's will most likely spam Boomerang and bombs, arrows aren't common but are used as a wall to hold back approaches.

Not much else I can say, RT already covered the whole thing.
 

RT

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I do play against TLs and Pits regularly, but I'm sure I missed something, lol.

If not, then you might as well move on to someone else...

Added some random minor additions and corrections to my posts.
 

phi1ny3

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Okay, I need two, possibly three things:
1. Numbers
2. handy tips and random stuff like that
3. Vote on next MU. Sounds like Link is a candidate.
 

#HBC | Red Ryu

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I'll tell the Link boards if you do, AiB links might come if they hear about this but the mods are having a fit with them coming over here.

Edit: Oh yeah, I recommend Frigade against Toon Link as a counter pick. and think the match-up is 55:45 Lucario
 

#HBC | Red Ryu

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An mod shut down a a ranking list thread rating the Link board members of best Link to worst.

Buzz a mod shut the thread down saying they can't make thread about real life people. The Link boards got permission from another mod to make the thread again, Buzz closed it again without saying a word about why he did it a second time.

Link boards complained about this nothing really got done. Mods were throwing out infractions all around the boards. In the end it was the fact they felt they were underrepresented having almost no mods helping the Link boards side. The main who was helping, Susa, at least helped the boards recover from the mass leaving.

The new anti-AiB stuff is mostly the fact some of the AiB members were advertising AiB which is against forum rules, to advertise other forums.

A bit off topic from Tink but that is what happened in a nutshell.
 

phi1ny3

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An mod shut down a a ranking list thread rating the Link board members of best Link to worst.

Buzz a mod shut the thread down saying they can't make thread about real life people. The Link boards got permission from another mod to make the thread again, Buzz closed it again without saying a word about why he did it a second time.

Link boards complained about this nothing really got done. Mods were throwing out infractions all around the boards. In the end it was the fact they felt they were underrepresented having almost no mods helping the Link boards side. The main who was helping, Susa, at least helped the boards recover from the mass leaving.

The new anti-AiB stuff is mostly the fact some of the AiB members were advertising AiB which is against forum rules, to advertise other forums.

A bit off topic from Tink but that is what happened in a nutshell.
Reminds me of when our social thread was shot down by Gimpyfish. I made an AiB group about it lol, but they were debating of either just continuing on the boards, or letting it die by coming onto the AiB boards or the SWF Mewtwo boards lol.
btw, I have a link on my sig to one of the funniest flame wars made by Aurashade, who iirc was one of the "link defenders".
 

Aurasmash14

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Reminds me of when our social thread was shot down by Gimpyfish.
btw, I have a link on my sig to one of the funniest flame wars made by Aurashade, who iirc was one of the "link defenders".
He shut it down coz you guys were talking about a flaming bus lol. The flame war Aurashade gave in that thread was also one of his last though.
 

Zucco

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For the love of god please do fox next. I need help in that matchup.
 

RT

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Fox or Shiek would be fine, but I will admit my knowledge and experience with both is somewhat limited. :ohwell:
 

RT

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If you want to go by tier list, Fox would be first. It doesn't matter to me...
 
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