Official Samus

[Xygonn]

Thanks for introducing yourselves. We all joined at some point. The more the better. More people mean more discoveries and more things to use in matches. Most of the people on the Samus boards don't think Samus is bottom tier, and in fact I would say the consensus here is that she is mid tier. She does have some very difficult matchups but she also has some pretty good ones, notably Luigi.

 

[Annihilat®]

I only think she's bottom tier/worst character because of how she was made. It's like she was designed to be bad, but I still see us doing well with her. Like, no one else has the problems that she has. But I'd probably shut up myself if I went to a tournament offline.

Just what I've noted is that she literally cannot escape from rushdown characters. Up B OoS used to be great. It's still here, but it doesn't work as good. Bombs don't explode on contact, so people can rush right through them and attack/grab. She's floaty, giving opponents more time to position themselves beneath her. All her moves are really slow, so CQC is impossible. And anything besides Z-air is terrible on shield because Samus lacks damaging moves. There's few moves she can do that cannot be grabbed OoS. And even then, people can shield grab you out of Z-air. Lot of bad things with Samus, but she can be played pretty well.

Other bad characters like Jiggly and Bowser don't even have these problems, but Samus is better than those two. Not exactly bad, but she's one of the worst characters to use against rushdowns.

 

[LIQUID12A]

Ladies and gentlemen, with Lian's help in the Samus Skype chat, I have unintentionally discovered that Charge Shot can bend this game's physics to it's will; as the victim of it.

P1 is me.

 

[Vyrnx]

Ladies and gentlemen, with Lian's help in the Samus Skype chat, I have unintentionally discovered that Charge Shot can bend this game's physics to it's will; as the victim of it.

P1 is me.

What just happened?

 

[LIQUID12A]

What just happened?

Quite frankly, I have no bloody clue. It all happens so fast, so by examining the clip frame by frame I was able to form a theory. Recommended to set the speed to 0.25.

1. Dark Samus(the paletted Samus, me) fastfalls in an attempt to catch Samus by surprise, conveniently dodging a missile along the way.
2. The second Samus fires the Charge Shot, Dark Samus lands on the ground; but only for a single few frames. It's impossible to grasp in the gif, but the video does show it adequately at the aforementioned speed. The game apparently registers Dark Samus as being hit on the ground while still having some sort of knockback.
3. As a result, the grounded damage animations happen. There's even a tripping animation there that appears for a fraction of a second. Dark Samus is sent backwards at a speed Sonic would be jealous of.
4. Dark Samus cleanly slides off the edge, and apparently I had inputted a nair on the way as well as a fair. I then die.

Why? WHO KNOWS. I think it has to do with the momentum I carried from the downwards DI and the game's apparent confusion at registering a hit for that brief moment.

 

[Lavani]

Intriguing. He landed the frame after getting hit, causing him to groundbounce and go flying off instantly instead of incurring hitlag or the usual trajectory. Seems to me like it's essentially frame canceling in reverse.

Seems like something worth looking into.

 

[Annihilat®]

Quite frankly, I have no bloody clue. It all happens so fast, so by examining the clip frame by frame I was able to form a theory. Recommended to set the speed to 0.25.

1. Dark Samus(the paletted Samus, me) fastfalls in an attempt to catch Samus by surprise, conveniently dodging a missile along the way.
2. The second Samus fires the Charge Shot, Dark Samus lands on the ground; but only for a single few frames. It's impossible to grasp in the gif, but the video does show it adequately at the aforementioned speed. The game apparently registers Dark Samus as being hit on the ground while still having some sort of knockback.
3. As a result, the grounded damage animations happen. There's even a tripping animation there that appears for a fraction of a second. Dark Samus is sent backwards at a speed Sonic would be jealous of.
4. Dark Samus cleanly slides off the edge, and apparently I had inputted a nair on the way as well as a fair. I then die.

Why? WHO KNOWS. I think it has to do with the momentum I carried from the downwards DI and the game's apparent confusion at registering a hit for that brief moment.

I honestly thought it was some DI issues. That looked like an untechable literal stage spike, too.

 

[Himura Kenshin]

>Saw cool video with Samus stuff
>Decided to try it out since Samus is one of my favs and my secondary.
>First opponent is a Shiek.

 

[Xygonn]

Quite frankly, I have no bloody clue. It all happens so fast, so by examining the clip frame by frame I was able to form a theory. Recommended to set the speed to 0.25.

1. Dark Samus(the paletted Samus, me) fastfalls in an attempt to catch Samus by surprise, conveniently dodging a missile along the way.
2. The second Samus fires the Charge Shot, Dark Samus lands on the ground; but only for a single few frames. It's impossible to grasp in the gif, but the video does show it adequately at the aforementioned speed. The game apparently registers Dark Samus as being hit on the ground while still having some sort of knockback.
3. As a result, the grounded damage animations happen. There's even a tripping animation there that appears for a fraction of a second. Dark Samus is sent backwards at a speed Sonic would be jealous of.
4. Dark Samus cleanly slides off the edge, and apparently I had inputted a nair on the way as well as a fair. I then die.

Why? WHO KNOWS. I think it has to do with the momentum I carried from the downwards DI and the game's apparent confusion at registering a hit for that brief moment.

I did it to Ganon just now. Video coming.

Edit:

 

[Jman3]

I have done this a few times and my friend and we thought it was a crouch cancel glitch. This game has different crouch cancel mechanics than Melee but in melee you could CC some attacks and just stay on the ground, you can do that with a few things in this game but it is relatively ineffective as far as keeping you on the ground like in Melee. I'd like to try messing with this and see if I can find anything out.

 

[Tonetta]

This isnt good to intentionally do since it is techable. It's way more common on stages like lylat or pilot wings.

 

[Woebroken]

Just wanted to interrupt to give a quick "hey".

I've been (silently) watching since this part of the forums since the game came out, and would like to give thanks to everyone who has helped develop this character, because tbh without the meta development my Samus would still be ****. Hopefully I'll be able to give some contribute in the near-future, since I already know you're all great guys :]

 

[DungeonMaster]

Woebroken Well met, and welcome to the boards!

 

[Deleted member]

I was thinking, don't you thinkshould get a moveset overhaul for next Smash ?

When you seefighting with a lot of projectiles and barely using his hands and feet,is now looking much likein comparison.

A few ideas Samus could have for her new moveset would her Charge Shot becoming her new F-smash, firing projectiles for her Neutral, F-tilt and N-air, and her Neutral-B would change her cannon's specificities, for instance to use ice instead of fire for her D-tilt, and would work like in Project M and 's Monado Arts.


Oh, and hi.

 

[_gold_]

So, does Samus have a combo breaker?
For example, when Mario goes on one of his u-tilt mayhems, do I just accept it? Cause I'm at a complete loss.

 

[Xygonn]

So, does Samus have a combo breaker?
For example, when Mario goes on one of his u-tilt mayhems, do I just accept it? Cause I'm at a complete loss.

Uair is as close as it gets at frame 5. You can usually jump out after two with Samus.

 

[LIQUID12A]

@Boney nice seeing you on FG :D

You left after one match vs my Ganon though ):

 

[TurboLink]

I was thinking, don't you thinkshould get a moveset overhaul for next Smash ?

When you seefighting with a lot of projectiles and barely using his hands and feet,is now looking much likein comparison.

A few ideas Samus could have for her new moveset would her Charge Shot becoming her new F-smash, firing projectiles for her Neutral, F-tilt and N-air, and her Neutral-B would change her cannon's specificities, for instance to use ice instead of fire for her D-tilt, and would work like in Project M and 's Monado Arts.


Oh, and hi.

But then you'd be making her close combat game worse.

 

[Hark17ball]

I didn't know where to put this so I'll put it here.

DungeonMaster on one of my videos from a previous tourney you told me if I break someone's shield on a platform to do Utilt>Uair>Uair>UpB.

Pulled this off on a Yoshi, who was giving me trouble in my tournament today. The second I did that, he died and ALL momentum went to me. Thanks for that tidbit!

 

[Zke99]

Anyone got advice on a good secondary for a Samus main? If been going Ness but I'm not confident with my play as him. Heard Greninja was a good option, but I'd like advice from some more seasoned players. (Fox matchup is mainly the one I want to mitigate.)

 

[DungeonMaster]

Hark17ball would love to see the match if you've got a replay! Up-tilt on high platforms is really quite good, even just basic up-tilt -> FJ -> up-B kills readily.\

Zke99 welcome to the forums, if you dig a bit there's a thread on secondaries. If it's just one or two matchups I suggest visiting the respective boards and looking at what they say is their worst, I can more or less guarantee you it's going to be "sheik". Maybe rosa, mario, fox or ZSS or some combination of those.

 

[Hark17ball]

Hark17ball would love to see the match if you've got a replay! Up-tilt on high platforms is really quite good, even just basic up-tilt -> FJ -> up-B kills readily.\

Zke99 welcome to the forums, if you dig a bit there's a thread on secondaries. If it's just one or two matchups I suggest visiting the respective boards and looking at what they say is their worst, I can more or less guarantee you it's going to be "sheik". Maybe rosa, mario, fox or ZSS or some combination of those.

Unfortunately was in the 3rd round of pools and not on stream. It was on Smashvilles Platform, he happened to land on it after Bomb>Reverse CS. So I was like "don't fudge this up!"

 

[Xygonn]

Hark17ball would love to see the match if you've got a replay! Up-tilt on high platforms is really quite good, even just basic up-tilt -> FJ -> up-B kills readily.\

Zke99 welcome to the forums, if you dig a bit there's a thread on secondaries. If it's just one or two matchups I suggest visiting the respective boards and looking at what they say is their worst, I can more or less guarantee you it's going to be "sheik". Maybe rosa, mario, fox or ZSS or some combination of those.

Worst mu isn't good enough because mains know that mu really well. You need to pick a less common poor matchup for it to be effective. How many fox counter pickers do you kill on the daily?

 

[DungeonMaster]

Xygonn , that's absolutely true.
I won't speak for most people but a secondary for me means considerable time investment, to learn the character well, a counterpick is just going to well known "hard" matchups without actually having the character as a main or a secondary, just doing it to get a basic edge.

 

[Xygonn]

Xygonn , that's absolutely true.
I won't speak for most people but a secondary for me means considerable time investment, to learn the character well, a counterpick is just going to well known "hard" matchups without actually having the character as a main or a secondary, just doing it to get a basic edge.

Any secondary is going to be worse than your main in terms of your skills and memorization and muscle memory. That's just the way it is. That means when you pick a secondary you will be worse than mains of that character. I'm not good with Sheik. Sheik is great, but people, everyone, knows the Sheik matchup. Even if I invested weeks and weeks into Sheik I'm not going to get results with her as a secondary. I really think the whole "high tier" secondary concept is horribly flawed. If you are gonna run a low tier main you have to run other low or mid tiers as secondaries. The reason being that people simply don't know the less common matchups that well, and even if they know it OK it's probably against a single playstyle for that character.

Basically, if you are running low or even a mid tier main that is unpopular you are using the knuckleball strategy. In baseball most of the best pitchers rely on their fastball. The exception is knuckleball pitchers. If you add another pitch to your lineup it shouldn't be a fastball (though hilariously in real life this is usually the other pitch knuckleball pitchers use, often to poor effect). You probably already tried that and established you don't have a great fastball. So you need to add another wacky pitch that's uncommon and hard to practice against.

What does that mean? Well, I'm waiting patiently for the MU chart to get finished. But that means you need to look at the MUs various mid and low tiers have and pick two (maybe three) that have an overall positive spread. I would suggest that Olimar is the top of what should be considered in popularity. Any more than that and the character gets enough exposure that lack of MU knowledge is harder to exploit.

Taking out the DLC aside from Mewtwo: here are the characters that you can viably exploit lack of MU knowledge. Keep in mind, the lower the usage, the worse the MU knowledge will be.

Pikmin & Olimar

554

Ike

549

Wario

547

Ganondorf

523

Lucario

517

Bowser

508

Falco

500

Pit

446

Jigglypuff

430

Palutena

420

Bowser Jr.

418

Robin

415

Mr. Game & Watch

411

Charizard

370

Samus

368

Pac-Man

367

Wii Fit Trainer

342

Duck Hunt

336

Lucina

286

Dr. Mario

230

Zelda

228

Dark Pit

203

Mii Brawler

182

Mewtwo

98

Mii Gunner

59

Mii Swordfighter

49

Ok, cool. So now you should pick out of those, characters that cover your bad MUs. I don't think it's by chance that I do better with Dr. Mario than Mario. Even if Mario is unarguably "better", everyone knows the MU. Not everyone knows the Doc matchup.


Zke99 to mitigate Fox, depending on local rules, Mii Brawler is a great option. I like Dr. Mario against him. Great tools for gimping Fox and I really don't think Fox has a good enough offstage game to capitalize on the Doc's weaknesses.

 

[JAZZ_]

Any secondary is going to be worse than your main in terms of your skills and memorization and muscle memory. That's just the way it is. That means when you pick a secondary you will be worse than mains of that character. I'm not good with Sheik. Sheik is great, but people, everyone, knows the Sheik matchup. Even if I invested weeks and weeks into Sheik I'm not going to get results with her as a secondary. I really think the whole "high tier" secondary concept is horribly flawed. If you are gonna run a low tier main you have to run other low or mid tiers as secondaries. The reason being that people simply don't know the less common matchups that well, and even if they know it OK it's probably against a single playstyle for that character.

Basically, if you are running low or even a mid tier main that is unpopular you are using the knuckleball strategy. In baseball most of the best pitchers rely on their fastball. The exception is knuckleball pitchers. If you add another pitch to your lineup it shouldn't be a fastball (though hilariously in real life this is usually the other pitch knuckleball pitchers use, often to poor effect). You probably already tried that and established you don't have a great fastball. So you need to add another wacky pitch that's uncommon and hard to practice against.

What does that mean? Well, I'm waiting patiently for the MU chart to get finished. But that means you need to look at the MUs various mid and low tiers have and pick two (maybe three) that have an overall positive spread. I would suggest that Olimar is the top of what should be considered in popularity. Any more than that and the character gets enough exposure that lack of MU knowledge is harder to exploit.

Taking out the DLC aside from Mewtwo: here are the characters that you can viably exploit lack of MU knowledge. Keep in mind, the lower the usage, the worse the MU knowledge will be.

Pikmin & Olimar

554

Ike

549

Wario

547

Ganondorf

523

Lucario

517

Bowser

508

Falco

500

Pit

446

Jigglypuff

430

Palutena

420

Bowser Jr.

418

Robin

415

Mr. Game & Watch

411

Charizard

370

Samus

368

Pac-Man

367

Wii Fit Trainer

342

Duck Hunt

336

Lucina

286

Dr. Mario

230

Zelda

228

Dark Pit

203

Mii Brawler

182

Mewtwo

98

Mii Gunner

59

Mii Swordfighter

49

Ok, cool. So now you should pick out of those, characters that cover your bad MUs. I don't think it's by chance that I do better with Dr. Mario than Mario. Even if Mario is unarguably "better", everyone knows the MU. Not everyone knows the Doc matchup.


Zke99 to mitigate Fox, depending on local rules, Mii Brawler is a great option. I like Dr. Mario against him. Great tools for gimping Fox and I really don't think Fox has a good enough offstage game to capitalize on the Doc's weaknesses.

I agree completely with this idea. As a Samus main I feel like the lack of MU knowledge my opponent has against Samus gives me an advantage greater than the tier advantage is. And as far as secondaries go, I stick primarily to Ganon, with a little bit of WiiFit and Kirby. There are a ton of characters I also play that I enjoy using as well like, Rosalina, Cloud, Link, and Lucas. But I only play those characters and a few more against my friends and family. Reason being my main and secondaries are too much for my friends and family to handle so I dink around with characters I practice very little with so its less unbalanced and less competitive. would I ever use them in FG or a tourney? No I cant say I would, I like using "low tiers" because I will most likely have that MU Knowledge advantage. And besides its already hard enough to find time to practice with my main, let alone a character like sheik which you'd need to be VERY good with to win given that everyone practices against shiek because she's that much of a threat.

 

[Hark17ball]

Guys follow our boy JWest today! His match vs Mr ConCon was AMAZING

http://www.twitch.tv/2ggaming/mobile

@Unholydeath123
Great game man and good luck!!

 

[Vyrnx]

So I heard a Samus player took a game off of ZeRo's Sheik, assuming it's Johnny Westside? That's big.

 

[PStoken]

Watching westside play samus was like a vision, i mean, i've seen sets by great samus players from here, but the reaction time and decision making on this guy were on point,will definately study the sets and work on my reaction time.
Bad luck going against tyrant, this matchup is busted.

 

[meleebrawler]

So I heard a Samus player took a game off of ZeRo's Sheik, assuming it's Johnny Westside? That's big.

Prepare for ZeRo's impending video about how Samus is secretly top-tier.

 

[Vyrnx]

MK vs Samus has to be one of the worst MUs that exists between any two characters in the game.

 

[Hark17ball]

0-40 death with such a small escape.... Dumb.

Great run Johnny! Inspiring play!

 

[DungeonMaster]

@Unholydeath123 have you seen my video and suggestion on DI + SDI vs that combo and the starters?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kbC-v6UOrM
It's our tendency to DI up and away as Samus mains, since this helps in 90% of all cases, but in this one it's really down and away, rocking the stick to down as fast as you can to get SDI repositioning (and mashing airdodge of course, don't jump).
I haven't died to this since posting in September on for-glory, for what it's worth.

Congrats again on your strong showing vs Zero!

 

[Vyrnx]

Johnny Westside got Ito in his pool lol. SkaterJay is in a pool with a few Luigis, including Mr ConCon, so that could potentially be a good thing (or bad since Mr. ConCon is still a great player).

 

[Xys]

Hey guys I have a quick question about Samus. Sometimes when i get of stage I try to z to horizontally recover but the tether turns into a forward attack. Is there something im doing wrong with my button input. Also I just wanna add Samus is a ton of fun ^_^.

 

[Hark17ball]

Hey guys I have a quick question about Samus. Sometimes when i get of stage I try to z to horizontally recover but the tether turns into a forward attack. Is there something im doing wrong with my button input. Also I just wanna add Samus is a ton of fun ^_^.

If she's in a tumble animation it will turn to a Fair. Anytime you tumble use Uair to break the tumble, then click Z/Grab to Zair.

 

[E.Lopez]

Xys , what I like to do is airdodge to get out of tumble, then tether. You can tether immediately the moment you hit airdodge.

 

[Xys]

Wow guys you were really helpful. Thanks!

 

[kCuzzzz]

Hello all! Thought this would be the best place to introduce myself.
First and foremost, huge thanks to everyone who has contributed to the Samus boards! I began my competitive journey in the Northwest region about a year ago, and walked away from Samus shortly after. But recently, due in large part to these boards, I picked her back up!
It's been great transitioning from always being the best player in my circle of friends since the N64 days to now having to push myself further and further to reach my goals (right now the goal is to go 3-2 in a tournament, one more win than my current best).
Anyways, one of my biggest questions was about getting consistent tether recoveries, and that was already answered.
But I've also been curious about something I find myself doing often, and don't see a lot of in high level Samus play. Frequently I find myself letting go of the charge shot mid-charge to stop an approach and tack on some damage. It seems pretty effective, but I don't know if it will get me into trouble at all. Should I always be going for full charge, or is this tactic something that actually does work?

 

[Hark17ball]

Hello all! Thought this would be the best place to introduce myself.
First and foremost, huge thanks to everyone who has contributed to the Samus boards! I began my competitive journey in the Northwest region about a year ago, and walked away from Samus shortly after. But recently, due in large part to these boards, I picked her back up!
It's been great transitioning from always being the best player in my circle of friends since the N64 days to now having to push myself further and further to reach my goals (right now the goal is to go 3-2 in a tournament, one more win than my current best).
Anyways, one of my biggest questions was about getting consistent tether recoveries, and that was already answered.
But I've also been curious about something I find myself doing often, and don't see a lot of in high level Samus play. Frequently I find myself letting go of the charge shot mid-charge to stop an approach and tack on some damage. It seems pretty effective, but I don't know if it will get me into trouble at all. Should I always be going for full charge, or is this tactic something that actually does work?

Mind games. Every player is unique so they all approach/handle situations differently. I am the type that likes to have it charged to make people always guess when in gonna use it.....especially when edge guarding. I do fire it off sometimes mid charge to catch people sleeping. If you go to the Gameplay/Video thread you'll see a lot more examples from all of us.