Liquid Crystal Dragon Style: Intermediate Game & Watch Guide

Before we begin, please make sure you know the basics of Game and Watch.
Terms and other Things you should already know:
Properties of Game and Watch's moves (windboxes, when dair slowfalls, etc.)
Basic knowlwdge of G&W's custom moves
Foxtrot
Reverse Aerial Rush(RAR)
B-reversing/Wavebouncing
Table Flipping
Bucket Jumping
Pivot Tilt /Pivot Smash
Basic Down Throw Combos(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZWhLNl7kM4)

Got it? Good.
Also, frame data and stats for reference http://kuroganehammer.com/Smash4/Game And Watch

Neutral Game: Offensive
One of Game and Watch's strengths is that he can tack damage on incredibly quickly, but that's pointless unless he can land the hits. However, one of Game and Watch's other good points is that his stunted animation makes it incredibly hard to tell what he will do next. Therefore, the theory of Game and Watch in the offensive is DON'T BE PREDICTABLE. Luckily, the rarity of the character lends himself to that goal.

Game and Watch is sadly not very good at applying safe pressure like Shiek. The gods of Sm4sh saw fit to give him bad landing lag on all of his aerials, so that they would be unsafe on shield. His dash attack is also shield grabbable, and his dash grab isn't the best. His only safe approaching attack in shield is the tip of fair, due to a reduction in the landing lag of the move between Brawl and Sm4sh. On the other hand, you're not going to give them the satisfaction of shielding your onslaught.

Game and Watch's initial dash is quick, covers a fair distance, and has no lag if you don't full on dash. It is Game and Watch's most powerful mixup option. Muster up your bravery and replace dashing with Foxtrots. Sure, you can only shield at the end, but you aren't really vulnerable unless you space it poorly. Throw whatever you want in there! Short hops, dash attacks, even a roll away! Remember: stay unpredictable! G&W's movement is his most important tool as a bait and punish-heavy character.

Neutral Game: Defensive
Game and Watch has some pretty good defensive options. Shield is prevalent in this game, and what a character can do out of shield is pretty relevant in this game. Luckily, G&W has some killer stuff here. Aerials out of shield are highly situational, as his nair isn't fast, but bair can catch laggy crossups pretty well if the opponent is large enough..

His Up-B out of shield varies from decent to amazing if customs are on. Normal parachute doesn't have a hitbox, so you'll be lucky to knock them away, but it's a very fast escape option and you have a lot of aerial mobility gliding down, so don't forget that. Trampoline Launch should only be used if you're sure the Trampoline will hit, because he's kind of a sitting duck if the opponent shields the Trampoline hit or you miss, even if there are platforms above. Heavy Trampoline is amazing for this though; has a wide area hitbox, throws to opponent off of you violently with a chance to combo THEM, and is fast enough to be a safe escape 90% of the time.

Up-B is pretty decent out of shield, but if you have a read, you can punish the opponent REALLY hard. Jump cancelled Up-Smash out of shield is amazing and underused. Most aerial assaults will be outright destroyed with this move. Fox gearing up for a dair/nair? Crush him with the helmet. Yoshi planning to decimate your shield with dair? Smash em' with the scuba(only works before first hit, G&W will armor the first couple attacks). Wario spamming Bike? You know what to do(But be facing away from him). Heck, I've armored through Jigglypuff Rest with Scuba Steve! What's more, there are plenty of attacks that get a guaranteed punish on shield with this move. Pacman's dash attack has the potential to cross up so that you can't shield grab it, but if you jump cancel up smash after the first hit, you'll power through the second hitbox and make him think twice about his next approach, if you didn't kill him outright!
If you shield somethng laggy with tons of shield pushback, dash grab probably won't come through for you, so dash attack. It goes far despite any reverse traction and is decently fast. Guarantees positional advantage and difficult to escape string opportunities at lower percents.
At low percents where Upsmash doesn't kill, you might be able to throw another move in there for an even harder punish. More on that below.

Dtilt is super important post 1.0.8, offensively and defensively. It's G&W's fastest tilt, and puts them offstage easily now. You can also screw up aerial approaches with the windbox. Don't forget Table Flipping! It has decent priority.This move is very effective against certain characters
Has a ton of trouble approaching with aerials against G&W between this move and upsmash. I really enjoy this MU.
Also has trouble approaching on this move, because it sends her float way upwards
/ I find it very easy to stuff Fox and Falco's Phantasm with this move, not to mention their consistently aerial approaches. It's a wall they can't get past easily.
Gyro is taken out of the equation for a while if G&W get the chance to dtilt it while it's stationary. It will go sky high and not come back down for a bit.
Table Flipping will let you completely avoid any non-key fruit.

Be careful though, this move is pretty laggy.
Despite it's laggyness, I'd like to note that because of G&W's low endlag on usmash Usmash into dtilt is pretty legitimate when the opponent is antsy to punish the safe on shield smash attack.

Speaking of usmash, as G&W's best move, it has a place in defensive play as well! Not just as a simple bait, but as a hard counter to people who always cancel run into shield, as they're pushed back safely and you get advantage for pressure.

Finally, the greatest defensive tech Mr. G&W has!
DUCKING
Mr. G&W's duck is reaaaly low. Testing has placed it at a cool second lowest, behind WFT. So low that he can low profile a TON of moves. You should especially know whose grabs and dash attacks can be ducked, because that cripples the effectiveness of their run ins. Just don't do it too much, or you will get read by a good player. Notable matchups where this is very relevant are
////I put these characters together because they have one thing in common; Game and Watch can always avoid their most dangerous projectiles by ducking. Charge Shot, Thunder, Lasers and Sun Salutation will never hit a ducking Game and Watch at ground level. With possibly the exception of Fox's lasers, you'll probably want to bucket them, but this requires less commitment. Also, Bucket is very hard to use on reaction since they added startup frames(Why Sakurai) If you've got the read down perfectly, Bucket is better but landing and ducking is best if you're unsure whether the shot is coming
I'd also like to note that Samus's punish game is pretty fraudulent so when they go for short hop aerials to punish bad pressure duck that nonsense! It's a good MU.
Oh boy. This is by far my favorite MU to play G&W with. Ducking circumvents nearly every approach option she has from the ground! Not to mention the short hop nair would have to be much tighter than usual to land! Here's the ridiculous list of attacks of ZSS G&W can duck: dash attack, jab, Paralyzer, Side B when very close(will hit at mid-max range), ftilt, uptilt, and GRAB(I've heard that specific parts of the whip will still catch him but it seems negligible because it's never happened to me and I've never seen it)!!! That leaves her with, what, down tilt, down-angled ftilt and down smash up close? And you can absorb dsmash with bucket, leaving her with NO GOOD OPTIONS. Being able to duck her grab is incredibly important because
1. It's very laggy, making it easy to punish
2. She can't really beat shield otherwise
and 3. It's where she gets most of her damage and kills from
Constantly ducking against her leaves her with only a couple approach options, all of which can be read or reacted to and punished with ease. Remember to move and not shield when you see the Flip Kick so you can hard punish!

All in all, G&W is a haaaard character to approach for a brawler type. But what about when you win neutral?

MAXIMIZING DAMAGE
This is THE most important thing about this character. If you trade blow for blow, you are going to lose against most of the cast because of your light weight. Therefore, you have to do more damage than them. Here are some ways to milk Game and Watch's hits.

Chef: Finally, this move gets some love. This move doesn't seem that great, but you can use it to milk a combo. after landing a move with low knockback that you cannot follow up on, throw some food at them to cover your next approach. A favorite strategy of mine is to B-reverse Chef for a single piece of food after landing a combo-ending bair. If they airdodge, you can punish harshly with a run-up upsmash or judge. If they take the hit that's a free dash attack or fair. If they jump away, well then you have stage position.

Tech Chasing: This is definitely not nearly as rampant in G&W's play as it was in previous Smash Bros. installments due to how they changed down throw, but there is still at least one instance where knowing how to tech chase can com in handy. When you sourspot down smash the opponent flies horizontally. If they don't tech, run up and shield. This puts you in a prime position to punish pretty much any get up option.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, Game and Watch can jab reset with sourspot fair, but that is highly situational and will mostly be done on platforms if at all. Landing a Fire at the ledge (more on that below) may set them up for this at low percents if they do not tech. Also, a footstool on the right height on certain floaties can lead to it. Down throw can even set him up! If you want to try this out I'd try in on Kirby.

Optimized Down Throw Combos and Followups: My Smash Corner's video was a fine rundown of basics, but he only covered true combos, and not even all of them. You can get a LOT more damage out of down throw, but you need to know both your moves and the properties of your opponent's character very well. For instance, after uptilt there are characters especially vulnerable to a followup nair or bair. Here's some different types of characters and how they react to dthrow:
Fastfallers(,,) Game and Watch loves fastfallers, even though he can't get proper uptilts off on most of them at low percents. This is because Game and Watch gets much more guaranteed damage at low percents off of them. These characters will pretty much be ejected on the ground in front of you, but with frame advantage to you. If you aren't confident in your footing or position, jab is guaranteed on most of them. However, if you're both on flat ground, footstool dair is guaranteed and awesome. You'll land both hits for a solid 18%, and the opponent won't slide that far away from you, so dash attack aftarwards sometimes works. after those very low percents, midweight rules apply.
Special Case: is vulnerable to down smash at the range where footstool is difficult and uptilt/nair/uair still won't combo.

Midweights(,) This is most of the cast, and where the BnB combos kick in. At very low percents you can land the usual uptilt and go for juggles. Middling percents (25%-55%) provide some more opportunities though. Now that you can land a nair, you actually have a kind of mixup. If you fastfall the nair and land before landing the launching hitbox, they are sucked back down to the ground for a possible downsmash or jab-regrab. The percents this works on are more difficult and success is rare, but the reward may the higher than Option 2, which is to get a guaranteed 25%-27% combo. Fire is guaranteed after the fishbowl, but you need to land the move just right, then Fire in the right direction. The most consistent way I've found to ensure the Fire is to land the final hit just so the opponent is just to the right of the center of the bowl. This pops them up perfectly for a forward-leaning Fire. It's much more difficult to land if the opponent is launched behind you.

Lightweights(,,and lighter) Lighter characters tend to be more difficult to combo, and this is no exception. Even at 0%, they are thrown high enough so that you can barely land one hit of uptilt. I don't recommend using uptilt when you can because it send them much too high up for combos. However, dthrow to nair lock works much better on these characters at lowest percents, and dthrow-nair-Fire works at 0, so that takes away some of the guess work of which option to go for. These are also some of the better characters to randomly throw a Judgement at from 0% because they won't hit the ground before the hitbox is quite gone so it will catch panic airdodges.

Heavies(,,) G&W prefers these guys too, because he gets much easier followups from uptilt on huge characters. DK in particular. Dthrow-uptilt-bair-double jump-bair-Fire is a TRUE COMBO on him, and the only character I've found who has the right combo of size, falling speed and weight for it to be so. It is also hard for the other heavies to escape that powerful string, so I recommend that. Dthrow-nair-dj nair is also appallingly easy on them(more on that in a bit)

Extra-OK, I know I listed him as fastfaller example, and he is, and the rules of fasfallers apply to him, but he's a little peculiar. If you catch him at 4-10%, then down throw and uptilt, he ends up behind you in hitstun, guaranteeing a second grab-dthrow-nair-Fire or anything else you want to do out of a second grab. The heavy combo I listed earlier also works on him after the second grab, allowing you to put on a whopping 48% guaranteed off a single grab. With regrab you can put 59%! Luigi is green with envy.
EDIT: Oh hey it's guaranteed on and too!

There are other ways to increase damage from grab.
Upthrow-Depending on the character, up throw to uair to Fire is the optimal 0% combo off grab. This applies to heavies and fastfallers for the most part. On larger characters you can sneak a fair after the Fire for extra damage!!

Uair- There are specific percents where uair true combos and kills, and depending on the stage knowing when is very valuable. But I won't go into that here. If you're curious, check this post in the G&W threads, courtesy of BBC7( http://smashboards.com/threads/mr-frame-data-frame-data-information-ko.383626/page-2#post-19026576 )What I'm going to mention is the incredible damage you can put on the opponent if they're not careful. If the opponent is careless enough to get get hit by one of the most damaging aerials in the game right off the ground at very low percent, the damage will be huge. On very heavy characters like Dedede you can downthrow, uair, jump into another uair and end it with a Fire, being a crazy 40% true combo after the first uair. You'll only be able to guarantee Fire on most characters though.

Alternate nair combos- Nair can combo into Fire out of dthrow, sure, but there are some rare, more damaging options to be used by the advanced. If you REALLY want to maximize your damage, You must learn the combo sweetspot of nair, because at very specific lower midrange percents G&W can double jump out after nair and follow up with an uair or another nair. Both can lead into another Fire, and will create HUGE damage. In this case, uair after nair may be easier to execute and get the Fire afterwards, but on most characters the effective percent range is smaller then nair, and as mentioned before you will do one less damage. The followup's difficulty depends on the matchup. Generally, the bigger the character the easier nair-nair will be at the correct percent range. There are exceptions, to this rule of thumb, like every combo rule-of-thumb in the game;is oddly forgiving despite his small stature(possibly due to low gravity + high fall speed), while , despite having a ginormous hitbox requires nearly frame perfect timing to make it a TRUE combo(You might want to use uair on her, along with the other floaties and extreme lightweights[,]) If you wish to practice I'd practice on Ike or Cloud because they're not difficult but not free like large heavies.

NOTE: On the top platform of Halberd, the dthrow upair will combo-kill at 70% on the lighter half of the cast(Mario and under), and you'll kill other characters later. This makes Halberd a solid choice for G&W players.

SOME OTHER COMBO NONSENSE
As mentioned already, Game and Watch is a glass juggler character. To fully take advantage, you'll have to capitalize perfectly on every stray hit. You'll be surprised at how many of his moves will true combo into other attacks.
20%+ DAMAGE POTENTIAL COMBO STARTERS (in order of how easy to land)

• Down throw, already covered
• Up Smash(low-mid percents)
• Bair(Low percents only)
• Grounded footstool to dair/ dair
• Uptilt, but mostly works out of dthrow

Non-throw BnBs
- landing bair-bair/nair/Fire/uair-Fire at 0-10%(Also combos into Judgement if they don't DI away and you're feeling lucky)
-usmash to uair to Fire(or just directly to Fire at higher percents)*utilt on extreme fastfallers at low percents
-Chef to fair/double bair or grab(Really only follow up on Chef on select characters)
*Safe on Shield
-Upsmash
-Farthest ranged bair(But not really)
-Retreating fair
- Jab and falling uair give frame advantage but not enough that you can just run away safely, but good for setting up G&W's 4-frame jab
OFFSTAGE PLAY
Game and Watch's aerial supremacy lends itself well to gimping, and also not being gimped. It's very important that a Game and Watch player be able to exploit weaknesses in recoveries, and be able to return to stage safely.

Gimping Guide:Here's a rundown of how Game and Watch gimps.
FIRE DAIR CHEF NAIR BAIR and sometimes BUCKET
OK, maybe that didn't make sense. Let me go into detail:
FIRE- Best gimping move in the game imo. Huge priority stemming from invincibility frames, to the point of outright beating the spaceys' phantasms(do that all the time)against them. good horizontal knockback and a big vertical hitbox. Nigh impossible to tech the stage spike. Also, the windbox can screw PK Kids.
DAIR- A bit overused, but a very good move nonetheless. Again, big vertical hitbox with good damage and the ability to reset the situation. Also, you can catch tether pull-ins with the spike hitbox from the stage, ending stocks very early.
CHEF- There are two ways to use this to gimp. The pan itself sends enemies at a semi-spike angle, which wrecks a lot of recoveries. Just jumping at the opponent and throwing food is a valid option. The other way is the food itself. You can put a crapton of damage with food from onstage if the opponent recovers horizontally. If they recover vertically, try running off the ledge and using a B-reverse Chef after a beat. the food should slide across the ledge, catching anyone unfortunate enough to have a hitboxless or vulnerable recovery.
NAIR- Run off dropzone nair is a very underutilized tool. If you don't land the final hit, or even if they airdodge it, you end up in an incredibly advantaged position where Fire will almost certainly hit the opponent if they don't recover IMMEDIATELY. So this is really a setup tool for Fire.
BAIR- Along with Fire, should be the gimping tool you use the most. if you RAR it they go away from the stage at a relatively low angle, but this really shines right under the ledge. This is AMAZING at stage spiking due to the fact that it's a multi-hit move. It's so easy to see coming but so hard to actually do it! It's not like anyone has the time to learn it. Also, the head of the turtle sends the opponent at a lower angle, so try to tipper it. Another thing is that on certain multihit recoveries you can trade a single hit for a false spike kill very reliably if you come into it at the right angle, notably ,, and .
BUCKET-Really just for , since Lucas' just keeps going if you bucket it. Steal his recovery and WATCH HIM SUFFER. Also, I recommend Bucketing Sheik's recovery, since after two of those it's full(of death!). Mii Gunner's Lunar Shot is good too.

Note: If you can't get the offstage kill, uair can make otherwise safe recoveries very unsafe by blowing the soon-to be-in-freefall opponent upwards and past the ledge. Punish accordingly.

How to not get gimped!
Not dying early is important! Mr. Game and Watch dies early already, so don't lose a stock before you have to! Fire isn't invulnerable at the end, and the move sweetspots quickly, so if you are under the ledge don't feel pressure from an opponent above you. Be patient if you have to. Parachute will take you far, so don't be afraid to use the move early. Better yet, if the opponent whiffs an aggressive offstage attack try to angle your Fire to hit them. You might just turn the tide!

If you're far away horizontally and pretty high up I recommend using Bucket to give yourself the new option of Bucket Jumping. I've had opponents underestimate how high it goes and whiffing attacks right under me, allowing me to get a dair and kill. The momentum change will make you a harder target.

Chef can also cover your recovery if the opponent is very aggressive offstage, But I don't recommend this.
I pretty much always use uair when double jumping to the ledge. Is that hungry for some spike action? The windbox will keep you safe, I promise. Same with other assaults from above. Will also catch/push away those who would wait at the ledge for you.

Speaking of ledge camping, don't forget to mix it up at the ledge! Dropping and jumping onstage is much too underused at all levels of play. If you wish to jump from the ledge, fading away from the ledge and immediately using Fire to get onstage is commonly a better option. It gives you the ability to hit those standing too close to the ledge, you rise faster, and you have more sideways aerial mobility when using the parachute(Never forget how important that is, don't be so eager to drop parachute just because you can to get to the ground ASAP)

Use all this correctly, work on your judgement(in more ways then one, don't be afraid to randomly short hop hammer to catch aerial opponents). And you might just go from beginner-level to pro level.