How important is c-sticking aerials with peach?

[ViVio]

New player here, I've been practicing peach on my own for a while but I noticed that my float momentum is different when I use the directional stick + a-button to perform aerials vs using c-stick to perform aerials. Is it worth making c-sticking aerials a habit? I have a hard time c-sticking while floating (I jump/float with x so holding the float + c-sticking is really awkward for me). And if c-stick aerials are the way to go, any tips? I've tried claw gripping my controller but it feels too weird to use and I'd rather learn a different way if possible.

also, what's up with the video from this thread? http://smashboards.com/threads/proo...e-c-stick-to-fair-and-float-backwards.243826/

 

[Vestboy_Myst]

very necessary. otherwise there is no way to do a fair or bair without moving in that direction. messes up your spacing and eliminates a lot of good possibilities in counter attacking. using it for dair-->downsmash is just much easier too. with the Uair it makes the timing much easier to beat out high priority attacks like link's sword plant

i think of all the characters, peach is one that can't be played at any competitive level without cstick smashes or aerials at all, although i'll welcome a second opinion on that.

 

[ViVio]

Yeah I've been slowly adjusting to a playstyle where I press and hold x with a one finger and use another finger to tap jump. it makes doing both easier but consciously switching my fingers mid game is taking some time to get used to. Thanks for your input man, I've felt pretty gimped when I used my a button to do all my aerials cause I had less spacing options.

 

[KirbyKaze]

Clawing with Peach was the best decision I've ever made

 

[Vestboy_Myst]

Clawing with Peach was the best decision I've ever made

agree, even down to the reconsideration about just peach. it helps across the board

 

[ViVio]

grr, I wish that wasn't the case haha. but yeah, I've been switching to a full claw grip and I'm definitely feeling the adv of clawing for aerials. I do have some major brain lag still when I claw but hopefully just by playing I'll get it down to a point where I don't have to think about it anymore. do you guys have any general bits of advice for learning claw? I understand some stuff is harder to do on claw than normal like wavedashing, what did you guys do to overcome it?

 

[KirbyKaze]

You don't have to claw everything. Your jump startup is on the slow side so it actually affords you time to switch grips.

 

[ViVio]

what do you personally do? full claw or switch between grips?

 

[KirbyKaze]

I switch grips but I can do everything with either

 

[dRevan64]

shoutouts to ToG
Super important, I don't think you need to claw though (and I can't, unlike KK) I've been doing stuff like retreating shorthop double fairs with marth who has a shorter jumpsquat than peach without it. Maybe it's easier though if you do learn to claw, I didn't want to learn to claw so I just stubborned my way through the awkwardness of quickly moving the base of my thumb to the cstick after jumping.
Melee is hard.

 

[KirbyKaze]

I also stubbornly refused to claw until I got to edgeguarding with bair.

Then I realized a lot of Sheik's stuff requires me to hug the edge and DJ + bair quickly to use the invulnerability, cover a big area, and hit a weak hitbox of the bair so I can deny the tech.

That's when I began to be less stubborn.

 

[ViVio]

shoutouts to ToG

yeaahh buddy! I haven't really met many others who also read ToG, so people recognizing her is nice :D

at this point, I think I just need to play without focusing on my grip and figure out which one comes more naturally to me while being able to control all of my aerials during a float. right now, switching to a weird claw grip mid game for floats is what's working for me but it may change to a full claw grip later on. getting into this game is so hard... I'm spending so much time figuring out how to hold a controller and I haven't even started on practicing tech skills haha.

 

[KirbyKaze]

Personally I think you're smart to be asking yourself questions like that. It's attention to detail and the willingness to try things that usually lets people get good at this game.

 

[ViVio]

Thanks for the comment haha, I'm trying to pick up the game as best as I can. I haven't been able to play much recently but from the few games I have played I noticed that my neutral game is worse when I play with grip and I can't figure out why x-x, but on the plus side I have more controlled floats... it's pretty frustrating not knowing which grip is personally best for me

 

[Vestboy_Myst]

most players switch from claw to traditional many times in a match. with enough practice you can adapt to switching pretty well, and that eliminates the cons of the one style while giving you pros of the other. getting hung up on whatever the 'best' grip for you is a pain, and also slows your improvement . good luck!

 

[knightpraetor]

irony.. come on the boards and first thing i see is KK talking about why he shifts between grips when i had just decided 5 min ago that it was necessary for a top level peach main to shift grips (if they are using my version of the claw where they can't have instant access to A and Cstick at the same time).

well, we'll consider this confirmation. I will master shifting between the grips in the spots that i need.

ps - this was prompted by armada missing two crucial edgeguards in a spot by hard reading in a spot where i would have tried to cover both on reaction. However, it's difficult to select between nair and dair with my grip at the speeds required if my finger is on the wrong key

 

[ViVio]

You're right i'm getting hung up over nothing. After playing last night without thinking about how I hold my controller I realized I did the best when I just played to play instead of focusing on practicing a certain grip. I ended up being able to switch grips without really thinking. feels good man

 

[ViVio]

just to follow up and for anybody else who was in my situation, I found that by just grinding out games you'll figure out where your grip will naturally rest. it took me a while to go from normal grip > hybrid grip / switching grips > full claw but now I can play with both grips. as KirbyKaze mentioned earlier, your jump startup is slow so that's where/when i practiced switching grips mid-game

 

[waifu]

I don't use claw and I can still do retreating fairs. You just have to be quick with your thumb. A lot of people argue that you need to to quickly FC a move but if you can't FC bair and chain it quickly without claw, how are you going to chain FC nairs?

 

[ViVio]

Holy crap this post was a while ago lol.

I do fast fc nairs or fc w/e on ground with a normal grip and use claw grip for aerial float stuff for better control.