Captain Falcon: Patch 1.0.8 Nerfs/Buffs

[SobaDono]

Acid is right, hard DI away alters the trajectory of Dthrow to the point where combos and strings are impossible -- tested it for an hour yesterday in disbelief. At mid percents even heavies are safe.

I'm not happy about this.

 

[~XeR]

Honestly, I knew he got nerfed, but up until reading this post I wasn't sure what exactly was nerfed. Overall, he still feels like the kick-ass man throwing ****ers in the air for 30%. It's all good.

 

[~XeR]

double post mb.

 

[Metalex]

Acid is right, hard DI away alters the trajectory of Dthrow to the point where combos and strings are impossible -- tested it for an hour yesterday in disbelief. At mid percents even heavies are safe.

I'm not happy about this.

If this is true it's a sad day for us Falcon players... i have felt like it was harder to pull off some things from a Dthrow now but thought it was just my mind playing tricks after the patch. Gotta go and test this myself.

 

[AreJay25]

Has this down throw nerf been tested without DI? Cause I'm pretty sure proper DI always made it difficult to get follow ups with Falcon.

 

[abit_rusty]

Has this down throw nerf been tested without DI? Cause I'm pretty sure proper DI always made it difficult to get follow ups with Falcon.

This is what I have experienced.

 

[BadDeku]

So this might just be me being bad at the game/placebo effect, but I think that the hitstun caused by captain falcon's up air may have been reduced. I'm not saying this to further panic falcon mains but I think that other players should test this. I took some mental notes on how captain falcon's up air combos worked on pit (a middle weight, easy to combo character) and found that not only was up air knee easy to do at all percents between ~40 and 80 regardless of di, but in the transition periods where you have to change your short hop knees into full hops etc. either would work. I also found that the combo still worked up until ~92 percent when the opponent doesn't di. I didn't experiment much with the weak hitbox of up air or inward di, so it's possible it could have worked at higher percents.
Now, the transition percents have become awkward and hard to follow up with at all. Maybe I'm just bad, but try getting a knee out of an up air on pit between 56 and 60 percent, or between 71 and 75 percent. It's doable for sure but it seems to take much more precision as well as a di read. Perhaps the knee's hitbox was made smaller?
Also the window of percents that this combo works is much smaller--I don't even think this can be argued. The highest percent I was able to confirm this combo on pit with the strong hitbox on up air was 85 percent. With captain falcon's toes, I could confirm the combo up to 92 percent. Past that and the knee might connect but I can't get it to confirm with the combo counter.
All of this could possibly be blamed on an error in my execution or me just being crazy, but at the very least it feels like the knockback and hitstun properties of up air are very different.

 

[Nate22Hill]

If they DI away from down throw past 15% there are virtually no follow ups, this is while being at 0% as falcon, with rage it's even harder, so if someone DI's away from down throw there's really no options to follow up on, dash grab down throw knee no longer seems like it's a thing either.

I think your right doing some testing I'm pretty sure tht you can still off of a dash attack if you buffer it quickly. but this will be hard to do considering tht good opponents mix up di so ur reaction tine would have to be quick to follow up

 

[N7S]

So this might just be me being bad at the game/placebo effect, but I think that the hitstun caused by captain falcon's up air may have been reduced. I'm not saying this to further panic falcon mains but I think that other players should test this. I took some mental notes on how captain falcon's up air combos worked on pit (a middle weight, easy to combo character) and found that not only was up air knee easy to do at all percents between ~40 and 80 regardless of di, but in the transition periods where you have to change your short hop knees into full hops etc. either would work. I also found that the combo still worked up until ~92 percent when the opponent doesn't di. I didn't experiment much with the weak hitbox of up air or inward di, so it's possible it could have worked at higher percents.
Now, the transition percents have become awkward and hard to follow up with at all. Maybe I'm just bad, but try getting a knee out of an up air on pit between 56 and 60 percent, or between 71 and 75 percent. It's doable for sure but it seems to take much more precision as well as a di read. Perhaps the knee's hitbox was made smaller?
Also the window of percents that this combo works is much smaller--I don't even think this can be argued. The highest percent I was able to confirm this combo on pit with the strong hitbox on up air was 85 percent. With captain falcon's toes, I could confirm the combo up to 92 percent. Past that and the knee might connect but I can't get it to confirm with the combo counter.
All of this could possibly be blamed on an error in my execution or me just being crazy, but at the very least it feels like the knockback and hitstun properties of up air are very different.

Your execution is slightly off. Up air to knee is still do able, but it has to be done at higher percents because of the reduced knockback. Doing an up air to knee at 55 would be good for pre-patch Falcon, but now. It doesn't work until about 10-15% later. The reduced knockback is good and also bad. The good thing is there is more combo potential and juggling in his game. The bad thing is now up air isn't that viable of a kill move now, which really hurts him in matchups like Peach, Kirby, or Jigglypuff. But we'll find ways around it. Double up-air is really good to rack up a lot of percent starting at about 50-55 though.

 

[Trifroze]

I did extensive testing with uair to knee and dthrow combos before the patch and I can say with 100% certainty that nothing about dthrow has changed. Uair does 2% less and kills about 20% later than before. Before the patch, I wrote down the percents where uair into knee worked (with DI applied) on Pikachu, Mario and Ganondorf representing light, medium and heavy characters. Here's a comparison of them before the patch and now:

Pikachu: 35-65% -> 40-70%
Mario: 40-75% -> 45-85%
Ganondorf: 40-80% -> 40-85% (starts working earlier than mediumweights because of their bigger frame I presume)

In a sense, the uair nerf was a buff to the uair -> knee setup. I know for a fact that dthrow wasn't changed because I discovered true dthrow to knee setups on Pikachu, Rosalina, Mewtwo, Kirby, Jigglypuff and Game & Watch which are frame perfect at certain percents (and easier at certain other percents) and they still work just like before. Falcon always had trouble comboing out of dthrow if the opponent DI'd away unless you threw them out of a dashgrab which gives you a momentum boost. In addition, it has more endlag the heavier the characters are.

The uair nerf was a considerable hit to Falcon's damage output and vertical kill options as uair was in my opinion his most useful move along with jab and bair, but damage/knockback nerfs never come without their benefits although they are slight. Dthrow is the same as before, you're just noticing properties people didn't pay much attention to before.

 

[SobaDono]

I did extensive testing with uair to knee and dthrow combos before the patch and I can say with 100% certainty that nothing about dthrow has changed. Uair does 2% less and kills about 20% later than before. Before the patch, I wrote down the percents where uair into knee worked (with DI applied) on Pikachu, Mario and Ganondorf representing light, medium and heavy characters. Here's a comparison of them before the patch and now:

Pikachu: 35-65% -> 40-70%
Mario: 40-75% -> 45-85%
Ganondorf: 40-80% -> 40-85% (starts working earlier than mediumweights because of their bigger frame I presume)

In a sense, the uair nerf was a buff to the uair -> knee setup. I know for a fact that dthrow wasn't changed because I discovered true dthrow to knee setups on Pikachu, Rosalina, Mewtwo, Kirby, Jigglypuff and Game & Watch which are frame perfect at certain percents (and easier at certain other percents) and they still work just like before. Falcon always had trouble comboing out of dthrow if the opponent DI'd away unless you threw them out of a dashgrab which gives you a momentum boost. In addition, it has more endlag the heavier the characters are.

The uair nerf was a considerable hit to Falcon's damage output and vertical kill options as uair was in my opinion his most useful move along with jab and bair, but damage/knockback nerfs never come without their benefits although they are slight. Dthrow is the same as before, you're just noticing properties people didn't pay much attention to before.

Based Trifroze. Thanks for confirming this for all of us. It was really hard to tell.

 

[King Omega]

I came here to "deconfirm" the dthrow fears but Trifroze already did it and with all that useful evidence to boot! Thanks, Trifroze.

 

[Gidy]

@AcidtoneX58

 

[Sol_]

@ Trifroze
The real mvp. Thank you for squelching our worst fears.

 

[OwenSmart]

Come on, Nintendo. Falcon wasn't even that good. With that bad of a recovery and the need for huge commitment in every move, Falcon didn't deserve any nerfs.

They leave ridiculous moves like Sheik's fair untouched and heavily nerf Falcon's main move.
Argh.

Falcon was amazing. He still is. You're just being biased

 

[90007000]

Pretty sure only the U-air was nerfed. (No buffs.)

 

[90007000]

Falcon's fthrow and bthrow always did 7% and 9% and bair is exactly as before. Uair got a major nerf in damage and knockback.

Everyone pray to the God of Falcon. Amen.

 

[Exor]

I did extensive testing with uair to knee and dthrow combos before the patch and I can say with 100% certainty that nothing about dthrow has changed. Uair does 2% less and kills about 20% later than before. Before the patch, I wrote down the percents where uair into knee worked (with DI applied) on Pikachu, Mario and Ganondorf representing light, medium and heavy characters. Here's a comparison of them before the patch and now:

Pikachu: 35-65% -> 40-70%
Mario: 40-75% -> 45-85%
Ganondorf: 40-80% -> 40-85% (starts working earlier than mediumweights because of their bigger frame I presume)

In a sense, the uair nerf was a buff to the uair -> knee setup. I know for a fact that dthrow wasn't changed because I discovered true dthrow to knee setups on Pikachu, Rosalina, Mewtwo, Kirby, Jigglypuff and Game & Watch which are frame perfect at certain percents (and easier at certain other percents) and they still work just like before. Falcon always had trouble comboing out of dthrow if the opponent DI'd away unless you threw them out of a dashgrab which gives you a momentum boost. In addition, it has more endlag the heavier the characters are.

The uair nerf was a considerable hit to Falcon's damage output and vertical kill options as uair was in my opinion his most useful move along with jab and bair, but damage/knockback nerfs never come without their benefits although they are slight. Dthrow is the same as before, you're just noticing properties people didn't pay much attention to before.

Thanks for the confirmation. Adapting to these changes shouldn't be too difficult imo.

 

[The Pizza Guy]

So there was never a need to worry in the first place. The biggest change is we have to rely on our other kill moves, and it shouldn't be too hard to adapt. Thanks Trifroze!

 

[HFlash]

To the people complaining about the nerf, please stop. Honestly, although they did nerf him slightly, he still has so many kill options, that if you were relying on uair for finishing stocks off, you are doing something wrong. Raptor kills super early, bair kills super early, uair to knee seems to be easier to pull off, and fsmash is still strong AF. Captain is still at WORST top 10-15.

 

[BadDeku]

So I've actually been having less trouble now with executing up air knee and, though i haven't been able to experiment much with super high percents, I've been getting it more often than usual with my friends. Probably because full hop knee is the easiest to execute and its at much more sensible percents now in my mind. I guess I just blame not practicing for a few weeks ^///^; Tri is a god for that info dump though, and its awesome to see falcon mains being logical and optimistic. Can't wait to see more ways this "nerf" might positively affect Falcon.

 

[Trifroze]

To the people complaining about the nerf, please stop. Honestly, although they did nerf him slightly, he still has so many kill options, that if you were relying on uair for finishing stocks off, you are doing something wrong. Raptor kills super early, bair kills super early, uair to knee seems to be easier to pull off, and fsmash is still strong AF. Captain is still at WORST top 10-15.

There's a difference in kill moves and moves that kill though. Fsmash and Raptor Boost are both very slow and punishable and only work as reads or punishes. Same with usmash although it's a bit less punishable, and backwards dsmash is strong and safe but comes out very slow. I rarely find myself using those moves in tournaments so we're now basically left with bair, dair, dtilt, bthrow and knee setups. It's definitely enough and Falcon stays among the most lethal characters in the game, but uair was our only practical vertical kill option and now it's last resort level at best. At least it didn't get Diddy treatment, but now it's nearly as weak as ZSS' uair knockback wise; not out of the picture, but definitely not something to consider a kill move anymore. It filled an important hole in Falcon's KO options and was among the best moves in the game, now it no longer fills that hole and is only a very good move.

 

[TheGreatBrawler]

I need to confirm this for myself, but word is that the dash grab ledge slide-off is gone for real now. Take with a grain of salt unless you can test it and find out.

Are you sure? I'm still able to do it, with patch installed of course...


Just placebo or does it seem like the knockback of falcon's nair was altered? I can't seem to do the dthrow to nair then to another nair again. May just be me though.

 

[King Omega]

Are you sure? I'm still able to do it, with patch installed of course...


Just placebo or does it seem like the knockback of falcon's nair was altered? I can't seem to do the dthrow to nair then to another nair again. May just be me though.

I said I wasn't sure!

IMPORTANT: Thinkaman's post in the patch notes thread indicates only two things were changed with Falcon in 1.0.8:

• Uair
• Fsmash: Minor knockback growth increase (so it should kill a bit earlier)

Nothing else (including dthrow!) was changed, potentially notwithstanding IASA and landing lag which are not part of the files Thinkaman examined.

 

[Trifroze]

Sounds good, they nerfed the downwards angled fsmash in the previous patch which was extremely strong, and after that the upwards angled one was left as the strongest. Did they buff only the regular one or all variations? If only the regular one, it may just be on the same level with upwards angled one now so nothing really changed except that you have to use a regular or downwards angled one to hit Kirby/Puff/G&W crouches.

 

[teluoborg]

They buffed all the variation, with up and neutral angles having the same kbg.

Also Uair still kills it's just that now it's Uthrow tier rather than Fthrow at the ledge tier.

Fun fact : when testing the changes I got Bow Jr in training mode and didn't know about his "feature", so I was going completely crazy thinking that Bair had been buffed to deal 16% lmao.

 

[The Pizza Guy]

They buffed all the variation, with up and neutral angles having the same kbg.

Also Uair still kills it's just that now it's Uthrow tier rather than Fthrow at the ledge tier.

Fun fact : when testing the changes I got Bow Jr in training mode and didn't know about his "feature", so I was going completely crazy thinking that Bair had been buffed to deal 16% lmao.

LOL that same thing happened to me when I hit him with a down smash.

 

[Trifroze]

They buffed all the variation, with up and neutral angles having the same kbg.

That's strange, since I'm finding it to kill at the same percent as before. Had written down the % when Mario dies to fsmash from the middle of Omega stage with DI applied. Upwards angled fsmash killed at 101% before patch, kills at 101% after patch. Regular one kills at 106% which is also the same as before. Downwards angled fsmash is still the weakest of them all.

 

[teluoborg]

http://smashboards.com/threads/luca...notes-19th-20-00.406319/page-19#post-19454998

Captain Falcon
--------------
F-smash (up)
all hitboxes
KBG 94 -> 95
F-smash (straight)
all hitboxes
KBG 94 -> 95
F-smash (down)
all hitboxes
KBG 84 -> 83
Uair
initial hitbox 0
damage 13 -> 11
bkg 10 -> 16
initial hitbox 1
damage 12 -> 10
bkg 10 -> 16
late hitbox 0
damage 12 -> 10
bkg 8 -> 10
late hitbox 1
damage 10 -> 9
bkg 8 -> 10

So yeah, the change is ridiculously low, borderline unsignificant.

 

[BadDeku]

Have you guys tested the knockback of back throw? I couldn't kill a marth cpu with it at 170% on battlefield when on the ledge. I had it in my head that it killed earlier than that.

 

[Doble-E]

I did extensive testing with uair to knee and dthrow combos before the patch and I can say with 100% certainty that nothing about dthrow has changed. Uair does 2% less and kills about 20% later than before. Before the patch, I wrote down the percents where uair into knee worked (with DI applied) on Pikachu, Mario and Ganondorf representing light, medium and heavy characters. Here's a comparison of them before the patch and now:

Pikachu: 35-65% -> 40-70%
Mario: 40-75% -> 45-85%
Ganondorf: 40-80% -> 40-85% (starts working earlier than mediumweights because of their bigger frame I presume)

In a sense, the uair nerf was a buff to the uair -> knee setup. I know for a fact that dthrow wasn't changed because I discovered true dthrow to knee setups on Pikachu, Rosalina, Mewtwo, Kirby, Jigglypuff and Game & Watch which are frame perfect at certain percents (and easier at certain other percents) and they still work just like before. Falcon always had trouble comboing out of dthrow if the opponent DI'd away unless you threw them out of a dashgrab which gives you a momentum boost. In addition, it has more endlag the heavier the characters are.

The uair nerf was a considerable hit to Falcon's damage output and vertical kill options as uair was in my opinion his most useful move along with jab and bair, but damage/knockback nerfs never come without their benefits although they are slight. Dthrow is the same as before, you're just noticing properties people didn't pay much attention to before.

Phew, Thank god!

 

[IrkenPPG]

R.I.P. in pasta, Falcon, say hi to Greninja for me.

 

[Fox Hater]

In terms of his upair all I can say is that it is not a nerf. I find myself extending the chain of upairs now more against humans than before because less knockback gets them not so far away from falcon. So it is easier to follow up and keep hitting constantly.

 

[Trifroze]

Maybe it'll even make them psychologically more tempted to airdodge and get hit by the knee.

ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴏsɪᴛɪᴠᴇ ᴛʜɪɴᴋɪɴɢ ɪs ʀᴇᴀʟ

 

[N7S]

The juggle ability is much easier because of the nerf, the lack of kill power can hurt at times, but it's easily adaptable. It's a 50-50 type of situation the way I see it. Trifroze has stated a very solid point. Up air to knee is even more dangerous now because it takes higher %s now to setup the up air part, which benefits the knee killing even earlier than before. I referred to this once in here, I'll refer to it again, I find this similar between the NTSC and PAL versions of Falcon in Melee. In NTSC, up air has solid kill power while PAL has excellent juggle ability, but lacks kill power.

 

[Captain Farukon]

Come on, Nintendo. Falcon wasn't even that good. With that bad of a recovery and the need for huge commitment in every move, Falcon didn't deserve any nerfs.

They leave ridiculous moves like Sheik's fair untouched and heavily nerf Falcon's main move.
Argh.

Thats one of the reason i quit this game, **** sakurai and the programmers they ruined CF with nerfs he was perfect...
I was trying to get into the game again and after witnessing how my Uair didnt kill i was like wtf man WHY? but oh yeah...ZSS still has that op flip jump that renders her invunerable , she doesnt deserve a single nerf ...**** u nintendo
**** this game

 

[UzakiuzuG]

:3

Thats one of the reason i quit this game, **** sakurai and the programmers they ruined CF with nerfs he was perfect...
I was trying to get into the game again and after witnessing how my Uair didnt kill i was like wtf man WHY? but oh yeah...ZSS still has that op flip jump that renders her invunerable , she doesnt deserve a single nerf ...**** u nintendo
**** this game

 

[Koby_T]

Thats one of the reason i quit this game, **** sakurai and the programmers they ruined CF with nerfs he was perfect...
I was trying to get into the game again and after witnessing how my Uair didnt kill i was like wtf man WHY? but oh yeah...ZSS still has that op flip jump that renders her invunerable , she doesnt deserve a single nerf ...**** u nintendo
**** this game

It was somewhat uncommon to kill with uair before. C. Falcon had many better and earlier kill options. The uair combos into itself at even higher percents now, making a hefty punish on even slight mistakes. It's as much of a buff as a nerf...probably more of a buff

 

[Captain Farukon]

:3

so im salty that my favorite character who is already one if not the hardest character to master is nerfed and other unfair characters are left unbalaced? whatever kid, i only play smash cuz of C.Falcon im not a real fan of smash brothers as a whole

 

[Captain Farukon]

It was somewhat uncommon to kill with uair before. C. Falcon had many better and earlier kill options. The uair combos into itself at even higher percents now, making a hefty punish on even slight mistakes. It's as much of a buff as a nerf...probably more of a buff

that was one of his safest KO moves since almost no one can reach him enough to hit him...it was an awesome move now its just a juggle a juggle i dont need because i dont want to play around i want to KO the opponent as fast as possible