Weekly Character Discussion: Toon Link

Many consider this tiny boy to be top tier. I disagree, but I'd definitely love to hear the discussion on him.

Gogo

There's nothing to say because no one will play him.

Toon Link is by FAR the most underrated character in the game right now. Someone is eventually going to start playing him and absolutely wrecking everyone else since no one will know the match-up.

The biggest key to playing him is effective projectile spam. You need to not only be smart but understand which situations call for which projectile. Double short-hopped arrows is very effective and so is short-hop bomb throw to auto cancelled arrow. The boomerang can knock him out of opponents grabs and also be used to help edge-guard by throwing it off in the direction your opponent which gives you enough time to react to them. If they airdodge you can sometimes get an aerial in on them, if not it gives you enough time to get to the ledge. If they don't have a good recovery this can lead to gimps or just your opponent making a mistake.

Ankoku said:

In terms of killing potential, Toon Link's surprisingly decent. His running usmash isn't terribly powerful but it comes out fast, his fsmash can hurt like hell

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Yeah, I don't think that will negatively affect him too much as long as he can build up damage well. Sethlon's Falco racks up damage really quick and he finishes off usually with a running up smash.

Every one of his projectiles are nice and serve multiple purposes. His recovery isn't bad by any means. He's pretty fast, and really fast when it comes to comboing. His aerials are amazing. His Up-Smash can actually kill. D-Smash can be used on certain inclines to kill near 0%...

Is it really that he's easily edgeguarded and that he gets throw far the reason why he isn't higher on the tournament results? Or is just nobody playing him anymore? I started with him as my secondary to Pit, and at one time considered bumping him up to my main. He is definitely a tournament caliber character but I don't see why he isn't higher. Maybe they all get knocked out by Snakes and Metaknights...?

I love doing a late uair and hitting people because they airdodge too soon.

I'd put him about where samus was in the last game.


Maybe a little better.

I loved Young Link in Melee but I just can't seem to want to play Toon Link in Brawl, I have no idea why either, considering how much they've improved the little Link. I guess the novelty of the little trick I used in Melee (ledge hop hookshot, if you connect with it, your landing lag ends before your opponent's stun time does) went away when it became more effective in Brawl with the lack of landing lag from "zairing."

Solid character.

This little guy is so good and I love his down taunt. He can actually combo with his Bair and his u-tilts. And his D-throw sets his opponent up really well for follow-up attacks/positioning advantage.

Also his zoning is great thanks to his SHDA and his Zair. He has the tools to be high tier easily. Too bad no one plays him.

Toon Link won't do very well in a competitive setting because all of his good points, save for spamming projectiles, are very situational. We've all seen Toon Link combo with his back-air repeatedly, get off a dair spike, or u-tilt combo to u-air. Not only can you DI out of the combos and kill Toon Link by air dodging his dair, TLink has to be in a good position to do those in the first place. He's a very light character that has to work really hard to do the same amount of damage others do with very simple setups.

His recovery, while far reaching, is also less than adequate. He has to recover from below to sweetspot, which allows for people to hit him easily if they have a spike or a good fair to trade hits; if his opponent simply stays on the edge, Toon Link's up+b has enough lag to be punished.

Toon Link has a few good matchups (Dedede, you're in trouble) and can cause serious trouble, but it takes a lot more work for just as much gain as other characters. I'd agree with the comment about him being as good as Samus was in Melee.

Toon Link will surprise people and be one of the more common causes of an upset in the bracket, but it'll be because he's rare. Not because he's awesome.

Also, Mic, do you have SPORE?! And is that an Andalite?!

i hate this punk, his sword is pretty strong and his recovery is deceptively good

also, he has the tether for some smash DI / grapple goodness

this guy i predict will be top 5 or 6

OS and Mic like ANIMORPHS?!?!?!?!?!

DUDES!!!!!!

You two are both officially too cool.

Also I disagree OS. TL is solid and has the tools to place well. The only thing that will keep him from consistently winning tournies is that there are characters better then him.

Toon Link just looks good on paper.


I read Animorphs when I was in Middle School... it was good times. I think I got to like, 32, before I stopped reading.

toon link seems to have very few bad matchups imo, taking down many of the dominating characters of this game with relative ease. The only thing i want to know is why no one plays him. He's strong enough, quick enough, combo's enough... whats the deal? I've been ramping up my anti-tl game for some time now expecting an influx of tl players, but i've yet to see it happen...

Hm, Toon Link has been fairly successful here so far, even took a small tournament. He's been one of my secondaries since the start of Brawl and still works well for me. He's quick, pretty strong, has a good projectile game and a good recovery. Downsides are that he's light, doesn't have much range and his aerials are easily dodged because they're all quick single hits. I think he's high tier-ish at the moment. Definitely one to keep an eye on.

I started playing him today. He's really great at punishing air dodges because he is so ridiculously floaty.

I like him a lot. I'll post before the week is over.

Diddy Kong is annoying.

My friend plays The Toonster, and he's fairly decent with him. He's got all the tools to be placing top 3 at big tournaments, but it just doesn't seem to EVER happen. Maybe after people finally get him down to a science he'll start doing better.

Does anyone have any good videos of TLink that aren't kizzu from before the game was released?

Overswarm said:

Does anyone have any good videos of TLink that aren't kizzu from before the game was released?

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I don't think anyone is even giving him a chance for the most part. Everyone is playing one of the game's beginning Gods.

AlphaZealot said:

That honor definitely still belongs to Diddy.

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I've still seen more Diddy players than TL players, that's why I stand by my comment.

I think he'll actually fall lower as brawl continues. People looking for superior attackers or defenders will find them, and probably with more weight.

There is a lot to say about his ability to play offensively and defensively well, many characters can only do one or the other.

just to throw it out there toon link's projectiles and quick high priority airs make his recovery WAYYYY safer than links due to the speed and angles he can throw them at, although he still generally has to recover from certain angles only, he can be pretty hard to actually knock out through edgeguarding when the recovery is applied correctly

Umbreon said:

I think he'll actually fall lower as brawl continues. People looking for superior attackers or defenders will find them, and probably with more weight.

There is a lot to say about his ability to play offensively and defensively well, many characters can only do one or the other.

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This is something I hadn't really considered; TL really can play offensively or defensively with ease.

see people, let this be a lesson, this is how you spot people that have at least tried choice band skarmory

>_>

Umbreon said:

see people, let this be a lesson, this is how you spot people that have at least tried choice band skarmory

>_>

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I don't know what that means.

the thing with cbskarm is it's only good when nobody expects it. even then, unless it chose natural gift and has a shuca berry, the same main counter beats it without question.

skarmory is usually better with the standard defensive set, and toon link in brawl is usually better playing defensively. offensively the guy works but defensively is just the better strategy, esp when talking about brawl in general

I like marmalade.

I completely forgot about this thread until Rofa asked me about it earlier today ^_^

The SBR is pretty busy lately, so its no surprise that the weekly threads aren't getting as much love. Either that or nobody cares about Tink.

Lol @ people talking about competitive pokemon in here? Toon Link must be a really boring character.

I think his offensive capabilities are hampered by his slow fall speed and floatiness, actually. Sure it let's him do a 2xbair combo every once and a while, but it's kind of like what happened to falcon in brawl when he lost his fall speed/acceleration, so he can't even get one more hit in unless he gets really lucky. And he can't really pressure with multiple different attacks very quickly either, unless he mixes up with his boomerang or his held bomb - but then you're using him defensively.

Whenever you're ready for the summary, Lee, I'll move the thread.

Why is this still here

Joshu said:

Why is this still here

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was wondering the same thing

Do I need to pick this back up again?

Lee is late again, so I'm keeping my promise to the people subscribed to the WCD thread and picking this back up.

Toon Link summary:

Toon Link is a character that can be played either offensively or defensively at high level play. This is unique, as most characters tend to do better playing one way or the other. Despite this ability, Toon Link is generally best played defensively in that he shouldn't approach without an opening. Fortunately for TLink, he can create openings; this, too, is something rare.

Toon Link's projectile spam is some of the best in the game and, once started, is very difficult to get through. This allows him to keep the pressure on the opponent while not putting himself in danger! Because you are forcing your opponent to approach you can decide when and where and how your opponent will attack and, because of this ability, can know in advance what your opponent will do. This allows you attack strategically and safely.

Unfortuantely for Toon Link, despite his strong aerial game, good smashes, and good specials and recovery, he has difficulty KOing and creating setups. Most of his best techniques, such as bomb to aerial combos, bair to dair combos, repeated bair combos, etc., etc. are not only hard to pull off, but are generally only for damage! The most common KOing combo you hear about is the bair to dair, and this is incredibly dangerous. Toon Link's KO potential isn't held back by the strength of his moves, but by his in ability to set them up as well. It is night impossible to combo into Toon Link's u-air, u-smash, or f-smash, and these are 3 of his best kill moves. This often leaves Toon Link frustrated as he has to drastically change his playstyle to get a KO by abandoning his projectile game.

Most good Toon Link players simply solve this problem by continually racking up damage until you can combo into a forward air or catch them out of an air dodge or laggy aerial with a u-air or u-smash/f-smash, but this strategy simply exacerbates Toon Link's light weight. It's bad enough when you have to deal an extra 30-80% to KO your opponent simply because you are light and they are heavy, but when you are light, unable to combo into KO moves, and have to patiently wait for the opportunity rather than create it to play safely.... this puts Toon Link in a bad position.

Toon Link's potential is very high, the surface of which has barely been scratched. It is inevitable that a smart player will pick up Toon Link and overcome his very basic inherent weaknesses and simply use his strengths in such a way that Toon Link will become a very big threat.