Smash critique

[Phislamajama]

Hi all, I've been a long time lurker here and finally got around to making an account. A couple friends and I have been playing smash for a few years now and thought it would be a good idea to get some feedback from the community.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjBdJLEMKME&list=UUDSq06LO0t3WjN-SI3AC9Bg&index=4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elDC1sHC2mA&index=3&list=UUDSq06LO0t3WjN-SI3AC9Bg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUUX23YaDaw&list=UUDSq06LO0t3WjN-SI3AC9Bg&index=2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCyllMhV9lg&index=1&list=UUDSq06LO0t3WjN-SI3AC9Bg
we'd be grateful for any advice

 

[mixa]

hi,

do you watch vids of the good players playing your characters / mu?

do you want to play to win, or should we dismiss some sub-optimal choices as you trying to style?

when you watch your own vid, what are some things you think you could improve on?

 

[Phislamajama]

I personally play for fun, but wouldn't say I style by any means haha I'd still like to hear about anything I'm doing sub-optimally though. I watch videos all the time, I enjoy watching sometimes more than playing. Also yeah, I watched these a decent amount before posting them and noticed a few times where I messed up, I definitely need to think more while playing

 

[mixa]

fox should be careful (I could end here but)

with those approaches vs a low % opponent, there is not enough hitstun in fox's aerials. try to connect the aerial closer to the ground, so there'll be more time to run away or to follow up (beginning of game 1 and 2. beginning of game 4 wasn't bad, but it was risky)
this is another case of a risky fox aerial. even though fox hit the opponent, because fox 1. didn't land right after the aerial, or 2. didn't have the opponent in enough hitstun to continue the combo, fox ended up in a bad spot. that fair is a bad fair every day of han solo calendar. don't worry, even isai does those

this should be clear to you, but don't try to be cute at the ledge. I used to do that all day even though I knew I was getting spiked all day. a li'l hard to stop that

samus can ledgegrab from pretty far, so consider d-tilt as an edgeguard when edgehog isn't possible. if d-smash is working every time, samus needs to recover better. a few times fox tried to edgeguard with a dash attack, that should never work. I'd say that if you play an MU often, you can pick apart the parts of the game for that MU (DI, edgeguard, 'neutral game' / approach, combo, how to avoid respawn inv, etc), select -one-, and improve on that. you said you watch high level play, so pay attention to what choices they do

opportunities for an aerial to dash upsmash like this one happened a few times. one time you did a shine jab instead, which is fine if you know that you could've killed it with an upsmash instead
my fox chart is somewhere around the forums, but bottom line is every character save DK dies at 91% from the bottom part of DL to a fox upsmash, samus must die at 82 or 85. so, again, not killing is fine, but if you want to improve and get out of pools, you try to get into the habit of doing the optimal thing and upsmash. I say this 'cause the habit was always a big thing for me. to this day I have to try really hard not to fool around with falcon


samus' fair is terrible [1] for defending yourself. risky [2], and this [3]
basically, samus should've been keeping her back to the opponent, and dairing more instead of fair

this happened a few times, samus would get a dair at high %s, hesitate, and do some random follow up. like in here. there isn't much secret, when the opponent pops up at around that height (% hint), always be ready for a high-angled f-smash, or even a (pivot) grab. also, if it is going to be an aerial, bair is stronger than nair unless stale

 

[Han Solo]

If you want to win with Fox against anyone that isn't Falcon, don't approach, run away, and laser if the opponent is far enough away.

If you're playing Falcon, then wait for them to upsmash, don't get hit by it, and punish it. If Falcon never upsmashes, then you're going to lose.

 

[BananaBolts]

Tip: Never do anything more than twice ( in succession ). You'll become too predictable otherwise. "Playing optimally" doesn't necessarily mean that you choose the option that typically produces the optimal result.

For example: If dash attack -> ledgegrab is the best option to edgeguard Samus (I'm not saying that it is), don't choose dash attack repeatedly for your edgeguard because the Samus that you play against will adapt to that specific situation.

 

[Phislamajama]

Thanks for taking the time to watch and respond, I appreciate it, mixa especially. I'll make sure to tell him about your advice with fox, since hes such an intricate character. As for han solo, I hope I never have to play you, lasers haunt my dreams..

I have been more so practicing movement over learning match-ups, figuring that would come in time, if that's any excuse for bad fairs and the like.
When, would you say, is a good time to fair with samus then? Also bananabolts did you notice me being predictable at all?

 

[mixa]

Movement is crucial, but I notice a tendency of some players do movement tricks for movement's sake: Nesses doing double-jump cancel on the side platform just cuz, Foxes doing shine-cancels on platforms just cuz, Stranded Falcons moving around just cuz. I think it's that thing this Seth Killian guy talked about: you find this nifty movement / trick, and you feel you have to use it, so you keep trying to make it work. You arbitrarily insist on some technique instead of focusing on taking the stock.

At CoA 6 Kero as Pika during warm-up was doing standing short hops from side plat to top plat, quick movement. But when the match was on, he got hit doing that, twice in a row even, because he must've felt he needed to use that, and in my eyes it was predictable. It's like when I play (J) Falcon, I want to use that magnificent stick jump to the top platform more than I should. With Fox I want to use shine more than I should.

So try to figure out where you want to be in the stage, and use the movement for that. Karajan made a post of positions for Samus vs most characters. To me is no wonder Jousuke gets more platform tech-chases opportunities on side platforms than anyone else, he positions himself on the stage in a way to create those opportunities. And his effective movement helps this. Unfortunately there aren't many Samus vs Fox videos out there. I have Samus clips colllected from matches, hit me up in the future if you want to get a grasp of, say, platform tech-chasing, shield pressure, etc.

And along with movement comes defense. So when you're weaving in and out of range, moving through the stage, you want to use bairs and dairs along the way, mostly. You'll notice that fair is more used when rising up in the air, less when falling down, and almost never when fast falling, since the hitboxes are not constant throughout the attack -- because of this when you fast fall fair, you're not creating a wall of flames to protect you, you're rolling dice.
Besides that, the fair use is intuitive enough. Don't overshoot and it's fine.

 

[BananaBolts]

Also bananabolts did you notice me being predictable at all?

I watched this in the library at school and I wasn't fully focused. I didn't realize that you were Samus because you never specified which player you were, however, that doesn't excuse my ignorance of not looking at your Smash 64 main.

The fox player you were playing against was being more predictable than you were. That being said, you need to notice a pattern in his play style and punish accordingly. I noticed that you missed numerable punishes on edge guards, tech chases, etc. As a Samus main, your movement and punishments need to be crisp and consistent. Samus is not the easiest character with which to beat another player, assuming that he's of equal skill and using a 'stronger' character. Just practice some tricky movement and advanced options. I would give you some more tips but I'm not fully versed in Samus.