Bowser Strategies

[GrabfestBowser]

If you want to write how you use YOUR Bowser, put it in this thread, don't go writing it in retarded threads like the, "Why can't Bowser throw Hammers?" thread. This way people will read it, critique it, and benefit from your thoughts.

My guide will be up in 2 weeks.

Luke

[ChRed2AKrisp]

No matter what you say I find that shuffling bowser works well for me. Maybe its just that my crew is pretty good but not wonderful. But I like shuffling into a ftilt

Grabs are out for bowser. THe only one that I use sometimes is either down throw or uthrow to >B or fair.
That's about all I can say for now, I'm still getting used to him and developing my strat. I'll have I'm down before the end of the year.

[GrabfestBowser]

Grabbing with Bowser is like 40% of my offense. It's his most underrated move without a doubt, and the down throw leads into multiple downthrows, or a downsmash if your opponent techs back into you, which is what 95% of people do when you pancake them and they are close enough to the edge where they won't get a full "away tech."

Do your friends not shield grab you?

I try to limit the Fair to times when both me and my opponent are in the air.

And I usually fortress after a ff into Lcancel, but against people like Doc or Ganon or DK or Jiggly or people who block and then jump into a quick Fair, I like to UpTilt because that comes out REALLY fast.

But if you don't grab, how do you go about beating characters who are better than you in the air? Like Ganondorf? Grabbing accounts for me getting people off the edge of the level so I can edgeguard... it's like 80% of my "get his *** off the edge" game.

Luke

[ChRed2AKrisp]

Thanks for poiting that out. I told you i'm not sure what i'm doing yet. I haven't played my friends Gdorf yet.
And they do shieldgrab. ALOT. You know i'm not sure about that. I think maybe its that I haven't played a seroius match against one of their good chars. I'll play them this Sat. and report my findings. Ur probably right but I'l find what works best for me.

[Zarelid]

you know whats a GREAT start for bowser? Ledge canceling!!!!! it's great since bowsers L canceling sucks edge canceling makes his lag time end quicker. Combos that I was doing, like back air to forward air edge cancling the back air obviusly. or like n-air edge cancel to forward B grab etc.... works wonders =)

[VilNess]

zarelid has a point... However you need to play in those platform stages.... I don´t see how edgecancelling helps in FD much. I can imagine that you can edgecancel into shield into fortress at the corner off the stage if bowser thinks the he can edgeguard but not KO...
maybe im just missing sometimes...

Definetly edgecancelling should be worked into bowsers game, since his hitboxes are quite big with moves like Bair.

[HoChiMinhTrail]

Yea my strats are very similiar to yours luke, mainly because ive been learning from ur vids, but i now have incorporated WDin into my game and have come up with a few things that it can be used for, this i will show u if i mirror u over Xmas break --;

[PXTalon2000]

My Bowser's kind of funny. I play with him a lot, but it's like I still don't know how to use him. So often I'll get in a match and I'll find one thing that works, and then continuously harass my opponent with whatever that is, and switch tactics as soon as he changes his behaviour.

Moves that I may spam: Dash attack, fortress (maybe CCed, maybe out of the shield), fair, klaw, downsmash, ftilt, grab, firebreath

But I do have an established style of Bowser. I wavedash and dashdance with him, but I try to maintain a generally aggressive game. I'm actually pretty fond of back and forward throws. Sometimes I'll grab after a neutral A. When I use the klaw, I mostly don't take bites; I just throw as soon as possible, hoping to catch the opponent off guard so they'll miss the DI.
Mih.. I'm sure there's more to say... (but.. of course.. not saying anything... I'll try to get a vid up sometime when I go back to school)

[LinksterJake88]

You just described all the moves I do with my Bowser minus the dash attack. Except I Nair too...

And I never headbutt out of a grab or bite out of Klaw for that very same reason... I want my opponent to NOT have time to think so that I can be up on him as fast as possible again.

Luke

[PXTalon2000]

Originally posted by LinksterJake88
You just described all the moves I do with my Bowser minus the dash attack. Except I Nair too...

And I never headbutt out of a grab or bite out of Klaw for that very same reason... I want my opponent to NOT have time to think so that I can be up on him as fast as possible again.

Luke

I use all of Bowser's moves, but I've never met a person against whom I've thought "I should be abusing nair right now"
I do, however, look for it when it is possible, because it'll usually "combo" into something. And I'll use it to try to interrupt a juggle maybe.

I'm pretty sure you're also more fond of the downthrow than I am.

Dash attack = good against some people, not against others. Some people using a few characters anyways. It is my observation that one must be very sensitive to his opponent's style of play and vulnerabilities to use Bowser at all, unlike Shiek or Falco when you can just be like "me want grabtilts" or "lazar time" whenever. If you're going to use the dash attack, it's only to get under somebody shorthopping, and you need to also build up a game of mixups/backup plans to go along with it, but when people start expecting a dash attack I find it can get me grabs, klaws, or even fair if they no longer cover their descent with an attack. If I use dash attacks successfully for, like, more than a minute, though, I get pretty uncomfortable. Jus' that anything that sends someone *up* is so tempting.. It's also pretty good against projectiles.

[VilNess]

The good thing about bowser dashattack is that you can actually use it on enemy´s in air, unlike most dashattacks (swordsmen have a bit of the same advantage if I remeber correctly)

[EK]

Do bowser have some nice grab combos or something like that

[TheRedMarth]

I'd hate (After looking at the impressive Decadent's guide)to put up a guide here. So what I would prefer to make this somewhat of a tips and tricks section for Bowse. Situational mind you, but these are a few things that I've learned.

Against Fox or Falco (and it seems against most speedy characters)-

-Nair is your best friend. One of Bowsers best approaches is a shuffled fair (Granted the fast-falling is almost not nessecary, but if you can get it in your fingers to l-cancel that fast fall I do believe it makes Bowse a little lighter on his feet), but a problem that I kept running into with the top tiers and their speed and respectable rolls, is that they would roll right past half of my shuffled fairs.

Disguising your fair is important, but if you are caught in the situation with a top tier rolling out behind or in front of you, and you successfully l-canceled fair, I've found that Nair might actually be a better alternative against those chars. At least the fast fallers among them.

Situationally it would be:

SH-Fair*(Opponent rolled)*L-cancel*SH*DI-toward opponent*Nair*btilt-or-ftilt

The only reason that I find this preferable to 'Fortress' is that when you n-air into the tilt it gives you a little more flexible being that there are two moves to execute and it gives you and oppurtunity to escape in the nair didn't work.

Even if the l-canceled nair didnt work you cant fortress your way out of it.

But if it did work you were able to rack up a bit more damage and a touch more knockback. I find this combo a little more preferable to fortressing out of the shuffled fair.

Either way. This is just one tip. I don't like writing for long periods of time so I'll post these every so often. I'm far from a Bowse master but I like to think that I'm decent. Besides, if this advice is total riciculous luke will surely come along and correct it. :)

[GrabfestBowser]

Nope, looks good to me. I like to F or Btilt after an Lcancel because it has good priority and coverage... and if you miss, like say for instance your opponent rolled away from you, don't feel afraid to spam the Fair then... in most cases or unless your opponent is used to Bowser, he needs great timing to run up and grab you in between attacks.

Luke

[MagnuM]

Luke, do you prefer to FF any Bowser attack, or attack right away w/o the fastfall?

Also, when you fortress, how do you make it effective so that lag at the end of the fortress is not taken advantage of?

P.S. How did you guys make such awesome banner/signature things?

[HoChiMinhTrail]

just dont get predictable with the fortress, thats about all u can do i think to avoid getting owned in the fortress lag time

[GrabfestBowser]

I try to fast fall every aerial attack. The only time I don't is when I'm doing a jump into quick Fair so that if I miss I can use my next jump to retreat further backwards.

Can't do nothing about the fortress lag, that's why fast people like Falcon destroy you. The best I can do with it is go back and forth once it's blocked to try to lead him one way or the other - like I'm either going to end up on top of him or far away from him, make him guess one, and if he makes a mistake, when he's bearing down on you you can fortress again only this time you'll hit him full force.

Luke

[Zarelid]

I like bowsers Dash attack because it gets them in the air and gets you ready to forward B grab and forward throw to up airs =)

[Gojira]

Basically i rely on grabbing...well pretty much alot also i use to forward tilt over his nutruel a two strike combo. I also Work on air attacking with l cancling....my only problam is i roll dodge with him in hairy situations instead of fortressing to saftey.

[GrabfestBowser]

Fortressing or rolling are the same thing... if you are playing against someone who is any type of good, you will get punished no matter what. Unless when you fortress away you are talking about when you are on top of him and in that case you'd hit him up in the air... that's different. I'm talking about the fortress "nip" that hits for like 3 percent that ultimately only hurts you more than you hurt him.

Luke

[HoChiMinhTrail]

i've begun to find that the bowser bomb has some usage when ur opponent is trying to juggle u in the air, i KOed a few sheiks in the last tournament i was in by doing so. And of course its great for flying onto the ledge quickly and safely )-.-

[Gojira]

The Bowser bomb is a neet move. Since its priority is above average you can use it to hit people who are coming from midair, by plowing through their up B and the grabing edge. They cant dodge obviously, and if they do recover you can cilmb the edge and do a Uair. Also if you do it when they have lower damage and if you have blow 100 you can do the bomb then roll on to the stage and start the up smash attack and hit em if the come above you.

[HoChiMinhTrail]

yes i agree.

[Gojira]

His basic double(A->A) claw is good if the opponet is in the air trying to revover as well.

[HoChiMinhTrail]

Gojira where are u from....?

[Suretman]

When I use bowser, I fortress often. Forward tilt is pretty good. I try to trap my opponent in the flame breath often and it usually works and you end up putting on a lot of damage and also using the flamebreath to edgeguard is good. When I'm on the ledge I sometimes drop down and then jump and forward air and then up b back to the ledge(this takes some pretty good timing, but I think it's beneficial and worth learning)

Down smash seems to serve as a great edgeguarder also. I don't grab that much(I usually choose to fortress or fair/nair out of shield) because I've just recently learned about his throw setups.

I occasionaly down b, sometimes when I'm on the ground and my opponent is approaching me I will do it and you'll end up a few feet in front of where you are, which should catch them off guard. Also if I'm coming back to the stage and I'm coming from above I may choose to sweetspot right to the ledge with the down b, to throw them off and get a safe passage back onto the stage without playing the guessing game.

I also forward b, ecspecially when they start to sheild grab me a lot. I sometimes move slightly forward or backward and or WD to a forward smash, so far it's proved pretty effective. When you land the neutral a on the ground remember to connect both hits not just the first. Crouch cancelling is good with bowser don't forget that and the down tilt seems to have decent range and power too. I would mention up tilt for about the same reason that Luke already did but there is no point in repeating. So thats basically how I play Bowser.

[Gojira]

Originally posted by HoChiMinhTrail
Gojira where are u from....?

Roy Utah

[Yo-Yo]

When I play Bowser I usually start by coming at people with shuffled fairs, and once they start shield grabbing I use the side B to get through the shield, or, if their character has crappy grab range, I try to position myself so that my fairs hit them, but from too far away for them to shield grab. If they start sidestepping so as to avoid both attacks, I use the flame to rack up some pretty good damage. If you hang on the edge you can actually let go, immediately midair jump away from the stage, use a bair and use the Whirling Fortress just in time to grab the ledge again. This works from time to time simply because nobody expects that from Bowser and, if it connects, it's almost a guaranteed KO. If I try to edgehog somebody and they just barely make it over me onto the stage I find that coming back in with a side B usually ends that particular stock if it grabs them. I try to throw them as soon as possible though, rather than biting because it helps prevent them from DIing the throw.

Against fast-fallers the side b's fthrow into a fair is deadly. I'm not sure, but I don't think they can DI far enough away to get out of the fair's range. The side b's fthrow can be followed with the uair a couple of times and then with a fair, if they're at relatively low damage to start. This builds up damage really quickly, and can kill them if they were near the ledge.

Unfortunately, the best player in my area won't play my Bowser in a serious match, so it's hard for me to say how much of this stuff works on good players, but hopefully some of it is helpful. Phew, that was a long post.

P.S. Is it just me, or does it seem like the Bowser CPU can milk a little extra distance out the Whirling Fortress when it recovers?



EDIT: L-cancel into Fortress or utilt is my friend.

[GrabfestBowser]

And when you forward B a fast faller like falco or fox or falcon, and you throw them forward... if they don't DI, you can jump and do it again for an infinite combo.

But falco and fox CAN DI the Klaw so that you can not get to them for a Forward Aerial. They have to DI the direction of the forward throw and you can't get to them in time.

Luke

[YOSHIDO]

Hmm bowser has great power. After 100% u dont have to charge anything. Try and do most attacking from the air. Work on ur blockin and dodgein. Grab alot and dont get grabed. Stunn with the fire.

[Yo-Yo]

I just got back from Fall River and I got to play some really good people and I found that grabbing was extremely helpful. If you use the dthrow you can usually follow their tech and get them with it 1 or 2 more times, which does pretty good damage. It's also a good way to get them off the stage, at which point it's not overly difficult to edgeguard with Bowser. Also, the dsmash is excellent against players that roll a lot. When I was hanging on the edge I found that jumping back in with the Koopa Klaw was pretty effective if you only use it once in a while. I don't bother biting, I just throw them off and hope they didn't react fast enough to DI the throw.

[LD50]

Just wanted to say that I got done watching a few videos of Luke and his "commentary" and I loved them, so I made this signature. Feel free to use it if you, too, are a Luke Fan.

Also, I am painfully aware of the previous posting date, and I apologize >_<;

[Gimpyfish62]

>_>

you may be aware, but thats still pretty bad LOL

nice sig, its very cool.

[DarkKnight077]

Most of the time with my Bowser I tend to try to stay in the middle of the stage so I can do my grab and air combos..it does not work on the edge for an odd reason plus his unair attack is good ar like 100% damage...I figure it out how to use it..

[LD50]

>_>

you may be aware, but thats still pretty bad LOL

nice sig, its very cool.
Yeah, I realised the date after I posted >_<;;

[ChuDat]

Yaaaayuhhzz

[McRustyJr]

Holy **** Its Chudat!

[LD50]

And, in typical fashion, leaves a trademark message of "Yaaaayuhhzz"...

Chu, my subliminal mind powers command you to use my sig, because we all know you are a true Luke Fan. Besides, if you use it, then everyone will think I'm cool. Everybody wins! ^_^b

[Haruno Kotetsu]

My strategies of choice are usually these:

-SHFFL nair [sometimes fair] into a fortress then ftilt or .
-Shield grab, bthrow, fair then edge hog.
-Fthrow [klaw], fair, fortress then edge hog.

You get my point ^^'

[NDigighost]

maybe throw a quote in there...
"now thats how you edgeguard with bowser! like a pimp!"
"mario is a ****ing midget, he has no range"
"tilt!"
"youre dead, game over"
"dont roll into me!"
"ill kill you if you jump"
etc.