Edge Guarding/ thunder

[T Bird]

I know it was dissmissed earlier By picitish in his guide, but maybe he didn't know how to use it effectivley.
I realize it can be easily avoided by an edgegrab, if you do it wrong.
The idea is to use thunder off the stage and miss yourself, creating a line down the entire stage just next to the ledge. Now no charecter can grab it.
The wind up is huge, so you need to have some time, but it lasts so long you don't really need timing, just start it asap. It pops the enemy up for a nice arial or even an upsmash depending on damage and where it hit them. and the lag at the end of your move.
Yes this can be done without falling off the stage to your death.

[EnigmaticCam]

Got a vid?

[Riemann]

I would like to elaborate on how this can be done. You have to jump over the ledge, then use your second jump to jump back, and as you do this you thunder. If done properly, you should be standing near the edge of the stage with a line of thunder going down the edge of the stageso that no character can edge grab while it's there. This tech will only work against some characters, and is somewhat situational. Oftentimes there will be a better way to edgeguard them. One great situation for this is if the opponent is coming up from the bottom into and edgegrab. Another situation is if they are too high to attack, but this is avoidable if they drop down to recover or if they airdodge through it. It is good against difficult to intercept recoveries like Zelda's and Pika's. This should pretty much never used against characters like Peach or Jiggly who can stall in the air or against characters with stage grapples (dont know what the term for theis is) like samus and link. Before deciding when to use this tech you should examine the alternatives. I don't mean during the battle. You should practice the different ways to intercept an opponent, find which is the best in different situations, and decide what to do based on experience. Ususally the lag on thunder will prevent further edgeguarding. This can also be used if you know that they will grab the ledge, fakeout this tech, and do the thunder just barely on the stage so that they will try to get up to avoid the thunder they think is coming and slam into the one they didn't expect. Good luck learning and using edgethundering!

[N64]

Riemann summed it up quite well, though I personally don't think edgethundering is a viable technique at all. Pika pretty much always has a better alternative, he's got quite an array of edge-guarding options. There are a few problems with edgethundering, and though they've been said, i'd like to elaborate on them.

1. Slightly long wind-up - Thunder has a moderately long wind-up (and also a nice indication to your opponent of what pika's doing by him calling "PIKA!" to the skies), which means you'll have to predict where your opponent will be when the move executes and reaches where you want it to reach, and that they won't be able to escape it. If they get past it...

2. Post-thunder position - So you used thunder to edge-guard. There are two ways you could have done this. Way #1 is to jump off & the edge and thunder on your way out. Now you are off the stage(and fairly far below it) with your only hope of returning being your double jump and upB. If you hit with the thunder, your opponent is knocked back slightly and you're both returning at approx the same time from it. If you miss, you're now the one being edge-guarded. Way #2 is to jump out, double jump back, and thunder on your way back so you land on the stage and the thunder goes right in front of the edge as intended(Riemann's explanation). This might be alright if it wasn't for...

3. Horrible post-thunder lag - The lag on thunder is extremely long. It's even longer when you thunder and it hits nothing (neither you nor the stage). If you use Way #2 and it hits the opponent, they'll probably be able to recover from it and return to the edge before you can get out of the lag from thunder and position yourself to continue edge-guarding. If it misses the opponent (they avoid it), then they have a nice opportunity to punish you in your horrible post-thunder lag. But, all moves have their risks, right? It's totally worth it. Except...

4. It's not likely to kill anyone - What is gained from edgethundering? Your opponent gets knocked away in an arc. It hits them up and away(or if they get inside it, up and over the stage), but usually with not enough knockback to prevent most characters from DIing and upBing(or whatever return method works best for the char) from the same spot they originally did. So what did you gain? They took like 6% damage, and are now probably more likely to return because of the horrible lag you are experiencing from thunder. But wait, doesn't pika have...

5. Better options - Pika's edge-guarding game is notable. You can harass with jolts, chase opponents off the edge with uairspikes/nairs/bairs and easily return with upB, fsmash the edge, dsmash the edge, and even snag an edge for an edgehog with upB. These are all relatively safe & reliable methods to edge-guard with pika.

Edgethundering just has too much risk and not enough results to be useful. Pictish knows what he's talking about.

[T Bird]

Picitish never mentioned off edge thundering, and yes, there are charecters that can stall it. However Pikas lag is NOT enough at the end of the move to keep him from attacking again, against some charecters. If they're poped up straight then an arial or smash is possible and if they're poped out they're off the edge with only their third jump. The trick is to start thunder right away so that they hit toward the end. Again, only useful against some charecters. It's pretty good against marth or gannon/ falcon and any other charecter that can come from beneath. It would never be used on someone above because tail spike is so much better, but I'm not positive as to why I wouldn't use it on people with grapples. Jolt is better maybe?

[Riemann]

Edgethundering only goes so far down, thus grapple characters can grab below the thunder and avoid being hit.

[TMTS]

I see what you mean, and I do this to some extent with Pichu to add some stall time to a b-right/left. Or I just let them come back, and when their third jump stops being dangerous and they're vulnerable, I Bash em.

But good idea, I'll try to do it more often.

[T Bird]

Actualy I just checked and thunder does not stop, it goes until it hits something, so off the stage it goes forever. This makes it the only viable choice against grapplers coming in really low.

[Riemann]

Actualy I just checked and thunder does not stop, it goes until it hits something, so off the stage it goes forever. This makes it the only viable choice against grapplers coming in really low.

Yes, Pikmachu's thunder does stop after a distance (at least in 1.0,) however I thought it was much shorter than it is because Pichu's thunder is about 3/4 as long and I am a Pichu player. Wit Pichu, on levels like FD or yoshi's story, people have grappled under my edgethunder, however I never tried with Pika and I just assumed it was the same height or even shorter because Pika is already much better than Pichu, I figured, "Nintendo mad a really bad character, they had to give him some things that are better than the original." Also Pika's travels a farther distance in a shorter time, ergo the hitboxes of the thunder pass by more quickly. Another thin I noticed when comparing the two is that Pichu's thunder seems to have a shorter hitbox at any given moment.

The differences between Pichu's and Pika's thunder (in version 1.0) as far as I cdan tell are:
If it doesn't hit Pika/Pichu
1. Pika's stops lower down than Pichu's if they don't hit anything.
2. Pika's knocks them back, Pichu's traps them.
3. Pika's does 10 damage, Pichu's does 4 per hit (average of 4 hits if you trap them the whole way through)
4. Pika's hitbox is shorter
5. Pika's hitbox passes by quicker.
If it does hit Pika/Pichu
1. Pika's does 17 damage and never traps them. Pichu's does 13 damage and will somethimes trap them (25 damage average if it then traps them.)
2. Pika's has more knockback than Pichu's.
3. When falling, Pichu's will hit him a very small amoiunt lower than Pika's.

I know not all of theese are relevant to edgethundering, but all can help you edgeguard with thunder.

[T Bird]

Nice to know. I guess I've never bothered to really check that, but Pikas gos more that far enough for most stages, If not all. i don't play pichu at all, but the distinctions are still going to be usefull to other players and may help some a lot. Pichus trapping them gives him a better chance to recover in time for attack, but pikas sending them out may kill attempting grapplers, who can only grapple once till they land back on the stage, also gives time to recover for pika as the enemy get's back. At higher damage it kills.