Guide (100% Complete) Doc. vs. the World (of Nintendo) - A Character Matchup Guide

[Dogysamich]

this guide has been updated some, $mac's just too lazy to give a bump for justice.

 

[otg]

Wow, Doc has so many disadvantages even against low tiers.... doesn't Doc have any easy matchups? lol

 

[Dogysamich]

its not that doc has bad matchups against the lowtiers, its more of knowing what the character does.

I helped $mac with alot of the lowtiers part because i see a ****ton of them because of where i live, and the other part because i've played half of them so i know what the hell is going on.

Cause seriously, you can see all the lowtiers you want, if you've never, ever seen a GOOD _____ character, it will scare you.

And i dont mean the people who play them and know the basic stuff, i mean like, a GOOD g&w. It's nice to know that d.throwing them wont make them bounce up to anything.

etc, etc.

 

[otg]

its not that doc has bad matchups against the lowtiers, its more of knowing what the character does.

I helped $mac with alot of the lowtiers part because i see a ****ton of them because of where i live, and the other part because i've played half of them so i know what the hell is going on.

Cause seriously, you can see all the lowtiers you want, if you've never, ever seen a GOOD _____ character, it will scare you.

And i dont mean the people who play them and know the basic stuff, i mean like, a GOOD g&w. It's nice to know that d.throwing them wont make them bounce up to anything.

etc, etc.

Too true, much respect on the hard work guys.

 

[boss8]

i couldnt find peach.......

 

[ridikulus]

I helped $mac with alot of the lowtiers part because i see a ****ton of them because of where i live, and the other part because i've played half of them so i know what the hell is going on.

Cause seriously, you can see all the lowtiers you want, if you've never, ever seen a GOOD _____ character, it will scare you.


etc, etc.

baha i remember when one of my friends first started 8D

he never played a good/decent kirby.
easiest match of my life. it was 46 seconds long and i got 13 % LOL XD

 

[DRD]

Sorry Smashmac, but could you explain to me--or maybe someone else can-- what you're talking about with the whole "cloud" deal at the beginning of the guide?

 

[Neverender]

Sadly, my friend doesn't even main kirby and he owns me with him sometimes
It's really embarrassing.
He's just really smart.

 

[St. Viers]

Sorry Smashmac, but could you explain to me--or maybe someone else can-- what you're talking about with the whole "cloud" deal at the beginning of the guide?

The cloud on Yoshi Story--Timing isn't random, and knowing where it is can help you alot

 

[DRD]

Thanks Viers

 

[otg]

Sadly, my friend doesn't even main kirby and he owns me with him sometimes
It's really embarrassing.
He's just really smart.

Watch my vids vs. SH3L, his Kirby is very good. It will give you a good idea of what not to do, and what actually works. Pretty much here is some advice:
-pill camp him, force him to make the first move. Don't let him copy you because than he has your approach.
-His crouch is pretty absurd, but you should be able to CC anything he throws at you.
-If you hit him out of his UpB he loses all his jumps, so it's pretty easy to gimp him. Don't get too comfy caping his UpB though because he'll catch on and start reverse UpBing. Lucky enough for you, he can't grab the ledge backwards when that happens so just let him fall.
-From a grab, you **** him. From Dthrow you can connect all the hits in Dair and than follow up with Bair/nair/uair, or hell even DJ and Dair him again. But the best part about this, is Dthrow->fair connects at pretty much any percent, and it also KO's him at really low percent.
-Don't roll behind him, his utilt ***** you and connects into his Bair which ***** you more. So don't stand behind him, just opt to run away and pill camp.
-As for recovery? Just be careful as he can jump out pretty far to hit you, and you'll pretty much die for any thing. But this applies to anyone who can jump out and hit doc no lol? Just be careful.

 

[KirbyKaze]

If you don't get hit by Bair or U-tilt --> Bair 50+ times in a match, or get Kirbycided repeatedly, Kirby loses.

For practical advice, he's not as good if he's facing you (U-tilt and Bair are his good moves, basically, and both of those start backwards; his F-tilt, and D-tilt, are much, much easier to punish, deal less damage, don't setup edgeguards as well, etc). So contrive to keep eye-to-eye with pills and whatever.

D-throw combos **** him.

Uair can **** him pretty easily if you get under him, he really has no priority below him. SHing Uair when he's airborne will probably beat most of if not all of what he works with, unless it's Bair, in which case space better or go over it with Fair or Dair or whatever.

CC anything that doesn't look perfectly spaced into D-smash, and anything that looks horribly spaced into grab, and then kill him a lot. If it looks perfectly spaced, then don't. It will only end in tragedy.

Edgeguard with your gimpy Bair. Ledgehop Bair as many times as necessary and edgehog. Or Bair --> Bair offstage and edgehog and he dies. Or cape his Up+B because you know his Up+B is just too good. Kirby is very easy to edgeguard.

 

[kiing-]

nice thread are there any vids?

 

[StealthyGunnar]

Yesz!

Great thread! This helped me a lot with my Dr. Mario!

 

[1048576]

The Pichu info is pretty wrong, if anyone cares.

Pichu can't kill with thunder after an UpSmash or with upair. Upthrow to Uair on Jiggs from the top platform of Green Greens non-stale only kills after 70, so it's not going to do anything to Doc.

U-air can't spike for Pichu.

Neither uair nor bair cause Pichu to hurt himself.

You should mention how easy it is to techchase Pichu. Doc's techchase game isn't the best, but he can certainly do it to Pichu after a Dthrow. This will allow him to continue a sort of Pseudo-chaingrab well into the 60s, if I recall correctly.

It's good to keep your pills low, since Pichu won't spend much time jumping high, since his shorthop is low and his groundspeed is high.

 

[Pink Reaper]

*Stone* - This is a good attack in general, and Kirby may use this as an option while tech-following you.

Dogy. Seriously. Edit this. You're a mod. You can do that.

 

[INSANE CARZY GUY]

wow that's bad. I saw the pichu stuff and was like yes let them be afraid

 

[1048576]

Well, they basically write the matchup off as, "you shouldn't lose to Pichu." Personally, I've beaten a Doc or two in my time.

I'm confident that even with proper matchup knowledge Pichu can still rise above his current tier position.

 

[INSANE CARZY GUY]

I argee but this isn't the place they wanted to ban me again for talking about pichu is other places. I am always willing to talk about pichu in the pichu boards as long as I know about it, like I can't tell you anything about pichu vs doc.

But yeah change the kirby thing and 1044876 are you going to pound4? I plan to. post in the pichu thread about it I made it like 5 days ago

 

[VGmasta]

O you Pichu players... Get out of my Doc forums you cheese rats! Just kidding.

The Pichu info is pretty wrong, if anyone cares.

Pichu can't kill with thunder after an UpSmash or with upair. Upthrow to Uair on Jiggs from the top platform of Green Greens non-stale only kills after 70, so it's not going to do anything to Doc.

U-air can't spike for Pichu.

Neither uair nor bair cause Pichu to hurt himself.

You should mention how easy it is to techchase Pichu. Doc's techchase game isn't the best, but he can certainly do it to Pichu after a Dthrow. This will allow him to continue a sort of Pseudo-chaingrab well into the 60s, if I recall correctly.

It's good to keep your pills low, since Pichu won't spend much time jumping high, since his shorthop is low and his groundspeed is high.

I care, I care!
Thanks for the additional info, sounds rather accurate.

Well, they basically write the matchup off as, "you shouldn't lose to Pichu." Personally, I've beaten a Doc or two in my time.

I'm confident that even with proper matchup knowledge Pichu can still rise above his current tier position.

Well I shouldn't lose to a Pichu, I just suck . But seriously, Pichus that are fast enough to avoid being hit can be a challenge to take down. I think Pichu's n-air is hard to beat out if you don't see it coming. I wonder if I can duck under it. Maybe b-airing or up-tilting will at least crash with it (possibly beat it), but you definitely can't out n-air Pichu's n-air with a Doc n-air.

 

[SmashMac]

Thanks for the input about the Pichu information. As far as the jiggs uthrow thing is concerned I don't know why any Doc. would ever uthrow a jiggs in a singles matchup. That's something entirely situational.

 

[VGmasta]

Thanks for the input about the Pichu information. As far as the jiggs uthrow thing is concerned I don't know why any Doc. would ever uthrow a jiggs in a singles matchup. That's something entirely situational.

Yeah, up-throwing Jiggs seems pointless in 1v1s. I think the Pichu player said (or was trying to say) that up-throwing to up-airing Jiggs as Pichu won't really kill in many situations. Meaning that Doc. won't die from an up-throw to up-air combo from Pichu, being that Jiggs should die off the top easier than Doc. dies at the top.

 

[INSANE CARZY GUY]

you can't really camp pichu(size,speed,amazing sheild to body size more likly to powersheild,jab/dash attack is fast and beats most projectiles) and he has a better grab game than pikachu in everyway range,set-ups,longer chain throws, etc. I THINK pichu can grab doc at low percents and chain throw a little very f-throw. Doc may be a great edge gaurder but pichu has a really really good recovery his vs pikachu's is pichu is harder to hit and is safer when he lands on the ground than pikachu.

 

[St. Viers]

however, uptilt, f-tilt, and cape shut pichu out almost completely, from what I remember*. Why worry about actually damaging w/ projectiles &edgeguarding when you can simply force them to approach, and just full jump d-airs (if they like to approach w/ shorthop nairs), or space tilts.

*I've played against a really good pichu.

 

[otg]

*I've played against a really good pichu.

hmmm I wonder who that is lol. Ftilt/grabs **** pichu all day. CC dsmash/grab, cg, etc. This matchups stupid.

vs. kirby is stupider though. And yes I'm aware stupider isn't a word.

 

[VGmasta]

Hmmm.... I don't know why I haven't tried the cape more often. That strategy would probably **** on half the matches I fail. Thanks for the idea guys!

 

[Dogysamich]

Doctor Mario Matchup Guide – By Dogysamich
​

I. – Introduction
A!! Intro
B!! Terms List


II. – Matchups
001!! – Fox
002!! - Marth
003!! - Sheik
004!! - Falco
005!! - Peach
006!! - Captain Falcon
007!! - Jigglypuff
008!! - Ice Climbers
009!! - Samus
010!! - Doctor Mario
011!! - Ganondorf
012!! - Luigi
013!! - Donkey Kong
014!! - Mario
015!! - Link
016!! - Pikachu
017!! - Young Link
018!! - Roy
019!! - Zelda
020!! - Game & Watch
021!! - Ness
022!! - Yoshi
023!! - Bowser
024!! - Mewtwo
025!! - Kirby
026!! - Pichu

III. Ender Stuff
Dogy1!! – Update Info
Dogy2!! – FAQ / Ask A Dogy
Dogy3!! – Future Guides?
Dogy4!! – Random Info of Randomness


I. – Introduction

A. The Intro

Aight. This is gunna be pretty frickin casual. I’m just pretty sick of people asking me the same question time and time again, and then people saying they’re going to post the info somewhere and it never being posted. It’s sad.

I’m not looking for some almighty Doc fame or anything; anybody who knows me knows that I could only care less. It’s just, people ask, I know, but people ask 20 times and it’s like *PUNCHES A HOLE IN THE WALL* STOP ASKING ME WHAT TO DO OMG. Or it’s like “Hey how do I deal with –insert super random character that you see once a year here- and I’m like “Hey, I clearly remember 4 specific occasions when I talked about this matchup, but who goes fishing for info on how to beat Y.Link”
This guide is by me and it’s a summation of my opinion of these specific matchups. This guide is not the “Holy Accepted Opinion” of the Doc community, so don’t hang this s*** over other people’s head. I’ll TRY to add a generic opinion, but all in all, this is me. So if you got a problem with it, don’t go lynch $mashmac, Cyphus, Bob Money, Captain Jack, or anybody of the likeliness.

This guide is also not a “how to play” doc guide. I’ll put some tricks and tips here and there, but the purpose of this isn’t specifically to teach you HOW to play doc. It’s just more of what strats work, what to look out for, yada yada. By that alone, this guide sounds like it’ll be kinda pointless and loose-form, but just go with me. It’ll work out.

My goal with this is that by the time you finish reading a matchup, you should have a fairly good idea of what’s going to happen, whether you’ve played the matchup 100 times or you don’t think you’ll EVER see the matchup
Some quick notes to know about this guide

A1. Terms List
First and foremost, this guide is going to be written assuming you know my theory of terminology. –Rough Insertion- Ya know what, screw it, I’ll explain some of my crazy jargon here, and if I miss something, hopefully it makes sense or I’ll add it later. YAH.

Dogy’s Matchups Chart: Are done working off of this concept – if you take character A (Doc) vs character B, equally skilled, and have them play 10 matches, character A (Doc) will win _ times, and character B will win _ times.

Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: Is based off of character advantages vs disadvantages. This will, at times, be different than my chart rating because it’s considering the characters actual pros and cons and how much they weight vs each other in the match, as opposed to just one playing another. (This one is more of theory fighter than the others)

The General Consensus: Is based off of the “Community” opinion of the matchup

Offense: One’s ability to start and maintain an advantage on a character. “Pressure”. This is accomplished by having frame advantage or holding a position in which the defender cannot respond to.

Defense: The ability to defend against another’s offensive efforts and pressure. This includes blocking (shielding), evasion (mobility), and zoning (spacing).

Gimmicks: Covers all sorts of shenanigans in and about the matchup. This will include stuff such as character properties you might not think about, somewhat outlandish setups, and just maybe some dumb facts you don’t know. *A gimmick is something that works under a special condition. I.e. Sheik’s recovery is a gimmick because you can punish it by grabbing the ledge.*

Mobility: A character’s “physical” ability to cover distance in a short amount of time. Example: Fox is very mobile on the ground, where as bowser is not.

Agility: A character’s ability to change direction of movement in a given area. Example: Captain Falcon is an extremely agile on the ground, while Jigglypuff is very agile in the air.

Capedashing: SH Cape -> Wavedash with Doc.

Respect: The concept that you have to know/accept that something CAN happen, and plan according to it. I.E., you have to respect the fact that Peach is going to CC d.smash if you keep jabbing at her.

Fear: Preparing for a situation to the point of going to the extreme to avoid it. I.E.: Most people fear Sheik’s f.air so they never jump.

Honest (honesty): The practice of doing (or lack of) a motion as to check to make sure the other people won’t fall for something “so simple.” I.E. A scrubby Fox player is going to d.throw -> u.smash all day to keep you HONEST about teching the d.throw.

II. Matchups

001 Fox McCloud (a.k.a. Victory McWin)

Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 48-52 Even (It’s bad to start with these “joke” numbers, but I’m actually pretty serious about this one)
The General Consensus: 45-55 Fox (40-60 on Fridays)
The $mashmac Formula for Work: Doc = (2Fox)W, where W is the amount of work you’ll have to put in.
The General Flow:
“You should be able to hold your own against a Fox player, but if you and the Fox player are at the same skill level, you're going to have twice as hard of a time trying to beat him.”!!!!11!ONEOMG! -$mashmac

Ah man. I love that quote. –laughs hysterically-

Doc/Fox. It’s not really as horrible as people make it out to be. Sure Fox has his n.air plane and FRC (shine), but so long as you know how to deal with said things, it’s not exactly horrible for Doc. It’s not like Fox outranges Doc, Doc actually outranges Fox (although with Fox’s ground speed and the small margin of reach, this doesn’t hold a great deal of weight in this matchup)

Everybody knows how dumb Doc’s edgeguard can be vs Fox (if Fox ejects, it becomes a 50+/50- guess, the +/- depending on how fast you can close distance before he blasts off), and experienced Fox players know how dumb easy it is to edgeguard Doc (Hint for Fox players, you can ledgeDROP a bair and still make it back), but along with recovery and more, Doc actually gets away from some Fox shenanigans.

1) Fox can’t kill Doc from a grab unless Doc lets it happen. Ever. Ok, I lied, but a lot of Fox players don’t know how to kill Doc from a grab, or won’t “run the risk”. The funny thing is that taking the no-kill option is still better for them in the grand scheme of things (imo).

2) Drill->Shine->Upsmash on Doc is work for Fox. A Serious 9-5, with some overtime.. I’ve been playing this game for like, years, and Chops is the first guy I remember being able to drill-shine-upsmash me consistently. Heck, I believed it couldn’t be done for a good long time, but lol. Victory McWin. XD The thing about Drill is you have ways to stop it (more than just shielding).

Anyway, more general stuff.

You can actually run your pill game if you want to, but you have to respect Fox’s speed. All that really means is that you have to either fade if you’re playing D, or start far the **** out if you’re trying to approach (or just close distance)

This match winds up being a style-vs-style kind of match. In the grand scheme of things it really should be a mesh, but melee (somehow) isn’t exactly to that point yet, so you still have Pill Happy Pat vs The Nairplane Pilot, or Mario-Doc vs Upsmash McOwn.

The last thing I’ll say before I break into some sections, and the most important thing to understand in this matchup, is that at all times you must respect what the Fox wants to do. The game is not fair. I’m not saying this trying to gripe about melee (although I actually am kinda griping), I’m being serious. One of Fox’s current meta-perks is that he can do pretty much whatever he wants and you have to RESPECT it. (Respect being the key word as opposed to allow. You don’t have to allow a **** thing to happen).

If he wants to run at you all day, you have to respect that and put up a good effort to stop it. If he wants to sit and play Halo for a while, you have to go through effort to respect it. He can pretty much do what he wants and you have to, to some degree, play his game. It sorta works to think of Fox as “the bully who gets his way”, per say.

Offense:
In this match, you won’t be doing a lot of flat-out offense. That’s because you really CAN’T do too much vs Fox’s defense unless he lets you. His evasion is through the roof for various reasons, and although his blocking defense isn’t his greatest option, he does have good punishment from it (B.airs, OoS Upsmash, OoS Shine, etc etc. He’s got choices.) So with this being said, it’ll be hard to generate an offense against him.
More specifically, you won’t be throwing out a lot of offensive fairs unless you’re psychic or he’s physically incapable of pressing buttons. Most of your offense will actually wind up being “defense”, per say. You’ll be doing a lot of preventing Fox from doing stuff. Trying to stop him from jumping out, from wavedashing (or rolling) out, etc etc. So with that said, you really want to focus on attacking where you think he’s going to be as opposed to where he is. It sounds kinda common sense if you’ve been playing this game for a while, but the subtleties are where I’m reaching at for this.

To help with this, you want to try to work Fox into a position to where he doesn’t have as many options. More often than not, that’s considered a corner. You work him to the edge of the stage, back isn’t that great of an option for him anymore. So now you have to worry about him jumping around you or fighting back (both of which is no problem for McCliggins.)
Pills are a great tool for trying to accomplish this. Fox is going to move, it’s just in his nature. He doesn’t have a reason not to. You just have to look for/predict how he’s going to move and attack accordingly. Note that, against McWin, Fox running under FH and SH pills is a completely viable option. With that said, you have to give him a lot more room when you throw pills. It’s also a nice start for when you land a knockdown as well. B.air for a knockdown, and then do a turnaround pill as you land (or where ever, depending on where you are), cuts out some options as he techs up.

In general, if you can ever attack Fox from above, go for it. Although your d.air isn’t the greatest tool ever, his u.air and u.smash aren’t too great for defense. His u.tilt is ok, but he has to be facing away from you, in which case he’s more liable to b.air anyway. So if you can jump in on him, that’s great.

Note that you don’t even have to do an aerial when you jump in, you can literally just JUMP IN as to close distance on him. Be wary of shines and all other stuff at that point.

If you can ever get close enough to land jabs, you can work a mixup very well vs Fox. Again, understand that your range is actually LONGER than his. If you space your jabs, he can’t punish them directly. He can’t grab them, he can’t upsmash, and he’s got to actually stop what you’re doing.

With all that being said, you need to still understand that working an actual offense against Fox is pretty hard. He’s got too many resourceful tools to allow you to gain and maintain a worthwhile offense.

Think of him as a shoto, lol.
Chaingrabs? 0-Death. U.throws. D.throws. They all works. Deaths from grabs. It’s pretty kool.

Defense:
This is where you’re going to have your work cut out for you. Fox has a pretty beastly arsenal of moves at his disposal. And this is where the majority of the match is going to take place, you defending against Fox.

First and foremost, you have to deal with his approach, which is more than likely going to be n.airs, d.airs (at close range), grabs, and fairly current to the game, the shine approach ( I **** you not).

Now, to combat the aerials, you want to have 2 goals going. To deal with the n.air, you want keep yourself in a position to where you can crouch. That means you want to basically avoid wavedashing as long as you’re in range of n.air. You REALLY don’t want to go in shield either, as you would then be allowing Fox to put pressure on your shield, but that’s not the bad thing. You want to be able to CC nair because you don’t want to get put on the n.air plane.

The next aerial you’ll have to deal with is his d.air. For him to realistically hit you with this, you have to be fairly close to him, so giving him a moving target will realistically solve this problem. But there’s no such thing as a fix-all against Fox (unless you’re like, Marth), so you have to be ready to actually deter him from d.airing as well. We’ll get to that later. As for the general stuff, you want to move and make it hard for him. If you put your shield up, trying to shieldgrab a d.air is completely viable option, although you always have to respect the shine afterwards. You can’t be predictable with your shieldgrabs, but understand that if he dairs and lands in front of you, he’s in range.

Note that with both of these, you can also play the levels game with Fox. If you think he’s going to sh, you fh d.air, if you think he’s going to sh, you throw out an early u.tilt (or f.tilt), or an upsmash. If you wanna be kinda gutsy with d.airs, you can opt to up+b to trade with it, “a la Fiction” (This is actually years old but hey, I’ll give him credit for bringing it up again). It is pretty imperative that you stop Fox from landing drills on you because he’s always got guaranteed stuff to do afterwards, whether it’s a kill or not.
Last but not least, you can always wavedash back against both of these moves. Not a bad tactic at all, but you can’t be predictable with it or else Fox will just jump deeper, and now you’re wavedashing. That’s kind of… a bad thing, especially considering you won’t be able to CC. You can avoid this by opting towards “I’m going to stay out of range of punish” when you wavedash as opposed to “I’m going to make sure I’m in range to punish every time.”

The next major approach you have to deal with is grab approaches. Against a good fox, this is hard to see due to Fox’s speed, which leads to his large grab RANGE (as opposed to marth who has a large grab reach, You’ll probably understand the difference between the two by the end of this, don’t worry.) But anyway, you pretty much just have to do the generic grab avoiders and just, don’t get grabbed. I’ll let you guys in on a secret that is not known at all yet, punish grabs with capes. It’s funny that I don’t have any vids of this yet but trust me, you’ll love the rewards for it. The tried and true stuff, such as retreating fairs, sh dairs and b.airs, etc etc, they all work too. DD n.air, all the usual tools, you just have to be ready for it. The turnaround for a Fox grab is pretty quick.

The last thing you have to worry about is the shine approach. You don’t want this to happen. Because this can lead to all sorts of immediate mixups. You have to stop this by throwing out tilts, smashes, jabs, JUST DO STUFF SO HE CANT RUN IN. Easier said than done, yes, but that’s what it takes to stop shine approaching. This is what’s hot in the current meta and it’s a beast to deal with if you come across somebody who can press buttons. If you think he’s going to run in and do this, you can do “stop run in” stuff. Again, remember he has short range (and shine has dumb short range), but he can fake the living s*** out of you if you over commit or you’re just, scared.

Ok, the next thing to deal with is fox pressure. Fox pressure is, without a better word to describe it, stupid. I mean, he has a 1 frame attack with low recover that he gains all sorts of perks and options from, not to mention he can just flat out attack from it (and continue pressure). Again, this goes back into the respect thing. You have to respect Fox’s ability to do just about whatever he d*** well pleases. With that being said, aside from a shine, the main pressure tool you have to look for is a jab. When you see either one of these, you have to take a stab in the dark as to what’s not going to get you wrecked. Literally. You can’t just roll every time, you’ll die. You can’t jump out every time, you’ll die. You can’t spotdodge every time, you’ll die. This becomes one aspect of mixup people don’t understand, mixing up your defense. You can look at this as one of 2 ways, making him guess what you’re going to do, trying to guess what he’s going to do and how to stop it. They’re both one in the same, but take the ideology and thought process however you want.

So with that, you realistically need o understand what ALL you can do vs mixup. Those things being; spotdodge, roll, jump, up+b (and up+b cancel), jump out aerial, wavedash, shield (or continuous shield), light shield, cc, upsmash, and probably a few more that I can’t think of atm cause I’m watching 2 setups of Modern Warfare 2. Knowing all that, you have to basically pick options that will get you away from Fox, or if you plan it right, will get you the advantage. Spotdodge gets you away from upsmashes and whatnot, allows you to get out of shield, rolling moves you and gets you out of shield as well, up+b can stop a oncoming d.air, jumping removes you from shine pressure (without rolling) etc etc. You just have to mix, match, come up with your own style, shake’n’bake whatever. This is more of a player-to-player kind of thing.
And with shine pressure, think of it as a mobile jab. But better than what hylian said about doc’s u.air years ago. Current meta now is spanimal shine->wavedash some direction -> shine -> wavedash back to spot one -> shine, etc etc. This is the kinda time where he’s looking for you to do something super dumb like roll. Don’t bite into this nonsense. It’s really a fast series of action – reaction. You can opt to wavedash or jump out and/or you can try to catch Fox with a grab or something, but just know that if you’re going to do something long and dumb, he’ll probably be right there with you.
Aight, so we’ve talked about what stuff fox is gunna to do get in, we’ve talked about basically what he’s going to do to keep pressure on you, there really isn’t too much to know about it beyond “It’s going to happen fast and it’s going to happen often.” The other stuff you have to worry about is the general, blatantly obvious stuff. Don’t run into backairs, be careful of him trying to snipe you with an u.air, yada yada.

Speaking of sniping with u.airs, lets talk about that real quick. When he gets a grab. Step one, DI somewhere. Left or right. Step 2, wait for the throw. It’s more than likely going to be up, down depending on location, etc etc, you got time, but be ready for it. If it’s up, be ready to jump. Once you hit like, 70% or so, you don’t have to jump immediately, but be ready to jump. Fox can’t ever get to you with an u.air unless you let him, but that doesn’t mean you want to jump every time. You jumping prematurely gives him the opportunity to juggle the mess out of you and just gimp you from the middle of the stage. He can land stuff like b.airs and nairs, but those aren’t as bad as u.airs.

One quick final note, lasers. Just because Fox is shooting lasers doesn’t mean you have to approach him. You just have to avoid them without putting yourself in a bad position. Jump over them, camp platforms, camp ledges, camp shield (as long as Fox is away), cape, there are plenty of options, but you just have to make sure you’re not putting yourself in a bad position trying to avoid them. Infact, your position is pretty much more important than you getting hit (because the damage really isn’t THAT much from them).

Edgeguarding:
Edgeguarding Fox isn’t exactly hard, but you have to do some guesswork. He’s realistically got 2 options of recovery, firefox and illusion. The trick comes from the timing and ways he can mix and match his recovery . Kinda like picking your meal from a buffet line, he’s got a few tricks that compliment each other.
In general,

Stopping the illusion isn’t too much of a problem, but you just have to look for it. You also have to be ready for it. You can’t be taken by surprise. You gotta be ready to do run-off nair, a bair, cape, tilts (preferably forward, but up if you think they’re going above you). You just have to be ready. The longer the move startup you choose, the faster your reaction time has to be. That’s kind of obvious, but that means that if he’s going a illusion half way in his line, you pretty much have to cape WITH him to stop him with a cape, as opposed to just pressing a as he comes in to tilt him. Cape works well for stopping sweetspot illusions because you illusion is one of the few moves in the game that actually gets interrupted by cape, which will force them to recovery from below (which at that point HAS to be firefox). If you ever land a f.tilt against illusion, you normally can immediately throw a pill and stop the following up+b (or make them up+b from lower.). You can get like, 2 or 3 pills before they’re completely out of your pill range. A dumb dogy gimmick I like is if they want to illusion over your head, u.tilt. I’ve yet to find a person that doesn’t continue to DI in while they illusion, so you know exactly where they’re going. At around 80%-110% or so, u.tilt -> dunk. You don’t want to bank on this (infact, you’re better off doing a SH nair if they want to go high), but know that the option is there. If they want to SS, note that you can just take the **** ledge. This is an option that kinda gets forgotten about in the current meta, as opposed to trying to cape or tilt them or something (Hell, even I forget to just take the ledge if I suspect a sweetspot). It works.

After you stop the illusion, or if they choose not to, you got the obvious up+b. You want to cape this if you can. Again, you have plenty of ways to deal with it, safer ways (such as b.airs and tilts), but if you want to get the end all, you want to cape this. Your goal is to get as close as possible before he goes off so that you’re covering more options (or realistically ALL) as he takes off.

A few gimmicks you have to look for when he up+bs; when he is in a position to go straight up, be prepared to edgehog him. If he’s not like, close to the stage, he has no option but to fall down onto the ledge. A lot of people (me included) like to try to hit him away again, when you could realistically just… take the **** ledge. So.. take the **** ledge. The second gimmick to look for is angling down at the ledge. This trips A LOT of people up. To stop this, you need to walk all the way to the ledge to do ANYTHING. And when I say all the way, I mean teather animation. If you want to do ANYTHING, you have to be that far to the ledge. The last thing you have to look for is him riding the wall up. If he’s looking to SS, you can grab the ledge, if he’s going to go over, you want to cape. Being able to predict this stuff solves all of this, but we’re not all psychic.

I know I’m not. lololol

Recovery:
I mean, I could go into a long winded explanation of how to recover, but all I really need to say is come up with a plan and pray. Fox can cover all of your options.

Know that you have a lil leeway vs shinespikes, especially low ones. A lot of people (for whatever reason) fear your up+b, so use that to your advantage and BE READY TO SNIPE SOMEBODY IF THEY LOOK LIKE IF THEY’RE GOING TO JUMP OFF AND DO SOMETHING.
With Fox, also know that he can do all sort of shine tricks and fake you out too. Like, jump out, shine to stop out of your range, jump, and land back on stage. The point of something like this would be to bait you into up+bing early. So understand, it happens.

If you have some distance away from you, feel free to cape/pill backwards so that you can b.air to defend yourself. It’s not the greatest thing ever, but it’s an option if Fox wants to try to n.airplane out there.

Pills? They’re ok-a-go-go, but understand that if Fox knows where you’re going to be behind the pill, he can n.airplane THROUGH the pill and hit you.
Fox doesn’t have too much to fear on your recovery. I mean, he can ledgeDROP a b.air and still make it back perfectly fine.

Shine-On!
Fox’s shine is obviously his godsend. Like, you could argue it’s a few more moves in his moveset, but shine is the one that’s a real bane on everybody, because it’s a 1 frame attack. So, you have to be able to plan around it.
The place you’re most likely to see it is shortly after Fox comes in with an aerial. If he does everything right, you can’t shieldgrab him because he’s going to shine. So you have to respect that, wait for the shine, and try to punish afterwards. However, he could just skip the shine and go to something else, so sometimes you have to just bite the bullet and TRY to grab him. It’s not kool.

The next place you see that is any time you’d wind up next to him. Now, that’s a real BROAD statement, but think about it. Anytime you try to chase his tech, if you’re standing over his recovery from the ledge, if you try to dunk him, if you’re on his shield, he’s liable to shine from ALL of those places. Shine is like glitter, once you see it, you really can’t get rid of it. You always have to be willing to let up, let him do it, and punish it when you can.

Know that letting up doesn’t specifically mean stopping your attack. You can take shine out of the equation if you space yourself to where he can’t shine in those situations. It’s hard, but what that means is you have to leave out grabs on your ground approaches, and ONLY look to f.air on your aerial approaches (or make sure you clear him, which is HARD). McCliggins can see through this nonsense and just go where you’re going, so this isn’t a fix-all for shine.

However, your goal is to make him think twice about shining. You get him to think about it stop, then you get a lot more leeway in this matchup. Now he’s going to wind up moving more (which gives you more room), or he might start hanging out dumb bad stuff like misspaced tilts and whatnot.

You’ve gotta respect the shine at all times, but don’t fear it. You can adjust and make him afraid to use it.

Gimmicks:
-Fox’s Shine: Fox’s shine gives him the ability to turn around at any time. On the ground, in the air, wherever he wants to he has access to his backair (or he can turn around and grab ledges). You have to keep this in mind. Although you’re ok being in the air IN FRONT of fox, note that he can just shine and b.air.

-Shine->Grab: a.k.a. “The Shiz Wiz” a.k.a. “The Spanimal Grimy Trick.” At any time Fox shines to put pressure on you, if he thinks you’re going to stay in shield (or if you’re going to be slow out of shield), he can JC grab. Kind of common sense if you think about it, but the turnaround is so fast you flat out have to guess at it.

-Multishining: You can’t really beat it. Gotta move away from it.

-Shine -> Upsmash: Hilarious trick that like, nobody likes to do (cept alt275 XD). If Fox is holding his shine, he can just upsmash out of it.

-d.throw chaingrabbing: It works on Fox, and starts at 30%, but at that low, it winds up being “The Ganon Chaingrab”, in that you have to know what way they’re going to DI BEFORE you throw and you have to make the perfect grab to get them again. You can always opt to let them fall for a tech opportunity.

-u.smash chains: yeaaaaah man. You can do em. U.smash -> u.smash (or u.tilts), upsmash -> tech chasing. Yeah.

-Fox F.smash: Safe on block if spaced well. Infact, if you try to punish it, you’re liable to fall for F.smash -> F.smash (a.k.a. Chops Choo-Choo). Fox’s F.smash doubles as a mini dash (because it moves a decent distance). Just keep it in mind.

-SH Double Laser: Will never hit you as long as you’re standing. Don’t be scared by it. You can just cape/shield the lower laser and go about your business.

-High Percent Lasers: When you’re at high %, some Fox’s will still laser you, because it’s habit and the recipient’s habit is to not get shot by lasers. … Why? The laser’s not going to kill you, and it’s not going to put you in a bad position unless you let it. So with that being said, when you’re at the obvious death %s, don’t respect lasers anymore. Now that doesn’t mean you want to stand there and let Fox practice Training Day outtakes on you, but him taking on 3 damage when you’d die from an u.smash anyway is no reason for you to put your d*** shield up.

Dogy Tips vs Fox:
-Once you start getting into 80% or so (so depending on the stage you’re on), shield more and pay less respect to grabs. Think about it, Fox can’t kill you from a grab unless he makes a good read on a d.throw tech chase, but he’s going to kill you if you screw up the DI on an upsmash. Once you’re afraid of dying to upsmashes, you’re OK to give up grabs.

-D.throw –> D.smash is great at low percents to setup gimps.

002 Marth
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 4-6
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 30-70 Marth
The General Consensus: 40-60 Marth
The General Flow:
Can you get in?

That is the main question of this matchup. Your whole goal is to get in on Marth, and when you do, that’s just half of the job. This is another one of those “unfair” situations. Normally with a setup like this, once you get in, you get to wail away on your opponent, but na, not with the blade. Getting in means you just have to deal with MORE of his stuff as you try to put in work on him.

Pills obviously don’t do too much but buy you time either way, so it’s not like YOU’RE going to win from long range. (although you need to try just to make sure your opponent isn’t ********. If they’ll get beat by pills, then beat them with pills.) With that being said, once Marth gets in mid range, you need to either get in or get out.

DO NOT STAY MID RANGE WITH MARTH. (Mid range = tipper range). You realistically can’t accomplish ANYTHING there. All you have is f.tilts and capes, and although both will hit, Marth gains soooooooo much more from being here.

There’s never a time where Marth is in horrible danger against you. I mean, I guess when you grab him at dunk %, but that’s realistically it. You can combo marth, but they have to be air tight because he can do all sorts of things to stop your combo. On the other hand, if Marth gets you in the air, he can pretty much have a field day on you.

So you don’t want to stay mid range (which you have to get in), you don’t want to be above him, being close isn’t completely safe, and far is not supposed to accomplish anything. So all in all, you’ve got work to do.

Marth’s main goal, on the other hand, is to straight up keep you out. Ironically, most Marth’s (especially ones who don’t know the matchup at all) will do a lot of the work for you. It’s not that they’ll never approach, but they shouldn’t be looking to approach unless they’re making you go into shield or something like that.

Offense:

This part is the real hard part of the match. You have to play some offense, straight up. But with the way Doc is and the way Marth is, Marth can shut down every offensive option you make free. It’s possible for him to stay safe the ENTIRE time.

IT’S POSSIBLE FOR HIM TO STAY SAFE THE ENTIRE TIME.

So with that being said, you have to have a no fear attitude about the matchup. This matchup is a risk-reward matchup. If you’re not willing to take ANY risks, the only way you’re going to get a reward is if the Marth screws up. In a normal match, that’s do-able, but Marth has to screw up BAD for you to get stuff.

That means you better be ready to run into some tilts, CC some aerials, and the likes.

First and foremost, you’re probably gunna be a good distance away from Marth, throwing some pills. See what he likes to do to get around pills, figure out what he likes to do with different stimulus. Does he jump when you run in behind it? Does he try some huge swing to get rid of pills? Is he dumb enough to actually sit there and block all of them? These are the kinds of things you want to look for. Understand that although Marth is fairly quick and has a good dash, he’s not going to disappear after a pill like other characters (Read: Fox) will. Marth is, more often than not, going to swing at/THROUGH your pills. He can do that with no fear. All you’re really doing at this point is checking to make sure his s*** “isn’t Pringles”.

Beyond that, the next wall you have to get through is mid-range. You basically have to play a 50/50 at this point, and that’s assuming Marth doesn’t run. You have to either jump or not jump. If you jump, you’re basically saying “Hey Marth, that’s a nice D.tilt, I’m coming over that.” If you don’t jump, you’re saying “Ok, that’s a nice n.air up there.” See the point? And realistically, you also have to look out for a f.air as well (which you’re more likely to see a f.air than n.air), but you get my drift in this. If Marth guesses right, he’s gunna knock you away (Unless he fair’d and you didn’t DI, then he gets follow up). You just have to take that risk.

*Random Dogy Theory note*This is a thing you can look at one of two ways. You can either look at this scenario as “I’m going to do this because I think you’re going to do that” or “I’m going to do this and you BETTER do that to stop it.” Both of them are realistically the exact same thing, but it’s just the thought process you have around it. It kinda touches into what kind of player you are overall (The first being more not aggressive minded while the second is) Both of them are attempting to accomplish the same goal. The only reason I mention this is because you will come to this junction every time, and you have to do SOMETHING.

Anyway, you could opt to stop at mid range and check what Marth likes to do. Or something might happen you get tripped up here. This obviously puts you at defense at this point unless he’s letting you get closer. Stay on the move vs Marth and, if you’re afraid of getting hit (which is a good fear to have), air on the side of being out of his range rather than in it.

The one big approach you should keep in mind during this match is your shield approach. So long as neither of you are near a ledge, Marth gains little-to-nothing from grabbing you unless you get tripped up in DI. All of Marth’s throws are affected by weight, and Doc is heavy enough to where you SHOULD have time to react to where he’s throwing you. (Not to mention, you also have the “logic factor” as well. If you’re near an edge, he’s probably throwing you over there). I’ll talk more about grabs in the defense section, note that your shield is a huge offensive tool in this matchup.

Run in to about midrange, shield, and then move from there. Jump out, wavedash out, MOVE THE F*** back, shake’n’bake. You’re not going to avoid this range if Marth understands the purpose of his character. I can’t stress how much you’re gunna have to *shades* deal with it.

If you’re not on top of him when he stops his zone, you still have for him to hang something out there. F.air -> u.tilt, N.air -> jabs, you’re STILL NOT IN. You’ve got to guess a few steps ahead to make it in there untouched. If you think he’s going to u.tilt, wait for it (If you’re on the ground, you can flat out duck it. U.tilt does NOT hit a crouching Doc if you do D.O.R. (Duck on Reaction))

And I have to note this because I make a bad habit out of this, Don’t think you’re coming in with a f.air. If you wanna come in with a f.air, you better make Marth do something. Better make him swing and miss, big swing at a pill, put his shield up, something. Marth stuffs Doc F.air Free. You’re gunna need n.airs, u.airs, and d.airs if you’re coming in the air. (Or just jumpins)

So, once you get in, you’re not homefree. You still have to do a lot of work. It’s like riding a bull, you have to do work and avoid getting bucked off. The thing is, since Marth not only functions well but better once you get in (he has access to grabs), you want to keep things short and sweet or else you’re asking to get interrupted. If you can get behind him (or turn him around with your cape), you’ll be in a much better position as he’ll only have 5 responses instead of like, his whole moveset. Regardless of where he is, he’s got a good response for you. If nothing else, he can side-b while adjusting his spacing.

Don’t get the thought that you’re going to beat Marth in a spacing war. If he wants to swing, you respect. Don’t like it? Play another character.

So after you see if he’s dumb, after you fight the 10 yard fight, and after you get in and maybe do something to get a reward, you have to MILK IT FOR ALL IT’S WORTH. You have to be air tight though. Anytime there’s a question if Marth can get out, he’s got options. F.airs, D.airs, loads more. I mean he can realistically kill you midair if you’re not airtight on your combos (Not with a d.air either XD).So you want to be extra careful when you combo Marth.

On the other side of this, if you know Marth loves to swing when you start combing him, you could try to bait him into more damage. You know he wants to come down with a fair? CC it and keep on going. Expecting a counter? Wait for it and f.smash. Marth can’t swing forever. You just always have to be ready for him to swing.

Defense
And him swinging is the bad part. As long as Marth is spacing well and swinging right, you aren’t punishing a d*** thing. You just have to accept that. Even if he does jack up spacing, if he knows HOW to do it, it’s bait (i.e. if you block a deep SHFFL fair, don’t always be in a hurry to shieldgrab, cause he could just move and wreck you for it.) You just want to try your best to stay away from places where he can swing at you.
First, zone Marth far range with pills. Note that his dash and run animation are low enough that he can run under pills. I didn’t say FH and I didn’t say SH, I straight up said pills. Yes, if you stand on the ground and throw a pill, Marth can straight up RUN under it. It’s not easy by any stretch, but it’s doable.

The real first, let’s talk about that midrange. Tipper range. Once you’re in his tipper range, if he’s using one of the only 3 moves he needs to beat you, you want to just get out of here. Trying to fight through is bad since you’re starting at a bad position. If and when you eject, you want to try to make it so that you don’t have to jump. I could say the obvious “you don’t want to be in the air because you’ll get f.smashed or f.aired”, but the real problem comes from if he puts you up in the air any way, you really can’t do anything until you get back to the ground. That’s not to say you NEVER want to try to jump back (and I stress jump back, because jumping in is usually asking for trouble), but don’t make jumping away from his pressure your default option.

The only exception to this is Dogy’s stupid Marth, which is a d.tilting machine.

Anyway, jokes aside, you want to look to punish something against Marth, which again, is hard to do. If he spaces well, you can’t punish anything. I just spent a paragraph saying that. So, what you wind up having to do is MAKE him space bad. Step up and step back when he’s not looking for it. You see him trying to space a fair at tipper range? Step up and block it (or CC it). You see him trying to size up a F.tilt? BACK THE F*** UP. You have to MAKE Marth mess up to get some rewards, but you also have to be ready if he’s ready for this.

In which case you have to be ready for him being ready for you being ready, which he can be ready for you being ready. And you have to be ready for him being ready for you being re~~~ YOU GET THE POINT. I told you this wasn’t going to be any kind of formal guide.

If you haven’t caught onto the idea, you’re pretty much going to be on the ground most of the time. You can’t really accomplish anything in the air, you can’t really zone him out once he gets midrange, and you can’t play a real spacing game with him to begin with, so you’re going to wind up r moving around a lot and/or staying in shield.

If you go the staying in shield route, you have to look for one thing, grabs. (Really, you also have to look for the Gate Breaker (Shield Breaker)) Grab beats shield, so you putting your shield up tells Marth to grab you. You actually gain A LOT by him trying to grab you. One plus is that Marth can’t kill you from a grab unless you let him (Hell, I want to say you actually have to HELP him with bad DI, don’t quote me), but he can’t kill you from a grab. He can put you in a bad position by tossing you up, but that’s not horribly bad because you can move around him and do all sorts of things to get back to the ground. The bigger benefit is that by trying to grab you, he gives up his reach advantage. Although Math’s grab is long, it’s not his longest attack (obviously, it’s not a sword), and it’s not longer than YOUR attacks. It’s just long in comparison to other grabs. So if he wants to grab, he’s got to give up the advantage of you being away from him. If you see a grab coming, you want to avoid it without going too far away. That means you don’t WANT to roll away from it or WD away from it (although sometimes it WILL happen).

The next thing that can happen in shield is you block something big, such as a f.tilt or f.smash. If you block a f.tilt, you can wavedash in and get a tilt or jab in return. You have to be quick to get out there though, as the turnaround is real short. If you block a f.smash, and it wasn’t tipped.. OOHHWWEE FIELD DAY. A blocked f.smash is a GUARENTEED d.smash, u.smash, f.air, or grab. Beyond that, you’re allowed to get as creative as you want to be and go to down on it (note that you don’t get a f.smash from this but you can get an u.air. Do the math)

When it’s all said and done, you’re probably not going to be perfect and you’re going to get hit. I mean, I wish I could get JV5s, but I’m happy with just winning. When you get hit, you’re obvious goal is to stop getting hit. That’s just logic. With marth, though, marth can rain down all sorts of shots as you try to get back in control.

When you get hit, your goal is to not be in the air in front of Marth. That’s his power zone. You obviously want to get away from him, but he can cover ground fairly quickly, so it’s not an easy job. With that being said, you have to be fairly tricky about how you get back to the ground. If you can just flat out DI away from him and be kool, do it, but sometimes you’ll have to bite the bullet and DI in and hope to throw him off. Constantly DIing out could result in him looking for WD F.smash, and if you’re still floating in the air, you’re everything short of screwed (you still have an airdodge).

Last, not least, and kinda just thrown in here, if you ever wind up on a platform above Marth, MOVE THE F*** AWAY FROM THERE. It’s kind of logical, but I felt like I needed to say it. Jump UP and OFF the platform, don’t EVER try to come down through it, not even if he’s blocking (That’s a trap and a half)

Edgeguarding

Aight kool, you got marth off the stage, now what? Don’t sweat it, he’s not superman off the stage. That’s not to be confused with him having a bad recovery. Not only does he have a good recovery, he can protect himself WELL on recovery .(which imo is actually more important for people who don’t have perks on their recoveries like m2)

Marth’s 2 main tools for protecting himself are going to be f.airs and side-b’s, more specifically f.airs. If he thinks you’re going to come out there and hit him, he’s gunna f.air. He’s got more options, but it’s not broke, so he’s not going to fix it.

If he has to make a lengthy recovery, feel free to start out with pills. ESPECIALLY if he has to/you think he is going to come in low. Pills aren’t going to completely break his recovery, but worst case scenario you’re tacking on damage. DJ (full double jump, not iDJ) pills, jump OFF THE STAGE and pill, not in his face but out to put pills further out. You can put some pills out there for him to work around.

With that being said, you have 4 routes for going out and hitting him. You have to either trick him into swinging early (or NOT swinging) so you can hit him in the face, come from above with some $mashmac d.air shenanigans, or you have to try to get under him. Under him will sound scary for obvious reasons (although it’s actually NOT if you know what signs to look for, which is him already using his double jump), and above is on that $mac outside of the box logic, so go with the front, mostly. ^_^

At this point, you’re trying to time him doing a side-b so you can b.air him in the face. If he’s not willing (read: dumb enough) to bite, you can try to play quick draw with him and go b.air vs Marth f.air. The worst that happens in this scenario is he f.airs you back onto the stage and recovers. If you’re ok with that, feel free to try.

If that’s not your cup of tea, you can try to take the ledge. Do all sorts of fakes and try to get him and go low and sweetspot. Jump out, cape, jump back; jump out, pill, jump back; waveland off the stage into shenanigans, you just want to scare him into going low and sweetspotting. Get on the ledge in time though, if you’re late, he’s gunna SRK you just like you would him.

If he’s going to up+b on the stage, you have a few ways to mess with this as well. If you’re on the stage, you can cape if and only if he’s actually going to up+b past the ledge (which is why it’s in this section. XD). You can also CC d.smash, which is a little harder to do, but you can actually do a grimy trick by facing backwards and CCing (This gives the illusion that you’re looking to WD onto the ledge which you can sell EVEN MORE by wavedashing in place. Dogy’s dumb audio tricks version 2). If you’re on the ledge, you can ledgedrop a cape as he comes up. You can also do the “Death to Marth” lightshield edgehog. If you’re going to try this, make sure marth actually has to sweetspot as opposed to f.airing and moving you off the ledge (although you could let him f.air you on the ledge, and then ledgedrop a b.air USING BACK, NOT DOWN, DOWN WILL KILL YOU OH GOD)

BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY, IF HE’S GOING TO UP+B ON THE STAGE AND YOU’RE ON THE LEDGE, YOU CAN JUST LET HIM UP+B, HOP UP, AND KNOCK HIM OFF AGAIN. Marth’s up+b is punishable, and if he’s up+bin onto the stage, it’s not a success until he gets control again. A lot of people DON’T do this for whatever reason, but it’s so good. You can actually fish for some dumb gimmicks (such as the reverse. You’re on the left side of the stage? F.smash him towards the right. It makes no sense logically, but logic says you should be DIing so you don’t go off the left again. What happens when you catch somebody DIing like that? (Which is then HORRID DI?) Ridiculously good on small stages)

The one thing you have to watch for in all of this is marth’s double jump. If he still has his double jump, he’s liable to DJ d.air you if he calls you. THAT’S DEVASTATING. He’s also got other nonsense that works, but that’s more of a player-by-player basis instead of the norm.


Recovery

When Marth gets you off the stage, it’s yet another situation where you have to pray. I really could sum up all of the recovery sections by saying “just practice all sorts of options, pick one, get on your knees, and pray to God your opponent does something stupid.”

Let me start with this and actually put some real meat in this section. If you float somewhere dumb, Marth can get to you. If you want to be in the same spot behind pills, he can ledgehop a b.air at you (Hell, he could just BAIR through it if he wants to), if you’re floating above the edge like a genius, he can d.tilt or F.SMASH! You can’t go above Marth, you’re Doc.

You also have to be mindful for d.air traps. If he throws you off the stage at a low %, DI AWAY so you don’t get tipped, and then don’t be so quick to up+b back. If you can catch him kool, but if he’s planning or waiting for it, he can either WD onto the ledge into a d.air (planning) or F.SMASH! (waiting). Or if you try to up+b past the ledge, he can just counter the **** up+b. (He can actually counter A LOT of stuff in your recovery)

OK! SO WITH ALL THAT ASIDE! I PRESENT TO YOU! DOGY’S TOP 7 “LOL MARTH WHY YOU GOTTA HATE” ANTI DOC EDGEGUARDS!


#7 – The FH Gate Breaker FROM DOWNTOWN! With a pill in his face!
#6 – Dropzone SHORYUKEN!
#5- The M2K Side-B-Palooza!
#4 – Momentum Boosted Counter vs Pill!
#3- The Countered Up+B Stage Spike!
#2 –The Darton Down-Air! (Ledgehop Side-B -> D.air. Shoutouts to Loud John)
#1 - The Mid-Air Side-B Suicide Spike of Justice

My point in this is that, well, Marth can LITERALLY have a field day on Doc’s recovery. You just have to pick a route, adjust accordingly, and prepare for the worst.

Getting into Marth!
It sucks. You have to do all sorts of things to get in on Marth. There are a few ways to go about it, but nothing is guaranteed. Here are some things to try out.

First and foremost, you can make him freeze up or jump if you throw ground pills at him. He can poke at them easy, and you can come in behind them with a n.air. However, the default answer for him is probably going to be to do an aerial. This is something to look for. If you see him going up, run in and just take the hit somehow. CC if possible, but if not, shield it.

Obviously, you can’t do this all the time or else he’s going to start doing retreating n.airs ALL the time, and you just get positioning. But, you can let him back up and start the process again (so long as you’re staying far enough to where he can’t do anything.) Catching him jumping also means you can dash attack in, although you have to slide pretty deep to get in.

Once you get him looking for pills, you can periodically just RUN in and defend. The key to know is that unless Marth is going to defend as you come in, you HAVE to defend. You don’t always have to pill, but you want him to think that’s the only time you’re looking to come in.

As you start knocking him around, then you have to just start messing with him. A lot of times when you try to jump in on a tech, they look to u.tilt. Don’t jump in. If you try to run in after an u.air juggle and you’re not going to make it in time, they’ll try to tilt or f.smash. Don’t run in. Now, if you’ve been keeping up with the guide, you should know that all of that IS punishable. That’s what I’m getting at. If you know it’s coming it’s punishable, but if you’re not there to begin with, you’re going to scare them into throwing it there’s a chance you won’t be there. When you get them to stop throwing the sword out (or just to hesitate), that’s when you get to take MORE. That’s when D.smash punishes on Marth F.smash turns into u.smash punish, that’s when tilt punishes on marth’s F.tilt turns into grab punishes, and that’s when you start being able to see d.tilts and jump them with a f.air.

If you can’t beat em, scare em. That way, you have a better hope at beatin’ em.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
- Marth SH Side-B: Something that like, NO Marth does now, but it’s pretty possible. Ridiculously safe move out of shield and it allows him all sorts of options since he can wavedash, fair, double jump, or do other stuff afterwards. Infact, I imagine mentioning this will make just a little more widespread.

- Walking Marth: Note 1: Marth, at full speed, moves as fast as Doc running (No lie). Note 2: Marth walking at you is one of the worst things you (or just about ANY character) can let happen. When he’s walking, he’s got –easy- access to ANY move in his arsenal. The gimmick to this comes from his range. He’s got more leeway in when he has to attack (as opposed to you trying this, where you’d have to walk deep as hell to be able to do anything). The trick to avoiding this is to move back as you see him walking up. It sounds dumb easy reading it, but you’ll be surprised how often this happens.

-Marth Falling U.air: If for any reason you ever expect this, duck it. Marth has to be jacked up on you for it to hit, and if he tries to do Falling u.air -> u.tilt, you can just duck the u.tilt too.

-Marth’s Platform game: Don’t be on platforms vs Marth. That’s like telling you the sky is blue; if you didn’t already know that, you’ve got problems. With that being said, you have to watch for some STUPID gimmicks vs Marth if you wind up on a platform. The obvious is u.tilts and u.airs through the platform. But you have to watch for crazy stuff like falling-through-platform u.airs, delayed u.airs, side-b -> double jump shenanigans, side-b resets, and all sorts of stuff. Just, be ready and know that it’s not over till you’re back on the ground with him.

-Marth Reverse Up+b: When Marth Up+b’s, the initial tipper sweetspot is behind him. So basically, if he’s in shield and you’re behind you, he’s liable to up+b, and if you’re not ready you die. Just keep that in the back of your mind.

-Marth Corner Throw setup: Marth grabs you at low %, d.throws you to the edge (not off the stage, not to the ledge, just the “corner” of the stage. You realistically have to pick the lesser of 2 evils at this point. You’re either going to tech in place/tech away (if he spaced right, both of those will be the same) or you’re going to tech in (which is towards Marth). If you tech in place, you’re getting d.tilted off the stage. If you tech into Marth, he’s gunna grab you and do it again. That’s the generic scenario for this setup; Marth can take more options depending on how brave he is and how scared you are.

003 Sheik
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 4-6 Sheik
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 40-60 Sheik
The General Consensus: 30-70 Sheik (lolwut? Probably 20-80, 10-90, or impossible XD)
The General Flow

Don’t. Press. Buttons.

Like, not literally, but Sheik is THE character that will “**** the bad habits out of you”-Lambchops.

Sheik is another one of those different matchups, but what’s odd is that most people never realize it until it’s too late (Me included). Sheik is kind of like a hurricane in that she’s fast, painful, and you probably are going to have to move the f*** out of the way, but understand that you are not completely helpless in this matchup. This is just THE matchup where you’re forced to do the right stuff because pretty much everything a sheik player would NORMALLY think to do works. (Now, when I say that, I mean the obvious. If a sheik player wants to f.tilt, it’s something that could work. Same with the other tilts, a few smashes, any aerial, etc etc. But you run across a ****** who wants to chain all day? Yeah sheik isn’t THAT dumb-easy)

Anyway, this matchup is pretty much going to be you on edge at all times. Although you get by a lot of Sheik’s nonsense as Doc, you always have to watch out for the default Sheik gimmicks that lead to big damage. IF YOU DON’T KNOW HOW TO, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, WORK ON BUFFER ROLLING AND BUFFER SPOTDODGING. If you can’t, you’re pretty much sunk unless you have some ridiculous ability to control sheik.


Offense

N.air and F.tilt. Unless you have a SPECIFIC goal that you’re aiming for, those are the only 2 things you even need to think about. Those are the 2 moves you have that, by default, are least likely to get you hit. Now more than ever.

You try to start any stupid s*** and sheik’s gunna abbreviate it real quick. So you have to have a purpose with what you do.

Starting with your long range, Pills aren’t completely out of the equation. They NEVER are out of the problem. The thing you have to understand is that if sheik throws 2 needles, she’s cutting through your pill (one) and the second one is coming for you. So that means you can’t get too predictable with where you’re going. You’re allow to throw as many pills as you want so long as you can maintain good spacing and not end up in needle lanes (or attack range if you are close to sheik). It really doesn’t matter what you get sheik to do in this as she’s a character who, if done right, can defend against all of your offensive options behind a pill. The thing you’re looking for is any kind of pattern. That, or the patterns you can guess at.

Beyond that, all you really have to do is avoid hanging too close to sheik in general. No matter what you’re starting, if you’re not careful about what you’re doing, sheik can turn it around with a random jab, tilt, or aerial. You don’t really want to lay on the offense unless you’ve managing to keep sheik in her shield. AND EVEN THEN SHE’S STILL GOT SOME GOOD STUFF GOING.

If you can get her to stand still long enough, you want to look for a grab. Grabs against sheik are great, seeing as you can chaingrab the mess out of her (or atleast take easy guaranteed damage). Understand that you have to run PRETTY DEEP on sheik to land a grab, and she can wavedash back -> jab to put stop you.

Inspite of what kinds of crazy ideas you may have, you’ve just got to be ready to put the brakes on and stop what you’re doing.


Defense

Defending against Sheik is crazy. Not so much because of how much pressure she can put on at much, but because of when and where she can do it. Something into jab, needles, b.airs, when I think about it, the ONLY two things you really don’t have to defend against at all are her side-b and her down-b. AND HONESTLY, SHEIK DOWN-B’ING ISN’T EXACTLY A BAD OPTION AGAINST DOC. XD

The first thing, and the most important thing you need to realize about defense vs sheik, is that you CANNOT rely on hanging out attacks. If you’re going to do that, they have to be well placed and have a good purpose. If you try to mindlessly WoP, Double u.air, D.air, any of that nonsense, Sheik’s slapping it. You throw a tilt in the wrong place, sheik’s gunna slap that too.

She’s kinda like melee’s Itouch. “You gunna do something stupid? We got a slap for that.”

Ok, with the “stupid” decisions out of the way, now you’ve got to straight up defend yourself. Anytime you’re on the ground, you have to be ready to avoid a grab. Roll, spotdodge, jump, whatever you’re going to do, you just don’t want to get grabbed. It’s not the end of the world if you do get grabbed (infact, you get off EASY compared to a lot of the cast), but you just don’t want it happening. Now, I say consider jumping, and you’re thinking “Wait, why would I jump? I’m just gunna get slapped.” That’s right you’re JUST gunna get slapped. You let her grab you, and she’s going to throw you (probably down), f.tilt you, and THEN slap you. So why go further into debt than you need to?

Jumping sets up the next thing you need to look for, you need to look for sheik hanging around YOUR area. Now, you have to look past the scary figure of disjointedness and understand that sheik isn’t invulnerable. You’re just looking for holes you’re not used to. One thing you HAVE to hone in on is Sheik’s jumping around your area. You could see all sorts of variants. FH Double slaps, SH slap, n.air, b.air(s), whatever. You’ve got to watch your spacing and be prepared to jump out and n.air/u.air to stop sheik from doing more bs than she’s really allowed to do.

The next place you have to really worry about is on the ground. Sheik on the ground…. Is Sheik; she’s a threat. You’ve got to be ready to contest tilts and jabs. In general, the ground is actually one of sheik’s weakest parts of her attack, because once she throws SOMETHING out here, it’s going to be the end of it and the start of something new. Your goal is to try to set yourself up to keep the new from happening. Force misspacing, punish tilts (and stupid smashes), or place yourself to deal with sheik’s next move. There’s no golden tip I can give you to make this magically work, you just have to be ready and willing to attack.

The one thing I CAN tell you is to keep in mind that you can CC. CCing vs sheik is good, so long as you can call or create bad spacing. Run in CC, Wavedash in CC (which is kinda hard), whatever it takes. At some point and time, you can CC everything sheik has except needles. So with that, if you can get in deep enough, you can actually punish something such as a f.air with your own d.smash. Again, it’s not easy, but it’s something to mix in. (For the record, you also can’t CC Sheik’s Down+B. Think about it)

All in all, defense is what’s going to win you games vs sheik. But it’s the one thing that’s hard to see against sheik. Everything gets mashed into one thin terroristic collaboration of hitboxes and nonsense.


Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding sheik. …-rolls eyes-.

Make her up+b. If you can do that, you’re pretty much done and you just have to not drop the ball. The first thing you have to understand is that you really can’t attack sheik off stage, … she’s got a slap for that. Like, if you want to get bold, you can try to go out there and n.air, and that MIGHT work (might literally meaning maybe. It is smash we’re talking about.) But like, if you want to go out there and b.air? Oooohhwwee good luck and god speed.

Now, when you get her to up+b, you’ve just got to stay kool and keep knocking her off the stage. Sheik’s up+b has horrible landing lag, and there’s like, NO way she’s going to do edge cancel tricks. So you just have to look for dumb gimmicks. Explosion attacks, which you beat by keeping your invincibility; up+b’ing straight up, which you hold the ledge for; or going on the stage, which you hop up and send her back off (you want to send her FAR so she has to do it again.) In terms of attack priority, you’re looking at f.smash > d.smash > b.air > b.throw - D.TILT (you’re welcome 18s) > f.throw, in response to how much time you have AND how far you’re looking to send them. If you’ve got the kill, you want to take your ledgehop f.air, dunk, or f.smash.

Beyond that, there’s really nothing to edgeguarding sheik beyond the norm. Watch for airdodges if she’s close, and if she gets the ledge, BACK THE F*** UP N****. If you don’t or cant, be ready for something of the ledge, it’s probably going to be a f.air, but you could catch something crazy like a d.air if they call a spotdodge.


Recovery

Oof.

I mean, it’s like, … oof.

Uuuuum. Needles are hilarious. Save your cape for crossing “the lines”. The lines being the horizontal straight off the stage (or platform), or THE HUGE FRICKING ANGLE KNOWN AS SHEIK’S JUMP HEIGHT. The first thing you have to do is just be ready to cross either one of these. If you think sheik’s gunna throw needles, have a pill ready and cape behind it (meaning you want to save your cape). This’ll kill all of the needles, while still keeping you on track. However, if you get caught by like, ONE needle, start thinkin bout your next stock or praying to whatever higher being you pray to.

Beyond that, you have to worry about getting into range of…… sheik. Do something stupid, she’s got a slap for that. And believe me, a sheik player has no problem hopping off stage and throwing aerials when they need to. It’s like, in their nature.

Like everybody else, you want to keep sheik off the ledge. If she gets the ledge, you pretty much can’t go low or you’re going to die. Like, Sheik COULD do the right thing, let you up+b on the stage, and then throw you off again (And when sheik throws you off, it’s with that low *** b.throw, so it’s still a GOOD option). But what’ll probably happen is she’ll just ledgedrop b.air you, whiiiiiiiiiiich is you dying. So, try not to let her get the ledge.

Beyond that, you just have to not do stupid stuff. Don’t go so close she actually lands a d.smash, don’t let the forkgirl edgeguard actually work (chain edgeguard), don’t get hit with double explosion. I mean, I tell you all this, but I know you’re Doc. You can’t really help it once you get out there. But, just try.

Actually, I take that back. You better not let the Forkgirl happen. If it comes to it, keep ****ing up+bing till you punch that sheik in the jaw if they try that. Look at em, and say “Worth it.”


Raiding Fort Sheik

Attacking sheik is f***ing scary. But unless you have the lead, you have to do it. And when you have to, Sheik doesn’t have to try hard to make it a living hell for you. Here’s some things to look for.

If she goes on a platform, this is obviously annoying to deal with. You’ve got to first get in without getting pinned up with needles. You can either cape the needles, dash under them, or n.air around them. The two things you DON’T want to do is get hit (duh ) or shield. You’re actually ok to take a hit or shield like, one or two needles, but you don’t want the full needle storm. That’s when trouble starts.

If you do get hit, expect sheik to come down with like, f.airs and n.airs and crap. If you get her to come down then you… sorta win? I mean, you got her down, but she came down on her terms and now you’ve got to avoid getting the crap beat out of you for knocking on her front door. –Bad End, start the adventure over.

Not getting hit is kool, but it’s not the end. She might come down anyway, but if you can actually drop down and CC something, then you might get to hit her. However, she might opt to keep jumping around on the platform, as it’s still safe. You DON’T want to jump up there with her. This is where you get to do more choose your own adventure.

You could either sit under the platform, time her as she lands, and make ONE poke at her with some aerial. The pros from that is that you’re less likely to get scooped up by a d.air or slapped away. The con is if she knows you’re going to sit there, she can go around and put a b.air on you, and THEN run. *shakes fist*

The other alternative is YOU CAN HOP ON THAT N.AIR AND KEEP POPPIN THROUGH LIKE A SHARK YAYHUZZ. Doing this keep sheik on her toes as she has to constantly keep jumping or else get hit by like, a half charged n.air (You can replace n.airs with the occasional u.air so that you don’t always poke THROUGH the platform). The con for this is that you’re poking through the platform; that’s asking sheik to hit you if she can time it.

There is a plan X, but it’s actually hard to setup. Plan X is getting on a platform ABOVE her and throwing pills at her. If you can get yourself into this situation, then it’s auto win for you, she’s got to start swinging at random pills or move the hell out the way. The ONLY thing that sucks about this is if you want to drone on with pills and she comes around and slaps you for it. That’s real easy to solve, you just fade back as she comes in. You STILL have to watch for her to come in and slap you though (it’s really a 2 action phrase on your part, but sheik sees it as “I’m off the platform -> I’m running under him -> I’m going to slap him).

Once you get her off the platform, you’ve got the schematics for what needs to happen. You just have to be ready for the quick turnarounds of her going on and off the platforms.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Sheik U.Tilt: If it finishes, it’s completely safe. Don’t try to punish it or you’ll get hit with something else.

Sheik Grab Nonsense: Sheik MAY have like, one regrab at low%, and that’s really ALL the BS she can possibly do. No chaingrabs, no guaranteed tech chases, nothing. If she gets a grab, she’s either going to get a tilt’n’slap, a straight slap, or some other aerial (i.e. u.air). Anything beyond that, and you’re LETTING it happen. Understand that the most common thing that you’ll “let happen” is an u.smash. I don’t be mad at you if you let that happen, as you should be respecting a f.air. But like, if you let some super dumb **** happen, that’s on you.



004 Falco
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 50-50 Even
The General Consensus: 40-60 Falco
The General Flow

Lane changing.

That’s the BIGGEST scrub killer falco has. Can you handle his lasers? If you can’t, you better hope you’re playing one of those wack Falcos who forgot to pick up the extra clips.

This matchup is all about you either controlling or moving out of Falco’s lane. Unlike most characters, you can actually control a bit of area, as well as stop him from shooting from time to time, but it’s not simple.

Beyond that, you just have to be able to deal with spanimal pressure. Fend off some aerials, go toe-to-toe with some shines, the general stuff. Oh, and you gotta avoid getting the everlasting yayhuzz comboed out of you. It’s really not HORRID, you just need to look out for combo starters.

If you can get past all that, you’ve got hope. I won’t say you’re scot free because I mean, you’re fricking Doc. You’ve got stuff you can do and all, but most of your follow-ups involve putting falco in the one place he loves. Being above people ready to d.air them to mess with him (U C WUT I DID THAR?) It’s really not (horribly) lopsided in terms of what position you want to take. You just have to be able to create the space you need behind the lasers.

Offense

Ok, attacking Falco is pretty hard. It’s not hard to actually do the act of an attack, but it’s so hard to get into position because of the obvious lasers. So with that being said, don’t ever go into a situation with a set plan of “I’m going to attack” that could get changed real quick with one slight hesitation or misstep.

So the first area you probably will be able to attack from is from long range, with pills (duh). Now, understand that it’ll be **** near impossible to attack falco STRAIGHT from pills. That being because he can outjump you easy, and he can move and keep a stream of lasers going to prevent you from setting him up exactly like you want. However, you still want to try and pill him to in an attempt to either make him stop shooting lasers, or make him move around your pill.

Beyond that, you’re actually not going to be doing any specific mid or short range attacking. Falco is not a character to really stay set for any reason, and because of how he operates, you’ll REALLY be paying attention to high/low.

With that being said, if you want to approach from the air, you’re probably going to n.air. N.air is your safety net for not knowing wtf to do. The only other aerial you even want to consider a “naked” approach with is some variation of a u.air. Either one of those set you up for a pretty strong mixup op upon block, or they allow for some follow-ups on hit. Every other aerial you may use have to be used for specific purposes, normally for defense (b.air or d.air), or if you get some sort of a safe jump (f.airing a tech or f.airing any “forced’ landing).

Staying low is obvious going to require you to run deeper if you want offensive rewards, but Doc’s small size actually adds some benefits to trying this approach. First and foremost, understand that you can’t rule out dash attack at this point. It’s obviously not great to throw out ALL the time, but it does make Doc approach in a tech crouch, which is **** good for getting under falco’s lasers. Forces falco to shoot near perfectly SHFF Lasers, in which case when he’s trained to do so you can start SHing over those free. Other than dash attacks, you’re looking to make your way in, stay low, and just lay into him.


Defense


Defending against Falco is obviously THE thing that trips people up, as you will hear time and time again. If it’s not his lasers, it’s his borderline-abuseable aerisl that will just be the completely bane of your existence. But fear not! You actually can deal with Falco’s onslaught, you just need some heads up for what you’re looking for.

First and foremost, you have lasers. Now, there’s going to be a section later telling you what all you could do specific against lasers themselves. What you need to understand right now is that when Falco starts approaching with lasers, you need to control when he can come in (with Pills, usually FH to get over lasers), and then actually defend against his aerials.


Although falco is somewhat fast (he’s really not, just looks it behind the lasers and with the shine), you need to understand that he can’t cover horizontal very quickly. That means that if you keep a decent distance away from falco, he’s not going to magically warp over to you and start landing d.airs on your shield like a Fox would. So the first step to defending against Falco is to actually defend when you need to.

If you start throwing attacks too early, that’s when he comes in jumping behind you with d.airs and whatnot. So unless you’re trying to maintain space with aerials (n.air u.air and b.air, normally), you don’t want to go crazy throwing aerials all day.

Understand that, because you need to be ready for Falco to come in, you don’t always have to do an aerial when you jump. It’s perfectly acceptable to empty hop. Especially now, when misplacing a f.air will put you in shield as falco comes in. You want to avoid that as much as possible.

However, it can’t exactly be helped sometimes. Falco can come in on your shield. You want to reduce collateral damage and get out as safe as possible, maybe net some damage in the process. If falco hits your shield with an aerial, the ONE thing you can’t do is have a habit. Now, you never want to have a habit against ANYBODY (unless it’s a habit that involves you winning), but Falco is a character who can throw out a large number of attacks and cover options very rapidly. With that being said, you can’t always default to “oh, I’m gunna roll when he d.airs my shield” for the obvious he’s going to punish the roll, but you also can’t look for something such as “I’m going to u.smash OoS because he’s going to bait it.” –Looks at Shroomed. XD

You have things you can do, if he d.airs past you, you can wavedash OoS or jump away from him with a b.air, you can try to block him from coming in with n.airs u.air and d.airs, you COULD roll or spotdodge, you could just jump to avoid grabs or shines, you could stay in shield to avoid jump punishers, you could up+b to cut off further pressure, YOU HAVE OPTIONS. The thing is, you really CANNOT afford to have a habit in this situation.

Realistically, defending against Falco isn’t as bad as people make it out to be, it’s just scary because if you get hit with something major (read: a d.air or shine, normally), it leads to a good chunk of damage. It’s not that you CAN’T stop him from raining down you, you just have to be willing to try a variety of things that work rather than defaulting to a few “safe” options that really aren’t safe at all.

Edgeguarding

Watch for his up+b. If for whatever reason you call or force him to up+b, he should be dead. That’s just a golden rule to keep in mind about falco. Unlike fox, Falco’s up+b has no hitbox on startup, so IT’S PERFECTLY SAFE TO JUMP OUT THERE AND HIT HIM IF HE’S UP+BING.

Ok, so with that being said, when you get falco off the stage, you have to kinda go through “the flowchart” of stopping as spanimal recovery.

The first thing you have to look for a falco illusion on the stage, all stemming from Falco having a second jump. To stop this option, you want to try and jump before them (if you think they’re going to double jump), or fall into them if you think they’re going to fall. When you get to either place, you’re looking to n.air or b.air. If you’re on the stage, you’re looking to f.tilt (or n.air /b.air if they’re going over you.) If they’re trying to sweetspot, you could edgehog if you called it and have time, or you can try to f.tilt or cape. Cape works because it reaches below the stage and illusion is one of the moves you can actually knock somebody out of (read: cause hitstun with). More-often-than-not, if you catch him in an illusion he’s going to fall below the ledge, when you would jump out, hit him and be done.

If you block the options of the first wave and falco DOESN’T illusion into anything, you still have to look for him to illusion, if he’s still above the stage, or you want to be ready to jump out and stop and up+b. Just be ready to waveland off and do something if need be.


Recovery

When you’re far away, he’s going to shoot lasers, when you get in close, he’s going to look to ledgehop something, trick you into coming onto the stage and b.airing you off, or edgehogging you.

Throw pills like you always do to try to move him where you want him, try to avoid an edgeguard if possible.

I don’t know why I have a specific section for every character. IT’S ALL THE SAME CONCEPT, REALLY.

Roadkill

First, go read Fox’s Shine-On Section (FOXS!!!), same rules apply to falco.

This, however, is about his lasers. Don’t be afraid of lasers. You, as Doc, have MANY more tools for dealing with lasers than most other characters. The thing you have to understand is, unlike “the current meta”, your strongest position to fight lasers tends to be on the ground. That’s not to say don’t ever jump over them, because you can jump over and f.air if Falco is stupid. However, you can do a lot to start and maintain control if you stay on the ground, caping, pilling, and sliding.

There’s nothing I can really say that will make dealing with lasers easier. I mean, I’ve read all sorts of laser guide, I’ve seen all sorts of strats from practically EVERY character, and I myself have (imo) an above average laser game with Falco (and ONLY laser game, cause I mean, I love projectiles and stupid gimmicks). I however, am not so hot at dealing with them.

The problem I run into is being too one track minded. It’s like “I don’t want to cape cause he’ll stop it.” Or “I’m going to jump when he comes in.” I’m not too great at literally mixing what I’m going to do.

I also suck at moving through platforms. That is one thing that I KNOW is great against Falco’s lasers.

I do, however, have a generic *** “flowchart” for lasers vs cape, and it always pans out the same. The end result is you ALWAYS have to respect lasers, Falco realistically NEVER has to respect your cape.

Goes like this. Falco starts filming Star Wars, you get mad so you start caping. If it’s a good Falco, he’s going to shoot LESS lasers, making them more sporadic and in harder-to-spots. He’s also going to set himself up to jump over your cape. A BAD falco is either going to continue shooting lasers like a ****** or he’s going to stop all together. In the event you’ve landed a good Falco, now caping is a liability because he could either fake a laser or he could jump it and punish you. If it’s a bad Falco, He’s eventually going to start doing dumb **** like shining (which he’ll just waveshine out of), or he’s going to periodically start and stop shooting 5 million lasers.

In the end, you ALWAYS have to look for Falco shooting lasers, but he really doesn’t HAVE to look for you caping. It’s interesting.

There are plenty of ways to deal with laser though. You can.

1) Random take hits: If you do this, Falco realistically NEVER knows if it’s safe to go in unless he spaces correctly. There’s very little stun on a laser, so unless he’s jacked up in your face, you have enough time to jump and n.air upon taking the hit.
2) Shield: Kinda obvious, gotta jump out afterwards.
3) Jump around the lasers: You don’t specifically have to throw pills or aerials, but this keeps you from being locked in shield as he comes in.
4) Roll / Spotdodge: this isn’t really for the laser as it is for the approach that comes behind it. You gotta make sure that he’s actually GOING to approach behind it or else you’re getting punished.
5) Cape: You can’t really follow it up (even with Capedashing), but it allows you to throw one (or two) lasers back at him, and then move for a little bit afterwards. One kool thing to keep in mind is that you can reverse cape, so you can keep your b.air ready.
6) Pill: If he’s mid/long range, you can actually try paying little-to-no regard to lasers and throw pills. Sounds crazy but think about it, getting hit by a few lasers is like, 10 damage, getting hit by ONE pill is like 12.
7) Duck: Makes it to where he has to shoot close-to-perfect SHFF Lasers, and that opens up your ability to SH over them.
8) Dash attack: Lower than your crouch. Thing that sucks is that it’s not long range like Marth/Roys/Peach/Sheik. :/ It is low though, so that’s pretty kool.

There’s more, and you can always mix and match. That’s what you’re going for actually, the shake’n’bake. So they have no clue what you’re really TRYING to do. You just need to keep an eye out for all of your options and not just go with the easy mac shielding. That…. Is bad.



Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Falco’s Shine: Is like Fox’s in that he obviously can jump out of it and turn around. So basically, know that he can pretty much turn around and b.air at will. Some dumb gimmicks from shine you’ll have to look for are.

-Shine -> U.smash: Falco sits in shine, reflecting stuff. Seems harmless till you try to run in, and then he JC upsmashes. Hardly used (Only person I know of who uses it is Alternate275) but if you’re not looking for it, you could just run into an upsmash.

-Shine->Grab: Pressure tactic. If –spanimal- expects you to stay in shield after a shine, rather than moving away or wearing on your shield, they could just JC grab you. This means you have to be willing to roll away from or jump out from shines.

-Double Shine: Prevents you from trying to punish a shine.

Edgecancelled illusion: Usually used for fast movement across a stage, if you’re mindlessly standing under the edgecancel, it will lead to aerials in your face.


005 Peach
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 45-55 Peach
The General Consensus: 50-50 Even
The General Flow

Moooooooove b****!


*Quick note: FC = Float Cancelled*

Playing Peaches will be fairly annoying to you, not because they have any crazy advantage or anything, but it seems like they’re just in the way of everything you want to do. It’s weird, too, because it’s not like they can chase you down or anything, but they’re just always there, hovering over your every move (sometimes literally), just waiting for you to f*** up.

That’s pretty much how everything is going to go in a nutshell, Peach is just an animated wall. She’s, in large, fairly immobile and not agile at all, but you’ll be hard pressed to actually move AROUND her. All she really wants is to keep pushing till you’re off the stage, at which point you’re pretty much screwed.

You’re goal in this matchup is to basically be annoying as hell. Run and throw pills, n.air and d.air to disrupt her stuff, keep her in shield, just be a jerk. You can’t specifically BULLY her around, per say, because hanging around too long will result in you catching FC aerials, which is the LAST thing you want to deal with coming from Peach. You really just need to keep moving and make her do real work to hit you.

Peach has all sorts of problems hitting a moving target, so long as you’re not moving like a ******.

Offense

Continuing on with horrible Dogy puns, the best way to think of this matchup is a fly vs a flyswatter; the fly is obviously annoying all the way down to his presence in the room, and he’s fairly hard to hit with a flyswatter, but when he finally gets hit, it’s one of the most satisfying things in the world (for the flyswatter).

… anyway.

My point in all this is that one of the keys to your offense is to be very varied with your movement. It’s one thing that Peach is praying to whatever God she chooses that you’ll stay in one spot, she’d be perfectly content if you attacked her with simple movements. In short, you don’t want to be so hasty to go in at the first chance you get, especially if she’s swingin’ to keep you out.

It’s so easy to fall into a pattern and want to make the same approaches. The problem with doing this against Peach is that THAT’S ALL SHE’S REALLY GOT. She’s not going to chase you down (unless it’s XiF, I swear his Peach wears Nikes), but if you ever let her do so much as put an FC aerial on your shield, you’re goin through hell just to make it out.

So first and foremost, when you’re long range at pills, POUR ON THEM S***S! Again, Peach is fairly immobile and not agile, so throwing pills at her is going to do more than piss her off, it’s actually going to make her disrupt a lot of her game. Although Peach is capable of getting around pills, it’s hard for her to do it, maintain space, and be prepared to defend against your attacks LIKE SHE WANTS TO. Now that’s not to say that you throwing pills is going to make her helpless, that’s never the case with any character. However, Peach is one where you can place pills to make her use a weaker defense than she really wants to. She’s the kind of character you can shoot out of positioning if you so well please, so feel free to do it as you see fit.

When you close a little distance, you need to be ready for a lot of CCs. Peach is a character who’s real content with taking a hit just to CC downsmash you, or CC grab if she’s quick enough. You really don’t want to mess around with too much at mid range as your useful offensive tools (namely your f.tilt) requires you to be stationary. It’s ok if you know it’s going to go through, but if you’re looking to actually attack and not sure if it will hit, opt to keep moving rather than take a standing shot at her.

If you’re moving in from midrange, know that n.air and d.air are great. If you jump in with a d.air, that will stop A LOT of peach’s moves, all aerials included. You just have to make sure you actually HAVE the d.air going before you get there. N.air is good for its default air-to-air use, but you run the risk of trading or losing to range by throwing out. You don’t want either one of these to get blocked, so if you know a shield is coming, SHFFL a late u.air or n.air, try some tricky, or move out of the way.

When you arrive at the doors of fort peach, yooooou really don’t want to stay there too long. If you don’t have Peach scared, then you’re liable to catching all sorts of bad stuff. Although you’d think jabbing would be a fairly good idea (although it’s never great cause Doc’s jab isn’t great), Peach is again a character who really likes to CC. Up close, you’re asking for the obvious d.smash, so try not to jab unless you’re stopping a move or you know she’s trying to jump. All in all, you really don’t want to hang around too long, just try to land an attack or two, if you fail, get out.

As you’re putting pressure on Peach, you really want to keep an eye out for a roll. Peach has a lot of –mechanic- reasons to roll, her wavedash is fairly short, her roll is fairly quick, yada yada. So don’t be too surprised if you see Peach roll away from you. Don’t ever assume it’ll be the default answer, there’s only one character in the whole game that really relies on rolling, but just understand that Peach is a character who will roll a little more than average.

At all times, you are looking for ONE green light to run in. If you can ever call Peach pulling a turnip, you’re ok-a-go-go to run in and put pressure on her, especially if you can keep her on the ground. Although peach is the ONLY character who still has access to her aerials while holding a turnip (by way of FCing), she still CANT grab, and she CANT d.smash (along with all of her ground normals). So if you find a mindless Peach who periodically does unsafe pulls, RUSH THAT.

As for another special note, if peach is ever on a platform, go around her or wait for the d.smash. It’s coming, you just have to wait. If you’re playing one of the 5 peach players in the world who just refuse to d.smash on the platform, …. Your *** still better not jump cause they’ll do it too. WAIT FOR THAT D.SMASH OR GO AROUND HER.

All in all, you want to just keep moving. Keep your attacks coming from different angles, different timings, the whole 9 yards. You don’t really want to sit and try to wail on peach. The obvious answer is because you can’t, but if she knows you’re coming in she’s probably going to n.air or b.air and just put a stop to it. Constantly moving forces her to make a fairly good read to get you to stop (so long as you’re moving in the right places).

Defense

Defending against Peach is really a simple concept but a hard practice. Run away. You obviously don’t want to RELY on running away because you give up too much, but you want to move out of her range as much as possible. She’s Peach, she’s going to have a hard time chasing you down (I mean have you ever tried running in heels?) So, your default defense should involve movement. Wavedashing away, jump away, aerial away, etc etc. The more aways you to Peach, the harder it becomes for her to put a constant stream of pressure on you.

Obligatory CC statement here. Seriously though, people make it sound like you NEVER want to CC peach, which is a horrible horrible misconception. There is a lot of stuff that you can and NEED to CC vs peach (i.e. her jabs), but the one thing you have to avoid is being predictable with when you’ll CC. That’s when you get downsmashed, and that’s when you lose 50% to one move.

And, if you’re brave enough to stand toe-to-toe with her, it’s not exactly too hard for her to put pressure on you. The best thing she’s got is FC aerials, and they’re pretty frickin good. You realistically can’t punish ANYTHING that’s FC’d, so the best way to avoid it is to not let her put one on your shield. That meaaaaaaans you move. Obviously we’re not all perfect (unless our opponent is that bad), so the inevitable is going to happen. When it does, you’re playing rock, paper, scissors at that point. You want to move or else she’s going to do it again (jumping out with a n.air is a perfectly viable option), but you can’t do what she’s guessing at, and she can actually cover everything. You try to jump, she can jump and n.air, she can jab to keep you from wavedashing out, run after your rolls, etc etc. All of this can stem from ANY of her FC aerials, so don’t think you’re looking for a specific one.

With all the above said, know that she has a very strong jab mixup. I mean, I could spend some time talking about it, but the generic options are standard out of it (she can cover jumps, rolls, she gets spotdodge free, etc etc.) So again, you want to try to maintain some distance on defense so she can’t really lay into you.

The one thing you want to keep in your mind AT ALL TIMES VS PEACH is that spotdodging isn’t the best idea you can come up with. Peach d.smash beats spotdodge free. Now you still have to worry about grabs and other stuff, so it’s not like you can completely abandon spotdodges, but understand that Peach has a free punish anytime you want to hang one out, so don’t bank on it.

Turnip approaches. Peach’s best approach. There are a variety of ways you can deal with turnips. The obvious answer is to, duh, move. Understand that moving doesn’t always mean running away. If you’re standing far enough away when she throws it, you can simply jump over it, which keeps you from giving up ground. However, running away is also a viable option. Shielding and shield options (roll spotdodge blah blah) also work, not always the best options, especially if she’s APPROACHING behind the turnip, but they do work. The next thing you have is caping, and caping is great. There’s a catch though, you need to make sure Peach is actually BEHIND the turnip. It does you absolutely no good to cape a turnip if she jumps over (or drops under) the line she threw it from. So you have to check before you cape. (An alternate to this is cape dashing, that way you’re not standing still as you cape). You could also hit the turnip with something like a n.air or b.air, but that’s play-at-your-own-risk. The last thing you could do is catch it. Now, catching it has its own risk/reward. Obviously you risk getting hit, and if you catch it you get a turnip, but having a turnip in your hand isn’t good at all. That takes away a large majority of your moveset. So if you’re going to catch the turnip, try to make sure it’s fairly random so Peach can’t predict it coming.

Outside of those points, you really just have to watch for spacing and tricks. You always want to keep a little distance so Peach can’t put a crapton of pressure on you. If you want to stop her from coming in, D.air works great (although D.air is always great if you use it right, so I dunno why I’m giving it a special moment.)

Just, keep moving.

Edgeguarding

If you knock her too high, she gets back free, no questions asked. That is the one thing that really sucks about Peach. Putting in work and then ending with a f.air that doesn’t kill, so she just floats back and drops dead in the middle of the stage. It’s pretty horrible.

Stopping her from coming high sucks in general. You only have one thing that might work, but it’s the greatest edgeguard in the history of Doc. It’s. The. YODEL!!! (Tornado edgeguard). No, I’m not joking, it actually works if you can hit Peach with it. The two rules you need to know about yodel edgeguards are that you want to be up there before she crosses over, so that she runs INTO you (and you have time to drop out if you see her pullup and f.air), and you NEVER double jump (Unless you’re just that ******. In the event you get hit out of this, you don’t want to go flying off the other side of the stage and die because you double jumped and tornado’d.

Another, “stronger” option you have to stop her high recovery is an up+b. It won’t kill, and you don’t get to follow up on it, but your goal at this point is strictly tacking on damage. This is actually the HIGHEST edgeguard you have as you’re up+bing, so you might as well double jump if you need to.

Beyond that, you’re looking to take Peach out of her float. It’s not really hard, you just have to realize that as she’s falling, she can stop and float at anytime. You may have to catch her with some high b.airs, some reverse u.airs, whatever it takes to kill her float. It’s nothing out of the norm at this point.

When you kill it, though, you’ve got to stop her parasol. That by itself it tricky to stop. Peach gets to open and close it as she pleases, and if she gets past you, she’s going to close it to land in neutral. You want to make her go low enough to where she has to try to take the ledge, and then you can edgehog -> roll. It’s easier said than done, trust me. All in all, you want to try to stay below her and jump into her. If you’re above her, she can just drop and beat you to the ledge or ground. Either one is good for her.

In the event you catch her BELOW the stage and she has to up+b to the ledge, you actually get some grimy **** on her. If she’s floating in a position to where she won’t SS the ledge (or you’re sure she won’t quickly drop to it back up and cape her as she goes up. Caping peach as she goes up (before she gains control of her parasol) is one of the animations where getting caped causes hitstun. So yes, getting peach BELOW the stage on recovery is golden. Don’t take more risks than you need to.


Recovery

Recovering against Peach actually isn’t as hopeless as you’d think it’d be. It still blows because you’re Doc, but you can actually contest A LOT of her stuff and make yourself a suitable challenge for her edgeguard.

First and foremost, turnips. Pills, capes, and catching. Done. She’s going to try to snipe you with one, so be ready. And don’t think she’ll just throw it out. She might jump off and throw it down. At that point, you’re going to cape or catch (or up+b if you’re close enough and can time it)

Next thing to look for is the default “im going to jump out there and hit you.” The worst position for you to be in is right in front of her, as the only way you can really defend yourself at this point is if you’re backwards so you can b.air. So you want to try to pill and position yourself so that she can’t time your recovery to this point. If she’s too early/goes too far, pass through her with a d.air (or drop down on her with a n.air if you’re high enough, or b.air her if she’s behind you for whatever reason.)

Alternatively, she could drop down to the bottom of your recovery and try to attack you from there. This is actually the best place for her to attack you (for her), so you want to try to avoid this at all possible. Again, you have to pill pill pill to keep her from getting where she wants. Even though she can cut through it, her n.airing a pill can give you the time you need to get around.

The last thing you have to worry about is coming up, which means dealing with d.smash (or d.tilt). Sweetspot, or be ready to tech. There’s actually a neat gimmick you can do if Peach’s positions herself to where her D.smash will send you back out. If you di down for the first hit (I KNOW SOUNDS DANGEROUS) the first hit and then press up for the second one, you’ll go out the opposite direction she wants you to. Not fool proof, not guaranteed, but it is an option if you’ve come to terms with the fact that you’re getting d.smashed.

In the end, recovering vs peach still sucks, but it’s not horrid. Infact, you can actually deal with it so long as you do the right things at the right time. You just have to be ready and keep her from where she wants to go.

Gardening

Peach’s Turnips are her utility tool. She grows em for offense, grows em for defense, she uses them all. You gotta be ready to deal with turnips. And although it’s not hard, you need to know some things and some funny things that can happen.

First and foremost, you need to pay attention to what she pulls, but you’re not concerned unless she pulls two things.

Stitchface: Looks something like this ~XXX~ (I’ll try to fix that, but you get the idea)
Dot Eyes: Has 2 beady little eyes, looks like ( : like that guy right there.

If she DIDN’T pull either one of those, the only other thing you really care about is a bobomb.

Ok, so on average, she’s going to throw the turnip and come in behind it, duh. Regardless of WHERE she throws it from, she’s really going to approach two ways. She’s either going to float or she’s going to run. Now, she might change when she jumps to float (or if she floats the entire way), or she might drop down and run, but know that she’s doing either or. You gotta be ready to step up and go under the turnip, jump over it, or cape it if she’s coming behind it. The worst string of events is if she throws it, floats behinds it, and you shield. That’s you in a crapton of pressure. Avoid that one if you can.

On defense, you just have to literally not run into turnips. You can pretty much take them out by pilling, but sometimes you can’t wait for all that. So be ready to do the same thing, duck, jump, or cape. It’s just now, you have to be ready for how she stops you afterwards. Heck, she doesn’t even have to throw it, she can still do aerials.

Know that she CAN throw turnips out of shield. So just because she’s sitting there shielding pills doesn’t mean she can’t come straight out and throw it.

Now, if she DID pull one of those 3 listed above, that’s where some fear starts coming in. The funny thing is, because of your cape, she’s going to get AS scared, if not more than you. You can’t literally stand there and spam cape, although the window for her to slot in the projectile is small, she can just come hit you for it.

What you want to do is cape in situations where she’s normally been throwing the turnip. You want to appear psychic with your capes. If she normally pulls and throws instantly, cape when she pulls it. If she DDes around and usually throws straight out of the DD, periodically cape as she DDs. If she waits to hit your shield to throw, then don’t ever cape. You have to give off the illusion that you’re not scared, you’re prepared. In all actuality, you can be scared s***less. You just have to have a system.
If all things go as planned, you can do as much as make the Peach straight THROW THE ITEM AWAY. Now that’s some comical stuff.

Don’t bank on it, but I’ve seen and made it happen plenty of times. It happens.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Peach’s Float: If she’s ever floating, you can knock her out of float with cape.
Peach on Battlefield: Can’t parasol to the ledge. Melee is a dumb game like that. Random thing to keep in mind.
Peach Upsmash: Is invincible from the shoulder up. (I forget where the sweetspot is, I think it’s actually on her shoulder). If you run across a Peach who will upsmash, don’t telegraph high approaches and don’t try to come down onto the stage right on top of them. Peach upsmash will win every time, even on Sundays.
Toad: Has more range than anything you have. So if she wants to Toad a pill, be ready to block.
Peach parasol: Great Antiair. Can actually lead to setups if you fall down onto it.
Peach turnips: caping them adds more knockback to them (not sure on damage, too lazy to check atm).

006. Captain Falcon
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 4-6 Capfal
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 40-60 Capfal (I still say this is my worst matchup. NOT DOC’S DAMMIT, MINE.)
The General Consensus: 45-55 CapFal
The General Flow

“Don’t get hit.”

That’s like, the only way you can stand a chance In this matchup, is you have to NOT GET HIT. It’s really not THAT bad, but everything Capfal can hit you with leads into stuff, that leads into stuff, that leads into stuff. And unlike most characters where he actually needs to knee them to kill them, he doesn’t even NEED to do that to you.

On your end, this matchup is going to feel somewhat like fighting a sheik, although it will LOOK completely different. What I mean by this is that this is yet another matchup where you don’t want to press a lot of buttons (read: Throw out a lot of attacks (for spacing)). Where sheik would just come straight through and demolish you for it, Capfal will go around you and hit you.

Really, the matchup isn’t that bad, you just have to be patient in how you go about dealing with Capfal. You can’t force anything on him because he can ALWAYS just run away, so you want to try to get him in a corner to limit how he can run away.

The two keys to this matchup are going to be your ability to DI to reduce (or stop) a combo video from happening, and your ability to force bad spacing. If you’re terrible at either one of them, this matchup is going to be long and painful short and crappy.

Offense

You’re not going to be doing a lot of this.

Straight up. Whenever you want to attack capfal, he can just move out of the way. Jump away, run away, whatever. So all of your offense is going to be fairly shortlived. His best defense is evasion. That doesn’t mean don’t try to attack him, you just need to understand that unless you catch him in a bad position, it’s not going to last long.

Now, there ARE bad positions for Capfal. Being by the edge is one of them, especially with his back to it. He doesn’t have a good backthrow, so you don’t have to fear a lot if you catch him in a corner. The second (and even better one) is catching him in shield. If you can get in his face while he’s shielding, there isn’t a whole lot he can do without you allowing it. He’s going to have to either jump out, roll out, try to force an aerial, or try some super gimmicky up+b.

Know that Capfal’s spotdodge is a little slower than average. For whatever reason, this makes a lot of Capfals spotdodge less than normal. They’ll still try rolls and jumping (and wavedashing when applicable), but they’re less likely to spotdodge you.

Again, all of your offensive spurts are going to be very short, for reasons that involve capfal moving. So say you want to throw some pills at him, you’re probably only going to throw one or two, more if he wants to just run away and stay in a corner (which won’t happen). You start throwing too many, and you’re asking him to either jump over them, run under them, or n.air through them. You can use this to your advantage and attack where he’s goin to come out, but you’re not going to be able to maintain this for too long unless you want to get tagged for it.

There really isn’t anything specific to say about attack ranges at this point. You really just have to be cautious and watch your spacing. Capfal is always going to give you a moving target, even if he stops for a second to give his finger a break. Although you can’t keep up with him in any department, you need to fake and dodge you way in so you don’t make the mistake of running into something like a n.air or side-b. He can throw out attacks to defend himself pretty well, so it’s not like you’re just going to chase him down at will.

As long as you’re staying on the offensive vs him, you want to stay close to him. The closer you stay, the further he has to move to get away from you. Although he can move TO get away from you even if you’re jacked up in his face, being close makes it harder for him to turn control around in his favor. If he’s at the end of your attack range and you try to, say, jump in and n.air him, he’s got plenty of room in his dash to move out and come back in with something like a d.air. However, if you’re jacked up on him and try the same thing, he’s got actually run a few steps (or FH BEFORE you get to him) if he wants a chance to retaliate against you.

The best place to be, if at all possible, is behind him. Yes his b.air kills, but it doesn’t come out instantly, so you can stuff it if you know it’s coming. Along with that, he’s obviously NOT going to grab you. So for him to stop you at this point, he’s got to do something crazy like d.air or move away. If you can sneak in a bs cape to turn him around, feel free. If you actually get him around, then you get a shot at something before he tries to get away.

The most important thing to remember about all this is to not get too set on attacking capfal. It doesn’t matter what’s happening, you shouldn’t be allowed to keep up an attack for long. Don’t lock into the tunnel vision.

Defense

Now, defense is where this match is going to be won.

You’ve got to practically lie, cheat, and steal everything capfal has going for him to beat his offense, but it’s completely do-able. He’s got nothing in his arsenal that you can’t stop. As long as his n.air is (and it’s dumb long), you can cut him off before he starts it, during it, or you can force bad spacing and shieldgrab it (doing something like a dash-in shield or ending up with a CC). You can keep him out of grab range with tilts, f.smash, b.air, etc etc. You can beat raptor boost with a variety of moves, or you can punish it with upsmash oos or a shield di’d grab.

He’s not impossible to stop, you just have to make a lot of rapid decisions.

Like I said in the intro, the one thing you need to keep in mind is that you don’t really want to throw out a lot of attacks. It’s not hard for capfal to move around, and you want to be ready for WHEN he attacks. If you’re too busy going crazy with double u.airs, he’ll have plenty of time to come in right behind you and attack, and you’ll have to give up throwing out an aerial or tilt and go with having to straight evade him. You don’t want to do that ALL the time, it’s only a matter of time before you screw up and get put on a highlight reel.

The biggest problem you’ll have in this matchup, aside from Capfal’s speed, is his n.air. It’s long, real long. If he spaces it correctly, it’s safe. You’ve got to keep him from doing that. There are a (in a nutshell) two ways you can go about doing this. You can either attack his n.air, which would mean you could cut through with your own n.air, stuff it with an u.air, up angled f.tilt, or u.tilt (if you’re in the middle of his arc), or jump over it with a d.air; or you could catch him in a spacing trap and punish, those being dash-in shield (Which would net you a shieldgrab at most, n.air at the least) or CC d.smash/grab. You’ve got to mix how you deal with his n.air. Although all of these work, the success depends on when and where he puts the n.air. If you only have one defense, he’ll simply put the n.air somewhere else.

DI Away from him unless it’s something that will kill you (a mid% knee or a high% u.air). Capfal doesn’t really combo as well as it seems, but you won’t be able to tell the difference if you’re constantly DIing for your dear life (read; “using survival di”). You’ve got to know when to DI to live and when to DI to not get hit again, or else you’ll keep getting hit till you die. I CANNOT stress that fact enough.

Outside of that, you have to just make constant decisions when you want to do stuff. Jumping gets you hit with u.airs, which begets more u.airs and n.airs. Shielding too much gets you grabbed, which just sucks. Rolling gets you hit with d.airs and raptor boosts. It’s just that everything leads to everything.

You have to pay attention to what causes attacks and where they go. If your capfal is DDing around unbelievably, is he trying to inch in so he can grab you, or is he waiting for you to fall asleep so he can jump in? Is he waiting for you to move near a platform so he can cut through your d an aerial or is he waiting for you to move out into the open so he can rain down darkness (U c wut I did thar?)

If you don’t pick up on your capfal’s options, everything he does will just seem completely random to you, and slot machines tend to be rigged. You’ve got to pay attention to how he fakes, what he fakes into, and what’s really real..

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding capfal is pretty cut and dry. Unless he’s jacked up on the stage, he’s going to up+b, and you want to be ready to cape or edgehog it. If he’s going to land on the stage (far on the stage), cut him off and send him back out.

Capfal is a character that really CAN’T defense himself on recovery. Infact, unless he has a wall, he can’t do anything that doesn’t involve a huge risk. So you’ve got a lot of liberty to jump out and b.air him as you need to. And you will need to. If you’re afraid to jump out at him, you’re allowing him to do high up+bs, which gives him a chance to edgecancel into unpunishable recoveries.

That’s some gimmicky stuff, though. The main thing you’re looking for is forcing him to up+b. You want him away from the stage, enough said. When you get him to up+b, you want to play on the side of letting him go past you. I don’t mean you straight up want to LET HIM pass you, but you want to pay more attention to the ledge incase tries to double back for the ledge, which is one of his safe options. If you call him trying to pull something like this, cape it and be done. However, if he catches you slipping, don’t just freeze up. You still have tilts and aerials you can throw at him to knock him off, reset the process, and take some damage. Just whatever you do, do SOMETHING.

Recovery

Yet another crappy character to recover against.

The reason why Capfal’s edgeguard is so good against Doc is because of how wide Capfal’s edgeguard range. When you add that to how linear Doc’s recovery is, you have a situation where if you’re any sort of far away from the stage, you’re pretty much dead.

I’m not going into great detail, I don’t need to.

The thing that sucks the most about Capfal’s edgeguard is that he doesn’t need to jump out and SS knee you to kill you. He can jump out and u.air or weak knee. If he catches you at the end of his jumparc, you can’t go around it seeing as that’ll throw you too far off course. If he wants to be completely safe, all he has to do is jump out there so you pull up. You’re not going to go through him, he’s just going to u.air.

You can try your best to block him with pills or turn around and b.air him as he comes out, but both of those can lose or trade to n.air. It’s not pretty.

Be ready to let go up jump (or up) to meteor recover.


Smoke and Mirrors

Like I said before, Capfal is a very mobile and agile character. You realistically CANNOT keep him contained, you just have to try and make good guesses. However, you can’t give him so much credit and think that you can’t, like, hit the guy.

Capfal has a bunch of smoke and mirrors.

The first thing to understand is that, in all of the movement he does, whether it’s flash or not, he ALWAYS has to come to you to hit you. He has no projectiles, and although he has some long ranged attacks, they’re not ridiculous. He ALWAYS has to come to you.

The second thing to understand is that what Capfal offense and defense are very deceptive. Not deceptive in the fact that you tricked into doing the wrong thing, but you get tricked by even identifying it. You might see him take a full dash in and take a full dash out and not think a thing of it. I mean, he can dash 1/4th of most stages. In all actuality, he just tried to bait you into swinging and you’re so unaware that you didn’t make any reaction to it. Failure to realize that he’s trying to bait you causes him to eventually start coming in instead of dancing around. On the other end of it, you might see him DDing around, and you know you really can’t hit him from where he is. So you move In some. Guess what he just defended himself by making himself (virtually) impossible to hit. He can’t get in and hit you, so he’s trying to get you to step in so he can safely take a shot at you. It’s the same as Fox blowing through clips trying to come in, the only difference is Capfal’s defense is to textbook and subtle you might not even catch onto it.

Every matchup involves you having to contend with your opponent’s offense and defense, and Capfal is no different. If you can’t figure out how to deal with somebody’s offense or get through somebody’s defense, then you’re done. The thing is that Capfal’s offense and defense revolves around movement. You have to pick on how he CAN move, he does move, and what he does with his movement.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Capfal Reverse up+b: A lot of people want to write this off as “a capfal (or ganon) mindgame” vs cape, when really it’s taking THE safe option. Cape reaches below the ledge farther than anything you have, so if you’re on the stage, you’re taking the best option. If you see this coming, you want to edgehog it. Even if they land on the stage (which they will, without an edge cancel) you can just jump up and hit them off again, so it’s no big deal.

Capfal D.throw -> Knee: Realistically doesn’t work on Doc, so long as you DI the throw out. At low -> mid percent, you can n.air/u.air/up+b/jump out of the way. At high %, you’ll DI out of the way. The only time this ever works is at high % (ok not high, starting at like 80 or so) if the throw would send you off the stage. Other than that it doesn’t work. (Dogy note: when you start getting into the higher %s, you probably want to close your eyes when he comes in. **** IS CLOSE).

Capfal moonwalk: Is actually pretty good and somewhat dangerous since he can approach with a b.air.

007. Jigglypuff
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 55-45 Doc (Jiggs are better than Docs right now. That’s just how it is)
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 6-4 Doc
The General Consensus: Something horribly dumb in Jiggs favor because Mango (and Hbox lol) exist, INSPITE THAT BOTH OF THEM ACKNOWLEDGE THAT IT’S A HORRIBLE MATCHUP FOR JIGGS.
The General Flow

Bully this dumb b****.

Out of ALL of the characters in the game, Jiggs is one that, by default, you will have the most freedom to fight against. So long as you do it right. The default Jiggs strat is to air camp, or stay somewhere in the air, whether they’re throwing aerials or not. The thing is, your pills control her airspace. Jiggs is very AGILE in the air, but she’s NOT mobile. You can straight up outrun her at will. She’s also very slow at covering verticals, so if you can clear her, you can get out of corners free.

Your goal for this entire match is to control the center of the stage. You can’t gimp Jiggles, and you really don’t want to try to edgeguard her as you have way more to lose than to gain. So you want to stay posted in the middle of the stage scrapping with her. The main thing you’re going to be looking out for is the b.air, and it’s really not as bad as people make it out to be so long as you literally don’t run INTO it.

If you ever feel like you’re losing against Jiggs, just go run around for a while. Seriously. She can’t catch you, so you can run around until you can reset yourself as you see fit. Or if you want to try to take on some free damage, go throw pills to make her throw bad aerials.

This matchup, although not free, is in your favor. So long as you stick to a safe strat, Jiggs has to overcome a lot of bs just to have a shot at you. NOTHING she has works on you. SHE CANNOT LEDGESTALL YOU, and he only rest setups she has is sniping a double jump or calling a roll/tech. However, if she ever misses a rest (which will be often if they try their normal setups), you are one of the 3 characters who get a HEAVY punish, and you are THE MOST DAMAGING CHARACTER TO A JIGGS MISSED REST. (The other 2 heavy punish characters being Fox and Mario)

Offense

You only want to fight in the middle. Period. That is the ONE golden rule you need to know for this match. Pitch a tent in the middle of the stage. Life is hard for Jiggs if you do that. You can play keep-away if you want to and just run and throw pills, that works very well against jiggles too, but when you go to fight, you want to be in the middle.

If you’re running and throwing pills, keep your distance and chuck them ****s like Sagat chucks Tiger Shots. In spite of whatever people think of Jiggs, she’s not going to magically WARP over to you. If she wants to stay in the air and contest your pills, keep out and try to tag some damage on her. She dies at dumb low percents, so anything you get is to some degree devastating to her. You gotta watch her though, she’s gunna try to move in so she can land an aerial on you. You need to stay awake and keep out of her attack range as long as she’s staying in the air. If she does get in attack range, you need to stop (obviously) or BACK DA F*** UP *****! The one sign you’re looking for in this matchup is if Jiggs gives up and goes to the ground. This is when you want to try to come in. A Jiggs player with half a brain (or one who’s not overly aggressive, rather) is eventually going to do this, as it’s a safe option. You want to time your approach as she’s coming down, not let her hit the ground and then come in. If you’re too late, she’s just gunna jump again. But yeah, you want her on the ground.

If you can’t get her on the ground, you’re going to come in with like, your default moves. CRAPTON OF N.AIR. OH MAN CRAPTON OF N.AIR. Like, I’m going to go through the basics in the Doc matchup, but N.air vs Jiggs? That’s like a Italian sub on a Wednesday, it’s soooooo good. N.air beats a lot of Jiggles attacks, so if and when you go in, this is what you’re going with. Your other default option is to try to get ABOVE her and D.air. Works very well too, although you run into some super gimmicky risks if you try to follow up.

While you’re fighting Jiggs, you want to keep up with the players jump habits. Besides the obvious “Do they use empty jumps, what aerials do they use and when”, one key thing you want to watch vs Jiggs is how many jumps a player tends to use. You want to know this not-so-much to try to snipe her out of her 4th jump, but because you’ll have a better idea of when Jiggs is going down to the ground. If you call her going down, you can start closing distance and try to put her in shield upon landing.

Keep the bomber grounded. When she gets there, KEEP HER *** THERE. She’s not helpless in shield as she can come out with n.airs or u.smash OoS (or more if you’re sloppy), but you want to do your best to keep her from going anywhere. You really don’t have too much to fear from her in her face aside from “The Mango Surprise” (rest OoS), so put some pressure on her. Her grabs won’t do anything except push you away, and she never gets a guaranteed follow up. Take whatever damage you get on her; jabs, grabs, smashes, THE SUPER AWESOME D.TILT OF D.TILTINGNESS, whatever. Damage is fatal to jigs.


All in all, you just want to keep her in the middle and keep her on the ground. Like always, you don’t want to go crazy cause she’ll find ways to slip out, but Jiggles can’t use any of her character perks to really hinder your offense. She can’t duck anything of real merit (Going off of my Kirby chart, If Jiggles can duck anything, it’ll be a long ranged F.tilt (forward or up), an u.smash, or a spaced up angled f.smash.) so feel free don’t fear catching a duck-rest. She can’t throw a rapid number of attacks, so just dodge around till you get in and put work on her.


Defense

It’s another matchup where you want to default to moving.

Jiggs can’t really put a lot of pressure on you, so don’t feel as if you need to make some super read to stop pressure. You just have to understand the gimmick behind her pressure. That gimmick is spacing. She really can’t put up a long string of offense seeing as there are ridiculously huge gaping holes in everything besides late SHFFL aerials -> something. So that means you need to play RPS and reset control.

If you ever don’t know what to do, or don’t want to take a risk, move out and start running around till you get back to where you need to. Unless Jiggs is jacked up in your face, she won’t be able to stop you from wavedashing (or even rolling away from her), which gives you room to reset. If you can’t go back, don’t be so quick to go in, try to go around her or fight her off of you.

If Jiggs is trying to push into you with Wall of Pain (WoP), you want to stop that. Her goal is really to just push you to the ledge, and if you get hit, then it’s an added bonus. Her WoP is actually the identical to EVERY OTHER CHARACTER who can do FH double b.air (you included), Jiggs just works so well because she can weave back and forth so well (air agility), and because she can throw the high option multiple times. So, just like every other character, you’re looking to come over the low option or under the high. The thing to keep in mind is that Jiggs can turn around with a jump, so if she’s WoPing with F.airs, she can turn around and b.air whenever she wants. She can also come down with a n.air.

Jiggs’ n.air and f.air are very powerful pokes because she can tap the top of your shield and dip back at the last second, moving her out of punishment range and setting herself up to poke at your next move. You have to pay close attention to where she’s going to determine what’s going to happen next. Be ready to jump, be ready to NOT jump, and be ready to move away from her. It’s business as usual, but understand that unlike most n.airs, she can choose if she wants to space the attack or the landing.

One thing to keep in mind the entire match is that unless you’re near an edge you’re ok to give up a grab. Again, Jiggs has no guaranteed follow ups on you from a grab, so if you’re worried about getting hit, or don’t know if she’s going to try to catch you jumping out, just stay in shield and give up a grab. Her grab range is very short, so she has to land next to (or run very far) to even have a shot at it, and she gets a very minute reward as long as you’re in good positions.

IF YOU GET HIT, DI AWAY. Jiggs only has a few moves that kill, her aerials are NOT one of them. So DIing in on a b.air is asking to get hit with a second b.air, and that’s when the WoP really starts. To even give yourself a chance at recovery, you need to be willing to DI out and make her work for more damage or her edgeguard. Once you’re in the air next to her, you’re already at a big disadvantage, so don’t lock yourself up.

All in all, you’re going to be making one solid decision after another to keep away from Jiggs’ offense. Stay away from her whenever possible, but if she gets you into shield don’t panic. There’s not a lot she can really do when you’re there except wait for it (or try to pound it out if it’s too low). Keep yourself away from ledges and don’t get hit.


Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding Jiggs is pretty unique in that you really DON’T want to edgeguard her. You have too much to lose by going to edgeguard her especially considering you have to her hit a few times

You want to keep most of your edgeguarding on stage. Honestly, I’d go as far as to say just let her back on and rain pills at her. If you get her far from the stage, she’s actually going to be in a horrible position when she gets back. She’s going to either land on the stage, which is a chance for you to attack her if you choose, or she’s going to the ledge, which is horrible for her.

IF YOU EVER CATCH JIGGS GOING TO THE LEDGE FOR WHATEVER REASON, BACK THE F*** UP *****. Back up and start bouncing ground pills over the ledge (it’s like, 3 or 4 character lengths away, I need to turn the game on to see it). If you position yourself right, Jiggs will wind up going through a waterfall of pills just to make it back ONTO the stage, in which case she’ll still have to land ON the stage.

If you do want to jump out and hit her, be ready for pound. You can actually DI pound so that it keeps you in front of her, but you just have to be ready for it. It’ll trade and beat b.air, so you want to try to wait it out. Cape it if you can. You can also go around Jiggs and d.air/u.air her. Jumping out and n.airing isn’t a horrible idea either, but you need to stay away from pound.


Recovery

Keep her from straight in front of you. That is your goal. Unlike most characters who get demolished by jiggs’s edgeguard, you can actually defend yourself fairly well so long as you keep her from in front of you.

If you got sent out by some b.airs, you’re probably screwed by default. You need to try to DI away from the first b.air so that she can follow up with a second one. You’re not going to die from a b.air, you’re going to die from an edgeguard. DI OUT! And then come back in.

As you’re coming in, you’re once again looking to keep Jiggles from being right in front of you. Pill to protect your space, but if she’s there, you gotta be ready to defend yourself.

You can pass through Jiggs with a d.air if she’s too early, and most Jiggs ARE going to be too early. They’re too used to helpless victims on recovery. So if nothing else, try to d.air through her if she makes it out to you. You’ve really got nothing to lose at this point, as you’re either going to hit her or she’s going to hit you. Another thing you can try is turning yourself around so you can b.air her. It works so long as Jiggs comes too far in, but it’s not the most reliable thing to do. If Jiggs does make it out there and she is square in front of you, your last ditch effort is caping. You have to time it and flip her around (as she’s not going to try to pass THROUGH you. If your Jiggs is doing this, you need to use n.airs/b.airs/d.airs.)

If Jiggs waits for you to come back to the stage, it’s business as usual for you. You wanna try to trick her off the ledge, which is really impossible, but that’s what you want. If you gotta land on the stage, you’re pretty screwed. If she actually waits for you on the ledge, try to shoot her off the ledge with some pills. If not just try your best to get into airdodge range.

Jiggs is another one of those edgeguards where you THINK it’s hopeless, but you actually have a lot more hope than you think. Don’t give up, just don’t do anything stupid.

Target Practice

A lot of people make jigglypuff out to be harder than it has to be. A lot of people like running into Jiggs strengths, whether it’s trying to constantly fight through WoPs or trying to force edgeguards that really don’t exist. You never HAVE to do that with Jiggs. You can do a lot of sitting around taking potshots. That’s how Jiggs loses.

First and foremost, you want to keep in the middle of the stage. You really have too much to lose and not a lot to gain if you try to engage Jiggs by the edges. You’re not going GIMP her unless you go above and beyond on the edgeguard, and she really just needs to jump out and hit you ONCE. So why play to her advantage?

So you’re probably thinking “OK Genius, so you expect me to just stay in the middle of the stage the entire time and have Jiggs not do anything about it.” No. That’d be a perfect world, and perfect worlds don’t exist. If you CAN do that, then you’ll realize why Jiggs absolutely hates fighting you, because you always have a safety net of forcing her to push you TO and PAST the ledge. But no, I don’t expect you to be able to hold the middle the entire time.

That’s when you have to know when to run and just take potshots at Jiggs. The thing you’re avoiding is trying to fight her straight up. That gives her a chance. You want to keep attacking her at angles she can’t handle (around her aerials, or pills to keep her throwing random aerials), and you want to keep moving until you can get BACK to the middle of the stage and get back to work. If you could take a “fight track” for the fight, it really should look like you leading Jiggs around the entire time, just taking shots every now and then.

She can’t really camp you. What’s she going to do, go to the ledge? Ok, go park yourself in the middle and throw pills. I’ve yet to find ANY Jiggs who can camp on the ledge perfectly for an extended period of time and not get hit by a single pill. It’s hard. She can’t back up or you just step up and throw pills in her way as she moves out. Now she risks getting gimped by pills (lol).

So where am I going with all this? Stop trying to stand toe-to-toe with Jiggs. You don’t have to. You can wait till you KNOW where she’s going with an aerial and take a shot at it, or you can wait till she wants to stop throwing **** and land. Until then, you keep moving around taking potshots at her. If you want to straight-up scrap with her, get yourself in the middle so she doesn’t get a free knock off the edge.

Target practice.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Jiggs rests: If you ever get hit by rest and you know you’re going to die, DI OUT so that you die from the side, that way you’re guaranteed to come in and punish it.

Jiggs MISSED rest: Oh you get to have a field day with this. First and foremost, CAPE. Caping a resting Jiggs doesn’t cause hitstun, so you get to rack up a ridiculous amount of damage with this. If you’re RIGHT ON TOP of Jiggs when she misses a rest, you’re allowed to take 6 capes before you need to do something else. 6 is really pushing it, so default to 5 (or 4 if you’re slow). From there, it’s your choice whether you want to f.smash, f.air, grab (to tack on a few more hits into a dunk) or do some tricky. Some tricky would include wavedash d.smash (wavedashing PAST her to mix DI), or jump in d.smash (mixed with f.air, to once again mix DI). Jiggs should be terrified of even thinking resting you because that’s a free stock if she misses.

Jiggs Sing ledgestall: Doesn’t work. You can SH cape it.
JIggs Late N.air -> rest: is the only rest setup that actually works, but you can stop it by DIing the n.air out. You just have to actually look for her to hit you with it instead of stopping short and doing something like f.smash (It’s kinda hard to see)

Jiggs Rollout recovery: Super gimmicky. If she’s trying to hit the ledge, you can cape it. If you’re at a low enough % and want to shut it out completely, just jump out and take the hit. You need to get far enough to where she can’t drift back in. If you’re a manly man, you’ll grab her (don’t try it).

Dogy Tips vs Jiggs:
-Stay in the middle. Period.
-Stay on top of Jiggs when on the offensive, she has to make dumb good reads to get a big reward.
-Count jumps. That gives you a timing for when to attack.

008. Ice Climbers
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 60-40 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 6-4 Even
The General Consensus: 50-50 Even
The General Flow
Pills and F.air.

That’s going to be the majority of what you’re doing in this matchup. You actually get away from a lot of IC nonsense, but you still don’t want to play with …. Ice. You just don’t want to play into their grab game, doesn’t matter if (afaik) they have no CGs on you outside of the standards, why give them what they want when you can keep them clean of it all day.

So you want to stay away, stay on platforms, pill, etc etc. You really don’t want to be next them unless you’re drivin. Even without the grabs, they have a lot of things they can do to you. Jab mixups, (fairly) safe smashes, disjointed tilts, it’s a lot more of the hit-it-and-quit-it theory.

This matchup isn’t too bad, though. You have easy ways to separate the ICs, you can (somewhat) fight them in the air (which will lead to separation), and you can easily dispatch most of their useful desyncs and make them resort to trying to walk you down and force you off the stage.

It’s not that bad.

Offense

This part of the match is fairly simple. You either pill, or you f.air. Everything else better lead to you going away from them.

Anytime you’re away from them, you want to pill to disrupt pretty much anything they try. The good thing is pills will only hit one of them, so it stops desyncs, causes a desync, etc etc. By doing this, you’re going to keep your ICs from getting too comfy and starting up some super gimmicky stuff. You can come in behind the pills if you want, but be ready to pull up as, again, you’ll only hit one of them. The other one is going to be free to swing at you should you guess wrong vs their defense.

When you actually move in on this, you want to move all the way in. Don’t play around at midrange, you’re really just asking to get hit. You’re ok to throw a f.tilt from here every now and then, but don’t bank on it. Go all the way in.

If you can get them to put their shield up before you get there (which isn’t hard, they’ll be looking for a shieldgrab normally), you want to f.air. Doing anything else is going to get you grabbed as you have to hit two shields. You f.air their shield, it pushes they too far out to do anything except wavedash back in. Doesn’t matter what kinda shield they do.

In the event you land a grab on one of them (and the other is around), b.throw immediately. This way, you don’t give the second one enough time to hit you out of the throw (a problem that many characters have playing ics). Regardless of percent, you really have nothing to lose by b.throwing them and separating them, where as trying a d.throw is liable to get you f.smashed or grabbed.

Past that, you’re just looking to catch them in the air and whatnot. This aspect isn’t really anything new other than the fact that you always want to jump AROUND what they’re doing (i.e. don’t come straight up top if they’re going to u.air, straight In front of a b.air, etc). If you can ever land a d.air on them, try your best to follow popo’s (the lead’s) DI and taggin him afterwards instead of hitting whoever. It’s another desync point.

Defense

Don’t let them catch you in shield. That’s the one thing they’re looking for. Whether they know they can CG or not, IC players tend to look for grabs, so you need to be doing a good job of keeping them out.

First and foremost, if you really want to be on the defensive, stay on platforms. As long as you’re on the platform by yourself, they have to go through hell to get there, to get up, and then to grab you together. Your goal is to just keep them from grabbing you together. Worst case scenario, you can just jump away from them as they come up to you.

Now, if you’re not going to sit on platforms (or you’re manly and you’re on FD), you just have to keep some distance from them. It’s not exactly easy, but you’ve gotta keep them from slip-sliddin in at will. Ground pills and (spaced) f.tilts are too f***in good when it comes to this. ICs aren’t very mobile in the air, so as long as you control space in front of you, they’re going to do a lot of wavedashing into shield, which gives you time to setup and push them out again. Keep it up until you’re ready to pick them apart.

If they do get close, -rolls eyes- fffffffffffff. Jab mixups are so good because you gotta deal with like, 4 jabs. Jabs to grabs, jabs to tilts, d.smashes, retreating b.airs, yada yada. They can cover stuff pretty well and stay pretty **** safe. You DO NOT want to let them in.

When you have to move away from them (which you will have to and some point and time, melee goes on too long), think of jumping first. They really can’t do too much to a jumping target aside from tag on some damage and wait for them to come back down. If you’re above like, 90% or so, you don’t want to eat a b.air (or double b.air) cause that’s you off the stage, but you still want them to consider you jumping away from them.

Reaching at them is really a no-no, too. Like, if you’re trying to stop them from running in, you’re perfectly fine. You better make sure they’re not going to stop and f.smash, first. Not only does it beat your range free, but it’s pretty much safe (if there’s 2 of them). If they want to go down their tierlist, they can opt for f.tilt, d.tilt, b.air, or even jabs. You don’t want to hang anything out that you’ll regret in the future. It’s not the end of the world unless you’re off the stage, but don’t do what they look for.


Edgeguarding

If you can get them separated, you’ve pretty much got the edgeguard locked up. That’s your main goal when you’re edgeguarding them. If you can snipe them with a b.air, that’s pretty kool, but if you can catch them with a pill and desync them, that’s even better.

You have to knock ICs PRETTY **** LOW for them to be dead if they’re together. Up+b and Side-B are too good for recovery, although you can still hit them out of it. However, if you just separate em, none of that matters.

If they side+b onto the stage together, you need to either be right on top of them to punish it or you don’t punish it at all. They have a dumb low recovery together. However, if it’s a solo side-b, you can just hop up and toss them back off all day. It’s pretty free.

They really don’t have too many tricks in their recovery outside from the wide recovery range when they’re together. Just try to put some pills on them, b.air if you see a spot, and be ready to jump on top of them going back to the stage.

There really isn’t much to say about their recovery.

Recovery

Their edgeguard on the other hand? Is pretty tricky. If you get off the stage, you’re theoretically ****ed, and it just depends on if the IC player actually knows HOW to do it

First and foremost, you’re going to be allowed to come a LONG way before you have to contend with anything. ICs edgeguard on stage, unless it’s a solo. Even if it is a solo, he’s probably stayin on stage cause their recovery isn’t good at all by themselves. That being said, you’re got a long way to go before you even SEE signs of a fight.

When you get in close, you’re going to make the same rough choice you always do. SS the ledge or land on stage. Shooting them off with pills really isn’t going to do anything seeing as… they’re two of them. You can do it to try it to keep them from the ledge, but you’re going to do either or. If you can catch them BOTH with an up+b, you’re in the clear. If not, you want that ledge.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
Desyncs: ICs can desync off of a variety of things, the list includes (but is not limited to)
-Rolls
-Spotdodges
-Pivots
-Dash Dances
-Empty Grabs
-Empty Hops
-Taunts
-(more)
Without explaining HOW to desync, all you need to know, as Doc, is that when you see them do one of these, expect to see a change in their attack pattern afterwards. You might see ice block chasers, blizzard shields, factory smashes, etc etc. Just, be ready.

Double Shielding: Obviously attacking IC shields involves hitting 2 shields. Main thing you need to look for is the light-full shield (Nana Light shields, popo does an almost-full shield, as Nana can’t Analog adjust). Timing an L cancel offa this is crazy, but just know it’s a lot later than you think it is. YOU HAVE TO AVOID HITTING THIS HIGH, THOUGH, or else you run the risk of getting shieldgrabbed by default.

Dogy tips vs ICs.

-Watch for Desyncs. The main one to look for are blizzard shields. Ice Block Chaser is kinda blatant, just don’t get trapped in shield by it.

-If you ever choose to attack Nana, make sure popo isn’t stalking you for a trap. ICs players are known to do that. Nana isn’t always the best option.


009. Samus
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 45-55 Samus
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 5-5 Even
The General Consensus: 50-50 Even
The General Flow

The longest yard.

Dear god, this matchup is so long, no matter HOW it’s played. I’ve played campy, runaway samuses, I’ve played super aggro samuses, it just doesn’t matter. Match takes forever. It’s actually not a boring matchup if you like chess, and that’s what the match WILL boil down to. Positioning, setups for a little damage, and solid edgeguarding (not from you, you’ll probably just be doing a crapton of killing).

Neither one of you will get any long string of hits; Samus can’t and she won’t let you. So the entire match is going to be a war of wits. You’ve got to contest with her CC game, her tilts, overall range, and beast recovery while she has to contest your pills, mobility, and ability to just flat out make her miss.

Bring a drink for this one, it’s gunna take a while.

Offense

The first thing you have to do is break Samus’s CC. IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT YOU BREAK HER CC DOWN SOME. To do this, you need pills and grabs. Loads of pills, loads of grabs. Those are the only times you can hit her in CC for a while w/o getting punished. Other than that, you have to catch her in the air or catch her trying to do something. Once you put some damage on her, you can start using other moves on the offensive. A lot of them are still going to get CCd, but your goal is to make it to where she can’t PUNISH you with a CC.

While you’re working on the CC, you’re going to be trying to pop shots here and there. Unless you catch her out of CC, you’re not getting s*** for it, so don’t get overexcited. You need to do a lot of quick hit’n’run tactics. Take your one u.air you got and move, tilt her out of range and get ready. There’s just no other way to go about it, it’s slow.

The things you ARE looking to attack, however, is anytime she hangs out a smash or anytime she jumps. If she throws out a smash, ANY smash, you can get some punishment for it. D.smash gets punished with a smash, F.smash gets jabbed or tilted, u.smash is take your pick as long as you didn’t get hit. If she jumps, you want to try to be UNDER her, seeing as it’s fairly hard for her to defend herself with her d.air. Be careful if there’s a notable distance between the two of you as you’re liable to run into a bomb on the way up. Attacking from behind her is acceptable, too, it’s just her b.air can send you pretty far out if you’re not ready for it.

Outside of these things, you’re actually going to be playing very patiently against samus. Do a lot of moving (out of her range) and try to frustrate her into doing something bad. It’s not easy to do seeing as any good samus player is used to having to wait 10 years for their one f.smash. Just make sure you’re not in a hurry or you’ll run into limbs and explosions.

This is a matchup where you can afford to be really aggressive with your shield. Shielding makes samus’s day horrid, as her grab is high risk-mediocre reward. As long as you have a healthy shield, feel free to run in and try to force her to make the first move. Understand that you have to change up where you stop, as you can’t make it straight in one go (unless she’s willing to let you slam into her face.)

Speaking of shields, don’t play around her’s too much. Like, it’s not a horrible thing to hit samus’s shield, but if you come in with something crazy (like a f.air, especially a high f.air), you’re asking her to up+b. It’ll happen. You can actually DI out of an up+b and punish it, but you don’t want to take any more damage than you really need to. If you can get in with something light and shield, you can also bait an up+b. Aside from up+b, and n.air, samus really doesn’t have anything from her shield unless you like smash it. Just tread lightly. Samus having a long roll and a teather grab give her plenty of reasons to hit the eject button if you want to play with her shield.

It really isn’t rocket science to attacking a samus, it’s just patience. Unless you’re playing a scrub, you literally CANNOT run over samus. It’s just impossible. So rather than trying to force something that can’t happen, you just need to slow down and take the openings you see. It’s not like she’s going to come in and wreck shop either.

Defense

Defense. –Yawn-

In the long haul, every bit of damage counts, so you can’t let anything slide. You just need to stay calm and get samus off of you as soon as possible. She’s really not going to stay on you long anyway, but you have to show some movement or else she’s gunna try some nonsense and stay right on top of you.

First off, you’ve got projectiles. Now, inspite of how samus’s projectiles are, don’t expect to ONLY see them at long range. You have to be ready for some missile cancel gimmicks. Missiles, by themselves, aren’t really too big of a threat. Cape them, pill them, or heck, just jab them. They’re fairly low-tier on their own. Their strength comes from what happens BEHIND the missile. More often than not, you can’t just SHIELD a missile, or else you’ll get your shield pulled down by a grapple beam. You can’t always JUMP a missile, or else you’ll be jumping into a charge blast. There are plenty of ways samus can go about messing you up with a projectile. The thing you need to do is you can’t be have a pattern for how you handle it. You have to be willing to jump some missiles so you don’t get grabbed or a charge shot with it. You have to be willing to stay in shield so she doesn’t jump up and n.air you. You just have to mix and match.

Now, that’s mixups off of missiles. If samus is having a projectile war with you, that’s a completely different game. If she’s just posted up on the other side of the map throwing ****, you shoot back too. You’ll beat her in a projectile war because she has to constantly jump to missile cancel. You NEVER have to worry about being in the second lane of missiles, and your rate of fire + your cape will make samus move, even if she can consistently SHFF missile. In this, you need to be weary of where samus is going, if she’s trying to approach or run; and if she’s got a charge shot.

If she does have a charge shot, you just have to be ready to cape. As long as you’re looking for it, you can cape chargeshot on reaction. You might have to sit down and train yourself to look for the animation, but you have enough time to actually wait for it and cape it. Don’t freak out. The only time she gets guaranteed charges is when you tech. You’re ****ed at that point.

Moving past projectiles, you have to deal with a rain of tilts and smashes. Like I said in the offensive section, shielding is your friend. Unless you’re just LETTING some bs happen, Samus can’t really do a lot to beat your shield. She can poke and prod at it, hoping you’ll move somewhere stupid, but she’s not going to just GRAB you out of it unless you tape your r button down. That’s where the slow comes into all this. You really want DO want to stay in shield a lot.

If you can catch her throwing tilts, feel free to CC and try come in behind it, but understand that it probably won’t work due to her range. You could CC jabs, and pull something, but unless you’re jacked up on a tilt, you won’t get anything. Same thing for smashes.

Instead, you want to shield and WD in (or jump in). Like I said in the O section. You shield a smash, you get a smash. F. tilts get you jabs or tilts. Depending on spacing, you have to mix and match if you try to punish from a f.tilt, though, as it’s got a fairly good recovery. Don’t try to punish u.tilt or d.tilt. U.tilt is safe if it hits you, and d.tilt is safe (when spaced). If she didn’t space it, she’s got enough time to WD back and do it again if you try to WD in behind her.

Keep yourself on the ground. It seems so tempting to go in the air, especially when you can throw b.airs and d.airs all day, but you’ll lose a lot of times. Her u.air is pretty beast vs your d.air, and everything else you could try gets outranged by foot. Only go in the air when you have to, or if you know she’s not goin to throw something out.

Patience. I can’t say it enough. That’s what this matchup boils down to. You can’t FORCE anything on Samus. You just have to wait your turn to say your words and go about your business. It’s pretty long.

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding samus is depressing. It’s like, You watch her do all sorts of slow, methodical, bomb jumps and whatnot, and you’re like “Man, my recovery takes 5 seconds and I still die.”

It’s more waiting until samus gets into range. When she gets into range, you can go out there and b.air here, or u.air, or n.air, or something. Just watch out for HER n.air, or u.air, or d.air, or something. She can defend herself from you pretty well.

If you can make it out there, you can try to go out and cape a bomb, to drop her recovery some. This is really only useful when she has no grapple beam, but it’s something different for her to look at, and might give you some random time to pull a b.air out. Don’t really bank on this.

If she ever goes below the stage, start raining pills on her. You can jump out and throw pills if she’s far out and below, but anytime she’s below, you’re looking to throw pills. You don’t really want to jump out there as she can just drop lower and do a rising grapple.

When she gets close, you’re looking for the grapple. It’s actually kinda hard to stop. Your goal is to hit her before she latches, and there are a few ways to go about it. Being on the ledge is your best bet, as you can use the invinc to go through the grapple and hit her (with a b.air or cape), or you could try to pill her. If you can’t do any of these, you want to be ON the ledge so she can’t grapple to the ledge. At this point, you’re trying to time her coming up and n.air her. If you’re feeling bold, you can just dropdown and n.air, but you’re not coming back.

If you get her grapple, the last thing you have to worry about is an up+b. Cape it. She’s probably going to make it back on stage, but if she does, it’s a free f.smash or f.air, so just cape it. If you are just 101% sure she’s going to go for the ledge, feel free to take that, but caping is so much safer at this point.

Recovery

Another crappy recovery day. All she has to do is n.air.

She’s got all sorts of stuff that works, waveland b.airs, ledgedrop n.air, missiles, yada yada, or she could just n.air and you’re going to die. The thing that really blows about this is that you can’t come above her or else she’s going to u.air. So you straight up have to avoid her on recovery.

One thing you need to watch for are projectiles. You actually DON’T want to cape them on recovery as they’ll stall you enough to force you to take the ledge. Unless you’re samus is on another planet, she’s not going to get hit by a caped projectile at this point. She’s usually doing this just so you cape it, she takes the ledge, and you’re dead cause you’re doc. So, the only time you WANT to cape is if you see she’s lagging behind on the flowchart.

If you’ve actually made it close enough to up+b, watch out for an u.tilt. I mean, obligatory SS memo here, but know that it could happen.

It’s like, …. Stuff happens, throw pills to keep her from coming out or taking the ledge, up+b sometime and hope to catch her doing something dumb, the end.


Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Samus Dash Grab: Has 2 hitboxes, so you NEVER EVER want to spotdodge it. You can just make a rule of thumb and NEVER try to spotdodge a samus grab period and you’ll be ok.
Samus Air Grapples: usually come after bombs, to add another jump into something. Don’t be thrown off by “random air grapples”

Samus Extender: can be set up ANYTIME samus whiffs a grab (ground or air). It’s not exactly the most useful thing ever, but it’s not complete trash like people make it out to be. Know that if samus misses a grab (for WHATEVER reason), she could have an extender.

Samus U.Smash: Completely duckable if you’re on the ground.

Samus Chargeshot: She loses her charge if she gets hit out of her up+b. If you ever GET the chance to do this, do it.

Dogy’s Tips vs Samus
-Patience.
-Whoever smashes a shield first is going to be the one to get smashed. Don’t do it.
-If you don’t know what to do, back up and throw some pills or shield. Gives you some time to think until she wants to get greedy.
-Never under estimate her range, especially in the air. It might take her a while to get anywhere, but she doesn’t need to chase you down, just pin you down and throw limbs everywhere.

010. Doctor Mario
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 7-3 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 50-50 Kobe Bryant
The General Consensus: Ask HMW and Shroomed, they’re the only people who play Doc dittos atm imo imho bbq 1914 ~~CROSS COUNTER~~
The General Flow

No gimmicks allowed.

Of all of the matchups in this ditto (mirror) matches in the entire game, Doc dittos are the LEAST gimmicky ones ever. It’s not like Falco dittos where the first shine wins, sheiks who chaingrab the dirt out of each, or pikas who run around tail spiking each other. No. A Doc ditto realistically winds up being you playing the other player. Doc is the kinda character who can actually function against himself. All of his setups and strats generally work against himself (as opposed to characters who don’t and therefore have goofy dittos).

There’s really not a lot to say about the matchup itself, it really just comes down to your playstyle vs theirs. I’m just going to take the time to talk about some general Do’s and Don’ts with the Good Doctor.

Offense

Eh, first, let’s talk about your aerial approaches. You really don’t want to approach in the air too much, seeing as the only option you have is n.air. (When I say approach, I mean the actual act of attacking your opponent. While the act of closing distance is still approaching, that’s generally NOT the norm for terms in this game). Anyway, n.air approaching is pretty much the only thing you want to use with aerial approaches. Any other aerial you use needs a specific reason. If you want to f.air somebody, you have to make sure they can’t swing back. So you’re looking for situations when they’ve just teched, any reason where they put their shield up (as they land), etc etc. If you try to f.air any other time, you’re going to get beat out by something, it’s too long of a windup. U.airs are good, but they’re shortrange and the hitbox is only a few frames, so you want to reserve this for attacking people in the air or when you KNOW you’re going to land on their shield (at the least). “Think of u.airs as a mobile jab” –Hylian. That’s really the truth behind it. D.air is more of a defensive move for controlling space, although you can use it to pass over people. You don’t really need to ever want to ATTACK somebody with it as you really just want to prevent somebody from coming to you. B.air? You don’t really attack with this, it’s a spacing tool. If you have good SHBAWD control, you can get some good stuff off of it, but again, b.air is all for protecting yourself.

On the ground, it’s all about getting in close. You can poke at people from midrange with f.tilt, but you’re not really going to be able to follow up unless you hit or they let you. You want to get in for some jab/grab pressure. The thing you need to understand about your jab is that it’s really a gimmick. Your string CAN be interrupted, so you have to keep that in mind. With that being said, you DO need to mixup jab and jab-jab for ANYTHING you do. D.smash is real good for keeping gaps closed, but understand that d.smashing shields is asking to get punished. F.smash is a great kill move, obviously, and is relatively safe on shield, you just need to find times to get it out. U.smash is good for combos, or killing if you can catch people in the air. It’s got a “double standard” where if you hit a grounded opponent, it gives them a meteored effect, where as hitting an opponent in the air gives you the full hit. It’s actually pretty good for killing, but again, you need to catch people in the air.

Grabs pretty much follow a rule of thumb that you d.throw everybody except for fox, falco, and capfal. You u.throw those 3. There are a few situations where it’s viable to throw “heavyweights” (bowser, dk, roy, link, ‘round that fall range), which is mid range and you want combos. If you’re not looking for setups, then throw people off the stage. Whenever you can, you want to look for b.throw setups, as your b.throw throws people out MUCH farther. It sucks that both of them send people high, but take what you can get. One setup you can look for is rather than b.throwing somebody off the stage, d/u.throw them and b.air them off. It’s not really easy to setup, but it will send people off at a lower angle.

You really don’t have a lot to follow up on with Doc, so don’t think you’re going wild with combos unless you come across the one guy who’s never seen D or I in the alphabet. The little bit you can do is chase people after u.airs, which generally leads to you having to make a good read afterwards, a followup from a d.air (which normally is an u.air, but you can do b.air or n.air also), landing a grounded u.smash at low-mid%, or an u.tilt that actually sends people up.

Catching people in a d.air in the air is good because you’re GUARNANTEED an u.air, n.air, or b.air afterwards. However, if you have a good read on their DI and reaction afterwards, you could take more from them. You have to pay attention, account for weight, etc etc. If it’s a fastfaller, they’re more likely to fall down into a grab or smash of some kind, floaty (floatier) characters tend to stay in the air so you could try to land and u.tilt or go for THE DOUBLE D.AIR! Get super gimmicky and try D.air -> D.air -> F.air. THE PHYSICAL CHALLENGE! (u c wut I did thar?).

U.tilts normally come from grabs, and are kinda weird to follow up on for people. Most people (myself included) tend to u.tilt people until you can’t anymore, and at that point, you really can’t combo them anymore. Sometimes it’s good to stop one short so you can jump up and try to u.air them.
Upsmashes almost always come from tech chases. The almost part is when you punish with it. You’ll be hard pressed to just run in and upsmash, although it is possible. When you hit one, you just have to relax, watch the DI, and get at it.

All in all, your combos really don’t look anywhere as “impressive” as other combos. It’s not a bunch of high impact moves, unless you’re landing u.air juggles. That’s what people think of. You actually can get a lot by catching people with d.airs and u.tilts.

The last thing offense tools you have from physically attacking and following up are your pills, which set you up for stuff. You have to learn how to space your pills, how to approach behind them, WHEN to approach behind them, etc etc. First thing to know, bounce mechanics. Pills will bounce back to the height you throw them at. So if you FH and throw a pill, it will bounce back to FH height. Throw one at SH and it goes back to SH, etc etc. This is useful for trying to keep people from jumping out as you get in, or making people jump when you get there. Now, when you come in behind the pill, you have to know what you’re opponent’s going to do. The safest way to check this is to run in and roll back. You can obviously disguise it by doing other things (such as moving up some and jumping, or WDing back), but you want to give your opponent the illusion that you’re actually GOING to come in so you can figure out what they’ll do as you come in. You don’t want to empty hop in if you never plan on jumping in, that may cause your opponent to give you a completely different reaction than if you’re running in. As for actually coming in, it’s just business as usual, the only difference is you put a pill in front of yourself for your opponent to deal with. It’s pretty hard to actually get in front of your pill (you have to double wavedash, and you’re just begging to get hit at that point.), so realize that all the pill is going to do is give you another “waypoint” in the fight. Instead of (I approach – You defend) it’s (I pill – You Jump : I approach – You double jump), or something to that effect.

Outside of attacks, you have to be one with your movement. Doc is a somewhat mobile but fairly agile character, when on the ground. In the air, he’s pretty vanilla. So with that being said, you want to keep yourself grounded so that you can work some movement tricks. Don’t go crazy on wavedashing while you’re in attack range, as you’re putting yourself in set animations. However, if you’re just trying to cover distance, or if you’re trying to bait something, feel free. Another thing to work on is movement through DDing. Although Doc doesn’t have a wide DD, it’s wide enough to where you can creep a pretty good distance with your DD. You have to have enough control to where you can move forwards and backwards while maintaining a DD.

In a nutshell, Doc has ways to set himself up, but he really gets nothing free. You have ways to get hits and get your grabs, but you have to put in some real thought. There’s nothing that you can really abuse, per say.

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One note related to the Doc Ditto matchup, the ONE thing to look for is how the other Doc pills. A lot of Docs love to FH pill because you can waveland afterwards. If you see a lot of FH pills, keep yourself on the ground and be ready to run under and punish. Even if you can’t make it all the way in (,,!,, DJN ^_^ ) staying grounded and weaving in and out under the pills will force them to back up and give you room.

Defense

Defense with Doc is kinda frustrating, because you normally don’t get a lot unless your opponent screws up bad. Your greatest assets to your defense is your size + mobility, and your shield. You’re not really going to defend yourself with a lot of attacks, seeing as they normally get beat in range. You still have to try, and when you do, you want to throw mobility in with it (SHBAWDs, retreating f.airs, WD back tilts, etc etc), but understand that this isn’t your safest option.

Don’t let stuff go free, though. You have to be ready to jump out and u.air/n.air people as you see. You can’t have (for the sake of our spot in the guide) the evil Doc running around f.airing all day. He really CAN’T do that, all you need to do is N.air/U.air him and keep him in check. If he’s trying to come in from too far, retreating f.air or SHBAWD away from him. Don’t just sit there and don’t just attack in place. You’ve got a lot you can do while staying on the move.

On the ground, you have to be ready to tilt/cape people to keep them from running in. Tilting is kinda obvious to the eye, but the reason why you need to keep the cape in mind is if they try to grab. Caping a grab animation is one of the times that will cause a knockdown. You can also control a huge range on the ground if you keep some ground pills going.

Outside of that, you’re going to be doing a lot of shielding and CCing. You’ve got to have little to no fear to running up, doing either, and forcing bad spacing. You don’t have good range as Doc, so you think you get to slack on your shieldgame. Learn how and when to dash-in -> shield. Out of shield, you’re not looking at a whole lot for punishment. You’ve got grabs, upsmash, n.air, u.air, and up+b. Whatever you can slide in. Upsmash and grab are the best things you’ve got in terms of following up, but you just need to have a plan and take what you can get. Your CC game is ok, it involves a lot of dashing in, too. You don’t really get too much from it, normally a d.smash. You can try some other stuff like jabs, grabs, and tilts (D.TILT GIMMICK HERE), but you’ll probably be in a hurry to throw something out, so you’ll take your d.smash and go from there.

The last option you normally have is to just flat out make them miss. Whiff punishing. Well, whiff PUNISHING isn’t really one of Doc’s strong suits, but you can make them miss and take advantage of the fact that your opponent is closer to you. This requires you to stay outside of the range, faking in and out in an attempt to bait an attack. The one thing that’s hard to pick up on while using this is what you can actually move in on. With the way the game is, it’s possible for somebody to whiff something and throw something else before you can react to it. You have to learn what to look for and when you need to continue moving.

If you’re trying to keep people from passing all over you, you have to be willing to throw out some aerials and whatnot. Double aerials are great, but you just have to maintain your spacing so that you don’t get caught. Double b.airs, double u.airs, SHBA -> double jump B.air b.air (SHBADJBABA, haven’t used that acronym in ages), you’ve got all sorts of things to keep people from running all over you. Just learn when to stop or else you’ll get sniped out of the air.

At long range, you’ve got your pills. If you’re trying to stay away from people, your goal is to force your opponent to come in from a ****ty angle. If they’re slow in the air, throw a bunch of ground pills, vice versa if their ground game is horrid. If they’re good in either or, you just want to try to take on as much damage as you can and keep yourself out of a bad place. You CANNOT keep a character out with pills alone. It’s physically impossible, don’t try. However, you can make people come in on bad terms, send them out, and start again. That’s totally do-able.

At the end of the day, Doc’s defense exists. Stick to your plan, and try to stay on the move when it’s possible. There aren’t too many times you want to straight up defend with a shield or CC as opposed to working that into your pressure, so don’t try to hang around and let people come in on it. Move around with aerials and try to find a gap where you can take initiative from your opponent.

****

More doc specific notes.

In the event he d.smashes your shield, you WD -> D.smash him back. Anytime he tries to start ANY pressure, you can pretty much wavedash away from him and get out of it. If you think he’s going to follow you, SH b.air (or n.air).

DO NOT LET HIM COME IN WITH FREE F.AIRS. If he tries to come in with some incorrectly placed f.airs, you u.air/n.air/b.air and stop that ****.

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding with Doc is actually fundamentally easy. You’re either going to b.air, cape, or grab the ledge. Anytime you want to b.air, you’re looking for a time when you can get TO your opponent and they won’t swing back. Sometimes this is jumping clean out and b.airing, sometimes this is wavedashing off the stage and b.airing, or shorthopping off. You just have to be familiar with the angles, timings, etc etc. Caping comes with knowing when a cape will give you a benefit. If somebody’s trying to fall to the ledge, it is actually very viable to cape them so they can’t grab the ledge. If for nothing else, you’ll atleast net about 12% from them in the process, so don’t forget about it. Grabbing the ledge obviously stops sweetspots or any ledge grabbing attempts, nothing to it. When you start combining the three, that’s when you start getting crazy results. Grab the ledge so they can’t take it, and then ledgedrop cape on the way up (or ledgehop cape if they’re going over). Ledgedrop b.airs to have invincible b.airs. Etc etc. With those 3 tools alone, you can do a lot of damage on the edge.

Outside of that, you’re looking for either obvious stuff to hit (i.e., they’re right in front of the ledge, you tilt or d.smash), or you’re looking for some fairly gimmicky stuff (d.airs, pills, u.airs, AND THE YODEL!!!) All of that stuff comes from knowing when and where to throw it out. You don’t want to try to yodel somebody (down+b) if they’re low, or if their character is real good at defending themselves, where as pills aren’t extremely useful after your opponent has double jumped (you want to snipe a double jump with a pill, but if you keep pilling, then you’re giving them something to up+b into). There are some exceptions to the rules, like always, but just know that you don’t really NEED the special stuff. They’re decorations for the room known as your ledge.


***

Doc matchup notes.

If you stuff that double jump, be ready to cape. That’s greedy but it works. Realistically, if put him in a position to where he has to up+b onto the stage, he’s dead and it’s your fault if you screw up at this point.

If he’s going to pill and come in behind them, n.air.

Your main goal in edgeguarding is to get him to pull up. Jump out there. You don’t have to chase him down, he’s doc. He knows good and **** well he’s either got to fight you or die. Wreck his day for coming in to fast, or just let him drop if he pulls up. There’s not too much he can really do. If he’s above the stage, WATCH FOR THE AIRDODGE. I’d almost go as far as to say wait for it, but some people straight up forget they can airdodge onto the stage.

And don’t be fooled by tornado. If he’s in range, jump out and hit him. If he’s doing it to move you from the ledge, you have enough time to move and then get back on the ledge. It’s really a parlor trick.

Recovery

Recovering sucks.

Like, everything is a gimmick at this point. Tornado does give a small bit of distance if you can PTP, but that’s all it really accomplishes. Pilling to protect positions is good, but most people can cut through your pills or hold their position. Defending yourself if viable, but your lack of range makes it to where it’s not fool-proof.

All in all, you just have to mix when and where you decide to go in. A lot of people try to credit doc for having a good recovery because “of the threat of his up+b”. And yes, while stages spikes are the greatest thing that can happen, you have to understand that it’s pretty crappy that you HAVE to up+b in the first place. If you land on the stage, you’re getting punished for it. Thank god when your punishment doesn’t involve you going back off the stage which it should.

When you’re coming back, sometimes you’ll have to do some waiting. Obviously because you don’t want to run into an edgeguard. But here’s why it blows, you’re letting opportunities pass as you wait. Sure you’re throwing pills and whatnot as you’re waiting, but all you’re really doing is shutting your options down to sweetspotting.

It’s really not a good list of options.

You’re never going to land on a platform unless you’re recovering from practically ON the stage, you’re not going to airdodge unless you’re right ON the stage, you’re going to do a lot of hoping and praying.

It’s not abysmally bad (that’s Roy’s job), but man, recovering is pretty depressing.

*****

You know what goes here.

You want to pill on recovery to keep your opponent from jumping out, if at all possible. If you can’t stop him, then your next goal is to keep him from being right in front of you to b.air you. You maybe have to double jump and d.air through him to get around the edgeguard, but it’s either that or die at that point.

If you have to up+b, you’re screwed, and you know it. That’s like, the ONE constant in a Doc ditto. If you somehow get back past the cape, take a second to completely jank on your opponent and lower his morale some. You need all the help you can get on your recovery.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
I mean, I guess I can throw a few dogy tricks in here for you.

Spin-Guarding: When you’re edgeguarding people, for whatever reason, you’ll get a different response depending on which way you’re facing. If your back is to the ledge, people tend to go around you as to not get baired, or they might come in faster to keep you from wavedashing on the ledge. If you’re facing the ledge, you might see people jumping up so they don’t get rained on by pills or waiting to not get caped (why I don’t know). The thing you need to realize is that a lot of people will give you different reactions. Sometimes these reactions aren’t what you want, especially if it involves jumping over you. So how do you make it to where your opponent has to guess what you’re going to set up? You spin. Just randomly walk back and forth. Easy idea, hilarious results. You’d be surprised how many people won’t jump you’re not standing there telegraphing a back air, or how many people will random airdodge as you turn around to face them. You just get all sorts of mixed results. You do have to stop when they come close and actually DO something.

Doc’s F.air: Understand that the best way to DI this and live is to NOT DI. Get the concept out of your head that you have to DI everything. That’s generally true, but that’s not law. Doc’s F.air sends you at about a 60 degree angle. DIing in sends you at like, 80 degrees, which is stupid if he’s trying to kill you off the top anyway. DIing out flatlines you, which is OK when you have an entire stage to spare (going across FD or something), but it’s stupid when you got caught in a corner. All in all, Doc’s f.air is super gimmicky when it comes to DI. I probably can’t make you believe me because you have the whole “DI everything” logic engrained in your head, but have fun flying off the top at dumb %s that you shouldn’t be dying at. ^_^

The MLG Combo: 0% F.air -> F.air -> F.air. Just some random idea I had in pools at MLG and it worked too **** good then. Still works today. No secrets about it, just chase lacks of DI.

The Kumite: a.k.a. the Kage-Kaze. B.air suicide edgeguard. Just know that you can do it as Doc to pretty much any character in the game. Great for securing a gimp.

 

[Dogysamich]

011. Ganondorf
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 55-45 Doc
The General Consensus: 40-60 Ganon
The General Flow

No fear.

This is my favorite matchup with Doc. You get to do everything you ever wanted to do, Ganon gets to do everything he wants to do, it’s just good times for everybody. Fun all around.

The matchup is pretty crazy. Your job is to just piss ganon off. You can run away and pill, you can rush him down and stay in close with n.airs and jabs, you pretty much get to go crazy in this matchup. All the while, you’ve gotta avoid getting bucked by out by ganon’s entire moveset. It’s just comical.

You actually get to combo and CG the mess out of ganon, but he’s only gotta hit you like, 3 times to make up for it. By that fact alone, you can’t afford to be too aggressive, and you can’t be too defensive.

Everything just winds up being a mad scramble.


Offense

You either want to be far the **** away from ganon throwing pills or in his face pressing buttons. Come to think of it, if you’re horrible at pressing button, you’ll probably hate this matchup. You don’t have to be uber (I’m fairly bad), but you have to be able to keep stringing stuff well enough to force ganon to move away from you.

At long range, the point of your pills is to just pin him down. Contrary to how ganon looks, and how his character is, this is actually very hard to do. His jumps are too frickin good, so he’s going to jump a lot. You want to be real hesitant on running in on an aerial ganon because there really isn’t a huge window to get in. You’ll either run into a f.air as he comes down, or a jab when he gets down. Tack on as much damage as you can and get right outside of his attack range.

From there, you’re looking to jump in and hang on for a ride. Ganon shouldn’t let you poke at him, seeing as he’s got you beat on all fronts in range. Retreating f.airs, d.tilts, f.tilts, and even his jab. Whatever he wants to throw at you is going to beat your range, so you need to slip in.

Once you get in though, you press buttons and you keep that sand n****r on his toes. You want try your best to stay low to not get sniped by an u.air (which ganon WILL throw if you linger in the air too long), however, you need to occasionally jump and do an aerial to keep him from trying SH D.air, B.air, or retreating f.airs. It’s all bout the checks and balances. Get that grab and you’re pretty much good to go. If you let up for something like an u.tilt or d.smash, then you should be done. Ganon’s not really going to hesitate too much when he sees a gap. He’s ok to take a hit as it’s hard to chase him in the air. So if and when you try to stop a jumpout with an u.tilt, be ready for him to actually jump afterwards and do something. If he’s slow you can still cut it off, but yeah, risk reward at that point.

If you can keep making good reads and keep him close, he’s going to try to roll. You’ve gotta catch the roll and stay with him. If you can’t stay on top of him, then you need to throw on the breaks. He’s liable to roll out into some retreating aerial, and you WON’T catch him. Just let him go and start over. If you read the roll, then nothing’s changed, the pileup just moved over some.

If he ever decides to go on a platform, be reaaaaaaal careful about chasing him up there. He can jump out of your range pretty easy and come back with a d.air. You’re almost better off leaving him up there, but you know good and well that won’t always work. Throw some pills and try to coax him off, or come from above him. If you can’t do either one, then understand that you’re going to have to go up and defend. You realistically just can’t attack ganon on a platform unless he’s asleep up there.

All in all, you just need to stay on top of him or stay out. You wanna make him swing and miss so you can get in, and then keep him from swinging once you get there. It’s pretty interesting to zip around while avoiding death.

Defense

Oof.

That’s what you’ll say EVERY SINGLE TIME you get hit. Ganon doesn’t have a soft hit. It’s just a whole bunch of “Oof.”

The one thing you CANNOT let happen is letting ganon push you to the edge of the stage. If he does, you pretty much have to defensively push your way back to the middle. You can’t really fight him as he can just retreating f.air, you can’t really jump past him as he can cover your whole jump are, and you can’t run by him because he’s (hopefully) not stupid. However, you really HAVE to try something. It’s more of a mix and match kind of thing. You gotta give him false hope and trick him into backing up. Make him think you’re going to roll to give yourself some breathing room, go back to the ledge if you need to. You just can’t try to take the whole 10 yards from him, he’s got that on lock.

If you can avoid that, you’re going to be ok. Ganon can’t really put a pressure on ANYBODY, all he has is pokes and grabs. They just hurt. A lot. If you’re near him, going in the air is asking him to u.air you. You can stop it with a d.air, but you have to be fairly close to him so that you don’t get clipped by the end of it. Other than that, you need to watch for him poking with aerials.

On the ground, you have to watch wavelanding lanes. Although ganon could be a good half a stage away, he’s liable to waveland in and d.tilt or something. You can keep control of this by throwing a lot of ground pills, but you just have to be ready when you leave this option open.

If ganon DOES get close to you and you put your shield up, for the love of god be ready for some jump tricks. Ganon can do all sorts of double aerial tricks, like FH D.air -> DJ (something). On the other end, he could d.air down into a grab or something if you’re trying not to jump or roll away from him. Being next to him on his terms is not kool. You can’t really throw out aerials to stop him from coming in, or you’ll get picked off, but you need to keep him honest about it. Don’t let him come in for free. Throw some aerials and back up when you can. If he gets you in shield, you want to stay low and get out of there. He’s not going to really chase you on the ground aside from trying to f.air you. If you can get away from that, you’re in the clear.

If and when you do get hit, don’t make things worse than they have to be. Like, unless you’re GOING to die from something, you want to DI out obviously, but don’t try to force your way in on ganon. It’s one thing that you never want to force your way in on somebody, but unlike most characters, he only need to hit you ONCE to get what he wants. He’s not going to combo the trash out of you, so you constantly trying to come back on him with a d.air is just helping him out. IF HE HITS YOU GO THE **** AWAY. IF HE JABS YOU ONCE, BACK THE **** UP AS THEY’LL KEEP COMING TILL YOU GO AWAY OR HIT THE DECK. Stop running into walls.
This is one match where you really need to keep moving. Ganon CANNOT chase you down, and he has nothing at long range. The best way to defend yourself is to run when you’re done attacking so that he can’t start. If you can keep him away from you when you’re not busy, he’s gunna new library pass to find some good reads.

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding ganon is hilarious. You would think that a character like him would have an ***-terrible recovery, and at a first glance he really does. But in all actuality, ganon can defend himself on recovery EXTREMELY well, especially vs you.

If you can jump out and cut off the down+b, do it. This is actually like, the ONLY time you want to jump out at ganon, unless you know he’s not ready. He can’t do anything for a brief moment after he down+bs, so just chill out and let him come to you. You don’t need to cut him off and steal his jump, you run the risk of getting down+b spiked, and that’s just embarrassing.

Any other time, you need to just hang near the stage and be ready to stuff an up+b. You’re ok to try and b.air him beforehand, but know that if you telegraph it he’s got ways to stop it. Ganon’s double jump is fast and high enough to where he can jump around you and d.air if you’re related to Captain Obvious (-Salute- Captain Obvious.). If you try to come from high above him, he can u.air you and then recover.

Oof.

So your best bet is to just hang out and cape him/edgehog when he comes back. If he up+b’s past you, don’t fret, just get up and chuck his *** off again. Or combo the mess out of him and send him off the other side. It’s bout whatever at this point, you’re in the clear. You just don’t want to take unneeded risks and die for it. Again, he’s only looking for ONE hit.

A word of the wise; if he’s recovering high and he’s near the stage, just wait him out. When he gets about a character’s height above you (a Doc character’s height, so 2 docs in measurement), you can try to take a shot at him if you want, but any higher than that and your *** better not try it. That’s about enough time for him to double jump d.air (or dj f.air you) on reaction. You can bait it (insert dogy gimmick here), but you do NOT want to mess with this. It looks like it’d be a low-risk, high-reward situation, but getting punched in the face is getting punched in the face. That sucks.

Recovery

Uuuuum. Guess what? This sucks too.

Ganon edgeguards are like everything. They stay on that Oof tier. He can hop out and punch, he can chill and d.air, or he can do TIPMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN (reverse u.air). Um, I could list some kool things here, but just know he hits.

If you’re going for the ledge, you have to sweetspot, ganon has too many options for you not to. D.air is depressing if it hits, even if you meteor cancel. It just hurts, so you want to avoid it when you can. Reverse u.air is the worst, though. Like, if you get hit with this, you’re dead. You have to go around him or stay away from him.

Pills aren’t really going to stop ganon if he wants to get out and hit you. I mean, they cut out SOME of his options, but it doesn’t stop his best option. So you can pill to try to stop him from getting in position on the stage, but once he’s there or he jumps off, you might as well stop. You’re just wasting energy at that point.

Stay away from him off the stage. That is all.

The Ganon Canon

Respect Ganon’s aerials, and his ability to position himself barely out of range and land one on you.

Like I said, Ganon looks like a character you could and want to run over, but you just can’t do it. He’s got too much range and his jumps are too good for him. So with that being said, the number one rule you need to know about fighting a (good) ganon is to not run in straight lines. It doesn’t matter if he’s literally trembling in his shield (I’ve seen a ganon do this, ironically), you running straight in is asking him to do a retreating f.air.

Ganon is a matchup that’s great for practicing offensive movement, as you’ll learn REAL QUICK whether you actually tricked somebody or not. You gotta be able to stop on a dime or when to jump over incoming jabs to get in on ganon. You think you might be ok after the first one, but then he just backs up to do a second one, second leads to third, etc etc. You have to chain your movements to allow you to weave and dodge without giving him room. You give him room, and he’s going to just expand out and start again.


Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
Ganon Jab Cancelling: Only time you can even contest this is if you shield the first one jacked up in his face. Other than that, you move. Doesn’t matter if you cc it or not, you won’t win.
Ganon Grab: You can duck it if you’re a little ways out. You can also duck it with a dash attack.
Ganon’s Down+B: this move gets stopped by EVERYTHING on the ground. It’s kinda sad. Jabs clank with this. Just be ready for it, it’s not that great, but it kills if you get hit.

Ganon up+b OoS: Some ganons (and capfals, now that I think about it) will try this out of shield, as they have very few good options. There’s really nothing you can do about this on reaction, you just have to guess when it’s going to happen and BACK DA F*** UP!

Dogy Tips vs Ganon:

-Stay low when you approach. It’s not that ganon CANT stop you when you come in on the ground, but he has to be more stationary when he’s dealing with a grounded target. You take u.airs out of the equation.

-Don’t risk getting hit. If you have the chance to move away from him to avoid further damage, do it. He only wants to hit you once, but he’ll take as many as you give him.

-If he goes on a platform, stay out of his range. You can’t really do anything to him, but he can do a lot to you.

012. Luigi
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 50-50 Even
The General Consensus: 50-50 Even
The Extra Special 18Spikes Ratio: 10-90 Luigi
The General Flow

Lay it on the ground.

Fighting luigi is odd, because you would think you wouldn’t want to stay on the ground with him. In all actuality, you don’t want to be in the air with him. Although he’s an obvious thread on the ground, the threat of his aerials vs air opponents is a very good reason not to jump up with him often. Not only can his aerials combo, but his f.air by itself can beat most of your aerials one way or another.

All that aside, Luigi’s air mobility is horrible, and your ground control is awesome. You want to FORCE him to come in through the air and pick him off (as opposed to jumping in/away from him and allowing him to do the same to you). Luigi’s wavedash is obviously dangerous if you let him start on it and go where he wants, so if you control WHERE he can go with it, you’re going to kill the problem.

When it comes to it, most of your fighting vs luigi is going to be quick two or three hit spurts, then you hitting the eject button. Luigi’s love to n.air out of trouble, and you CANNOT afford to get hit by it. It’s worse than pretty much any other n.air in that it leads into combos easy (it pops you up), so you’ll want to be doing a lot of dashing out and in to get around it.

In the end, Luigi isn’t really so bad (NOT AS BAD AS 18S MAKES HIM OUT TO BE LOLOLOLOl), you just need to focus on stringing together a bunch of consecutive hits.

Offense

Try your ****edest not to jump in on him. If he’s neutral, you should lose every time.

Any jumping-in you do vs luigi have to be methodical, period. He doesn’t have an aerial that WON’T work for defense, literally. That’s not to say you never want to TRY to jump in, but you better have a good reason and a good situation. You can pull some random-tier nonsense like you would practically every other character in the game.

So with that being said, you want to keep your approaches on the ground.

At long range, you want to throw a lot of ground pills. At this point, you’re obviously not going to hit luigi cause you’re long range, but you’d like him to be in the air or coming down from the air when you get there. Not so much because you want to fight his aerials, but him in the air is easier to pinpoint (upon landing) than him already on the ground. You don’t want to try and catch a luigi who’s on ice skates. That’s some nonsense in itself. So throw get a groundpill or two going to force him to do something or jump it.

This is another matchup where midrange realistically doesn’t exist. If you can catch him here, you’re ok to f.tilt or cape him here. However, it’s hard to really SEE midrange cause he’ll be zipping in and out of it so much. You’re more concerned with pills and “OH **** HE’S IN MY FACE”. One thing to note, if you DO catch him sliding in, try to put a f.air on him as he comes in. Yes a f.air. The thing you need to look for his him WAVEDASHING in. You’re obviously aiming at a small window at this point, but being able to nail this (even if he blocks) will get you a huge reward. Either he’ll get hit, which is awesome, or you’re looking for him to block it, which pushes him back and gives him less room.

Keep him contained if possible.

You wanna cut Luigi’s skating rink down to a pond. You keep him contained in corners and whatnot, and attacking his is a breeze. He’s not going to WANT to jump, he’s really a target in the air. On the ground, you can poke, prod, and mix him up as you see fit. It’s not that he can’t defend himself, but without his wavedash, he’s got to respect your desire to come in and leave.

Whenever you land a hit on him, you don’t want to stay around him too long. Not at first, atleast. You don’t want to try chaining u.airs or d.air setups because luigi is going to n.air. For whatever reason, (I honestly think it’s just the nature of the character, nothing with game mechanics because ALL characters can do it), Luigi is prone to n.airing out of your stuff. The reason why this is so bad is, again, because his n.air sends you up, which sets YOU up for combos. So, you’re thinking “Yeah, I know this, this is why you can’t combo luigi.” First off, you’re wrong, you just have to be honest about when you combo him or you’re going to eat a n.air. But second, and more importantly, you can actually use this to your advantage. Stop and give luigi a chance to n.air. If he does, move out of the way and come on top of him again. You know he’s not going to do ANYTHING until he hits the ground anyway. It’s not like his n.air has an amazing recovery, so him n.airing is really just setting you up to come in on him again (this is a perfect time to come in with a f.air if you want to).

Eventually what will happen is luigi will stop trying to n.air (or stop doing it ALL the time), and THAT is when you get to start chaining stuff on him that shouldn’t be allowed. You still can’t go wild with him until you get him into real juggle percents (when he starts being knocked over by attacks), but when you get him to stop n.airing all the time, you open the door to take one or two more free hits that you shouldn’t be allowed to have. Keep milking it for all it’s worth, but keep baiting n.airs.

Luigi isn’t tough, he’s just a character that calls for a good set of brakes. Failure to yield at the right time will cause you to get wrecked in the middle of your own offense. It’s all bout those 3 C’s.

Contain, Catch, and Cheat. …[/horrible-dogy-puns]
*Don’t worry, I slapped myself for that one*

Defense

Defending against luigi, lol. It’s actually pretty funny, Luigi’s offense isn’t really too hot, you just need to have a good plan for both sides.

First and foremost, you’d prefer to defend against him on the ground. Although you don’t have too much of a problem with his aerials, that’s where he can generate his pressure (per say). If you let him get up there, you have to respect shorthop double aerials, and I’m talking stuff that leads to n.air (meaning he can come down and put some pressure on you). Although you can try to jump up and b.air him, or tilt him out of the air (which you should try occasionally, but not too often), the best way to limit his aerial offense is to move. Remember, Luigi has horrible mobility. If you keep on the move, he’s going to have a difficult time trying to pinpoint you because he cannot chase you in the air. Heck, you can literally walk away from him if he tries to approach from the air (you can’t ACTUALLY do it, but he’s literally that slow), so as long as you keep moving, he’s going to have to keep himself grounded.

And being on the ground is where his problems come in. You control the ground. You can dictate when he comes In with a mix of pills and tilts. The only goals you really have with these are to disrupt his wavedashes and close distance to where you’re inside his wavedash range. As long as you’re side his wavedash range, he has to walk or run towards you, as wavedashing will get him d.smashed or grabbed (or any shenanigans you want to try. I’m real fond of upsmashes).

If you’re outside of wavedash range, however, you’re going to have to watch for him skating in, obviously. Here’s the kicker; on the ground, there’s not a lot he can REALLY do that works. His jab mixup is legit like Mario’s, so that’s works. However, everything else he throws at you is easy to stop. You can realistically stop ANYTHING else he’ll do from the ground with a shield, and then punish it. Tilts, Smashes, you name it, you can shield and punish it. If you want to be extra sure on the punish, you can CC tilts (same with smashes, but at low percents.)

If you see them wavedashing back and forth, trying to aim something and make it safe, step up or step back before you go into a defense. It doesn’t matter which way you go, you’ll get something out of it. Stepping up makes them wavedash too far, which leads to you getting shield punishes, stepping back makes them more likely to miss, which gives you whiff punishes. You gotta adjust, figure out which one they’re NOT looking for (if any) and milk it.

Miiiiiiiiilk it.

You just want to keep him from wavedashing all over you. SHBAWDs work great for making him slow up, but you can’t really rely on them for an actual defense, as he can just go up and chop you for a trade. Pills are awesome, but there’s obviously a “too close” for using pills (For the record, SHFF pill is beast in this matchup. Mobile ground pills). When it’s all said and done, you’re really just lookin to mix

1) If you let him do it or not
2) When you’ll deal with it
3) How you’ll deal with it.

Them 3 C’s man.

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding luigi. … You can go about this two ways. You can either play it safe, which will sometimes gives luigi chances he doesn’t deserve, or you can roll some serious dice on him.

In general, you want to wait through all the nonsense he’s going to do, try a b.air when he comes in close (if he’s in range), and then look for an edgehog/cape when he up+bs. HE’S GOT NO HORIZONTAL ON HIS UP+B, SO HE’S GOT TO BE RIGHT NEXT TO THE LEDGE TO DO IT. If he’s too low to hop out and b.air (which sometimes you don’t want to do anyway, you can opt to try and pelt him with pills. Pills really disrupt luigi’s recovery. Stopping the up+b is a 50/50. Half the time he’s going to shoot past the lead to hit you out of an edgehog attempt, and then fall down; half the time he’s gunna’s just sweetspot. You can eyeball the distances easy, but just know that he can stop you if you’re slow.

The only other thing you really need to look out for is his tornado. It really isn’t a threat at all in recovery, but … well, just look down in the gimmick section. I’ll fill you in there.

Now lets talk about Vegas, baby!

If you get a good read on where he’s trying to side-b, you can jump out and cape it. Caping it isn’t goin to kill the recovery, but it will make him throw a controller at you. You’re obviously rolling dice because he could misfire, but you need to consider some things.

1) Misfire is like 1 outta 12 or something like that, I dunno.
2) You could always cape respecting the misfire (actually, if you space yourself right, you can cape misfire on reaction)
3) Unless you’re at like, 70% or so, you’re not going to DIE from misfire (which actually still hurts his recovery).

So you really don’t have TOO much to lose from trying this. If you’re scared to cape (which Is understandable, I tend to shy away from it unless I’m at the throw-away percent) then you can replace Cape with b.air. Comes out faster, still get essentially the same result.

Now that you know HOW to deal with side-b, the next dice thing is figuring out where he’s aiming. More often than not, luigi looks to aim BELOW the stage (a good luigi, atleast), He wants to be out of your attack range, knowing good and well he can climb fairly far. A lesser Luigi (or a more brave one) may try to go at you or above the stage. The best way to go about this is to jump off the stage, and fall with them. SPACED OUT so you can react. If he goes further than you’re willing to travel, eject and go to the ledge.

Now, you have the when. A general rule of thumb is that the higher they are, the more likely they are to try multiple side-bs. So if they start to hold it for a long time, they’re going to look to go low.

In the end, dealin with the Lu isn’t a problem, the question is how brave do you want to be on his recovery?

Recovery

……. Um, I mean his edgeguarding isn’t anything fancy or spectacular, but it’s more than enough to deal with your crap recovery.

Luigi’s not going to chase you far off the stage because well, that takes too much time to get out there. He’s gunna keep it real close to the stage. He’s looking for some aerial, normally a b.air or a f.air, or a ledgehop n.air. You want to just throw pills at him to keep him from the ledge and disrupt him.

There really isn’t ANYTHING spectacular about luigi’s edgeguard (That I know of), it’s just super standard. Don’t do dumb stuff, that’s about all I can really say.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Luigi’s Tornado: For luigi to use his tornado, he has to use it once on the ground per every time he does it in the air (think of it at CHARGING his tornado). He starts the match charged. He doesn’t get a great deal of lift from this, but he gets some horizontal (that’s all he REALLY needs from this). The thing to keep in mind is that if he uses it on in the air, he’s likely to use it on the ground to charge it, and he might use it on YOU (as he can combo from it.)

Luigi SS Up+B: SHINRYUKEN! He’s got to be jacked up on you for this to work. Looks to punish techs, rolls, and spotdodges with it, normally.

Dogy Tips vs Luigi

-He doesn’t have more range than you, so if he’s predictable with his wavedashes, you can just fight him with range. If you know he’s going to come in and do something on the ground, jump it with a f.air.

-SHFF pill. It’s beast.

-CCing luigi is pretty beast. Especially his n.air. You can CC that for a LONG time, especially if luigi likes to throw it early to stop you from following up.

013. Donkey Kong
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 6-4 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 60-40 Doc
The General Consensus: 7-3 Doc (rolls eyes)
The General Flow

YAFACE!

Donkey Kong. He’s a kool guy. He enjoys his work (as you can tell by his cheesy a** smile on the character select screen). He enjoys U.AIRING THE EVERLASTNIG CRAP OUT OF ANY AND EVERYBODY. :MAD: :MAD:

Dear god! You’ve got 2 things to worry about in this matchup. B.air, which is pretty beast, AND FRICKING U.AIRS. It’s soooooo hilarious. Watching you lose 50% to PSSH PSSH PSSH PSSH!. Oh lawd.

The matchup is actually pretty kool, though. Like, it’s very fair imo. You’ll spend a lot of your time far away from DK throwing pills, and just trying to contain him, and he’ll try to b.air his way closer so that he can try to land a grab. When you guys finally do meet up, one of you is either going to try to run in, in which the other can stop with a tilt or smash or something, or you’re going to try to jump, which the other can stop (ALTHOUGH DK STOPPING A JUMP WITH AN U.AIR IS UUUUUGH)

You’re going to be a little more on the offensive end because DK isn’t going to TRY and run you down. He can’t really approach too well. He can inch his way towards you with b.airs, poke, and then grab, but he doesn’t have a very useable approach move. So if you can force that on him, you’re good.


Offense

Stay on him.

Staying on top of DK is a nightmare for him. He can’t really get anything accomplished with you in his face except for pray that you screw up and let him grab or, or that you jump too far and let him u.air you. If you can avoid both of those, he’s to try to get away from you.

His shield sucks so he’s not going to stay in it for long. But I mean, if you can get it down some before you even get IN there, you make attacking him soooo much easier.

So with that being said, at long range, chuck the pills. DK is a character that you can force ALL sorts of bad things on with pills. He’s not exactly the most mobile character, so moving around pills is a chore for him. He’ll get chipped every now and then. He can swat at them to keep himself safe, but then he’s running the risk of letting you move in on him as he’s dealing with it. Be ready to do so. He can also start putting his shield up every now and then, but he does NOT want to do that. This is, however, the one thing you want to happen. If you catch him putting his shield up for pills, keep at it until his shield is gutter trash. It’s already bad as is, but a small DK shield means you can come in with some crazy stuff and he has to beat it or move. It’s reaaaaaaaaaal easy to shieldstab DK.

As you come in closer, you need to look out for tilts and his b.air. He can keep you out. You’re not going to beat him at midrange, period. His ENTIRE moveset is midrange, so he just needs to be setup to deal with you. Don’t try to mess with him here.

As you come in, if you need to get around a b.air, FH D.air is great. The alternative to this is sh u.air, if you think he’s going high. Both of them lead to you putting DK above you, which is awesome. But anyway, if he doesn’t take the bait, you move in.

Get in his face. When you get in his face, DK gets scared. He wants to grab so bad, but as long as you stay away from it, he doesn’t have too much to fall back on. If you stay low, you’re going to avoid the real dangerous stuff he can throw (b.air and U.AIR UUUUUUUUUUGH!). If he’s not in shield, the ONE thing to be weary of (while on the ground) is his d.smash. It’s fast, and it sends you out, end of discussion. Like, if you think he’ll TRY it, let him. Punish it afterwards. But you don’t want to mess with it and get kicked back out. Other than that, you have a pretty clear runway to land whatever you can while staying with him. If you get behind him, you want to look for him trying to jump and b.air and stay under it. Otherwise, it’s the same old “Don’t be where he thinks you’re going to be”. He has to make some good guesses to get you off of him.

You want that grab. Grabs are good vs DK. Heck, anything that leads to you knocking him up is good as he has a horrible time defending himself in the air. You want to do ANYTHING that puts him above you, and keep him there.

When it’s said and done, you just want to work your way in and stay there. If you ever feel the need to get out, the LAST thing you want to do is go up, especially high up. DK is looking for that and is going to pick you up off u.airs. Back out by keeping yourself low. Just keep this in mind; the closer you are to him, the lower you want to be.

Defense

Don’t. Get. Grabbed.

Just, ugh. U.airs for days come from grabs. And it’s so bad, because the default thing to do to get away from grabs is to jump away. BUT IF YOU JUMP, YOU’RE DOING THE HARD PART FOR DK. Now he’s just got to take target practice at you. So, again, you want to keep yourself grounded as he comes in. You don’t want to do it ALL the time, as you’re asking him to run in and grab, but jumping, by default, is bad.

The main thing you have to watch for is his spacing. DK realistically CAN’T just run in on you unless you let him. He’s got no real approach moves, and has to rely on makeshift stuff like n.airs if he wants to aerial approach. Realistically, he has to keep you from swinging (with b.airs) until he can get close enough to run in and grab or catch you trying to do something. Keep him away from you.

Lay on them pills. Turn his 100m dash into the 100m hurdles. Having him jump in at you is great as you can pick him out of his aerials. And again, if you catch him jumping clear in your range, you get some u.airs and d.airs. You WANT that, as you get to bump him up again. Don’t let him stay on the ground very long.

Once he gets too close for pills, you need to stay on the move. DK isn’t going to teleport over to you, so you don’t want to stand still and let him size you up. I mean, he doesn’t have anything TO size you up with, but you need to make spacing hard for him. It’s actually tricky because you have to balance between giving him too much room and running into b.airs. Mix and match where you go.

If you can time him landing and jumping again to b.air, jump at him with a d.air. FH or SH, doesn’t matter. If you get next to him with a d.air before he b.airs, you can cut it off and move pst him. You don’t have to completely stop what you’re doing when he gets close to you, you just need to be careful.

When he gets in your face, DON’T PANIC. IT’S ONLY A GORILLA, NOTHING DANGEROUS. You have to be willing to back up and give him room, as he can’t chase you down. There’s really not a lot he can do keep with you if you move early enough. The ONE thing you do have to worry about though, is if he has a giant punch. That thing is LONG, so if he has one charged, don’t telegraph wavedash or roll backwards. That’s going to get you jacked in the jaw. Hard.

The one thing you cannot do Is give up a grab. Too much nonsense can come from a grab. You have to be willing to n.air out (or d.air to try and stop a headbutt), wavedash, roll, whatever if you see him coming. DK’s grab is too good in that he can setup A LOT of stuff outside of just combos with his grab. All sorts of cargo gimmicks, stage spikes, suicides, etc etc. If he’s in your face, you’re pretty much OK to take some damage as opposed to getting grabbed.

If you’re on the run from DK, the one thing you want to TRY and avoid is running to a platform. It’s obvious what happens from this, you’re above him. It’s not the end of the world if you do so as you are putting distance between the two of you, but you can’t just STOP and take a breath when you get there, you gotta keep moving. He can jump pretty far through a platform and u.air if he thinks you’re going to jump in range, or he can SHFFL (really, “auto cancel”) u.airs if you’re going to stay there. Worst case scenario, he can poke at you with u.tilts and u.smashes. Platforms should really be checkpoints in your race to get away.

The goal in the end is to keep DK out. It’s not easy, but that’s what you have to do. Although you’re pretty dangerous when you’re up in somebody’s face, that’s ALL DK has, and his “up close” is longer than yours. You cannot let him come in on his terms. Keep him in shield up close to you, keep some distance between you till you can stop him with a pill or something, just DON’T let him in.

If he gets there, don’t panic. You don’t want to get u.aired, but being scared and trying to premature run out of corners is what’s going to cause it. Just keep backing up and wait till you can squeeze out of your situation and move out.


Edgeguarding

DK has like, no vertical. So if you can b.air him or EVEN D.TILT HIM. You’re going to pretty much destroy his recovery.

DK is the one character who is looking to go high when he can, because low is trouble for him. Be ready to jump up and b.air him and bring him down.

He really CAN’T defend himself on recovery. His defense is to up+b. So if he’s a long ways out, feel free to jump out and b.air. If you think he’s going to up+B, come over him with a d.air and then push him out with a b.air when you’re done. DK’s a character who’s real easy to scare by jumping out at. You don’t need to go all the way out, just enough to make him pull up some. Take the ledge on the way back, and b.air him down.

If he’s up+bing back to the stage, be ready to poke him with a f.tilt. As long as you knock him out and he up+b’s again, you’re ok. It’s fairly hard for him to SS, as you can just turn and take the ledge from him. Don’t let him on the stage, though. He doesn’t have a lot of recovery lag on his up+b (Its better off if you think he has NO recovery lag).

Not a lot to really be said about DK’s recovery, it’s super linear.

Recovery

Now recovering against DK……. sucks Actually isn’t bad at all.

He can’t chase you far out and he can’t chase you low. Cause his recovery blows. So yeah, you’ve got a lot of room the work with on recovery. Infact, most DKs tend to stay on stage and try to punish missed sweetspots, or edgehog. Easy mac generic.

Here’s where it gets tricky.

DK can jump out and b.air, that should be obvious. What’s hard to catch is spinning kong edgeguards. That’s ledgedropped up+bs. You CAN’T beat that. You CANNOT beat that. So basically, if DK gets the ledge, going low isn’t an option anymore.

So you HAVE TO HAVE TO HAVE TO stop Dk from grabbing the ledge. You HAVE TO HAVE TO HAVE TO throw those magical pills at him. If you can’t stop him from getting the ledge, then you still have to throw pills to make him move around and hopefully disrupt his timing. You’re not going high from far out, you’re doc. Your recovery blows. But you HAVE TO HAVE TO HAVE TO try and make his life harder than it needs to be to stop you.

You cannot just let him SIT there on the ledge and recovery. That’s how you get destroyed on recovery.

Other than that, it’s business as usual. SS to avoid normal ****, don’t hang yourself in front of the stage like a ******, you know the drill.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
DK Up+B: DK can actually use this move similarly to Bowser’s fortress. Meaning, he can use it OoS, , he can spinning-kong-hog with it, and he can somewhat use it as an anti air. Know that the ground one DOES has a SS, which is like, right above DK as his arms start spinning. It hurts.

Cargo Hold: DK can use his cargo for all sorts of s***. The default procedure is to either cargo hold -> U.Throw -> U.air (or PAWNCH!), or Cargo Hold -> (Jump off stage) -> D.throw. A default gimp he has is to Cargo hold -> Jump off the stage -> Spike you into the stage, so be ready to tech.

DK PAWNCH! (Neutral B): He loses his charge if you hit him out of up+b. So if he ever has a charge and you see him up+b (which is completely possible), nail him out of it.

DK F.air: Meteors if it hits you from above.

DK Side-b: Meteors. It’s a hilarious edgeguard that really doesn’t work.


014. Mario
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 45-55 Mario
The General Consensus: 50.1-49.9 – You get the point
The General Flow

Ditto match +.

For all intents and purposes, this match is really a ditto, with a few small nuances here and there that you need to know. I’m not going to dwell on it because, like a ditto, there’s really nothing super gimmicky about it. You just need to play your style vs his style.

Some key things you need to know right off the bat.

1) Mario can keep your *** honest with his f.smash. What I mean by that is that if you want to **** around and be stupid in a place where he CAN put a f.smash, he’s got the ability to come up and do so, and you’ll have to deal wit it. If you ever blocked a spaced f.smash, it’s COMPLETELY SAFE. You can try to move in, but don’t you dare try to punish it unless Mario gives up.

2) Mario’s Jab mixup is legit. Like, one of the most legit ones in the game, actually.
3) He’s going to combo you more than you combo him. Just accept it and make your hits count.

4) You’re allowed to stay in the air more than him seeing as his fireballs use the decay-bounce mechanic. (They bounce at half the height they’re thrown from).

And last, but not least.
5) It really doesn’t matter too much that you kill better than he does, both of you are going to gimp the trash out of each other.

Offense

Don’t you dare hang out anything short unless you want to get punished severely for it. I actually have a big emphasis on the word HANG because you don’t specifically have to be SHORT to get punished by Mario. If you put It short, then yes, you’re going to get f.smashed, and there’s nothing you can really do about it except try to put your shield up or roll/spotdodge out of the way. However, hanging a move out there near him is begging him to u.smash, or even worse, u.tilt you. You DON’T WANT TO GET U.TILTED AT LOW %S. It’s not like you’re going to die, but he is going to rack up some damage. You don’t want that.

When you approach him, you’d do very well to get him to jump. Make him jump pills, DD around to coax him into jumping, whatever it takes. Mario in the air isn’t as scary as Doc in the air because you’re not going to die to a Mario f.air. You’ll get the trash comboed out of you if you get hit by it, but that’s not death.

If you do get him in the air, you don’t want to screw up and have to run in and shield an aerial. Again, his L-Cancel lag is lower than yours, so running in and putting your shield up again Mario is actually giving up the advantage. His is low enough to where him randomly hitting your shield with something is going to turn momentum to his favor.

Um, you don’t really have to be concerned with too much besides that. Just try to inch your way in, like always, dive in past f.smash range, and try to keep control. Be ready to jump (or possibly duck) some fireballs as you go in, don’t run into any aerials, and try to land a grab.

There’s not really too much I can say about this.

(Note: If you’re still feeling fairly lost, go read the Doc matchup if you haven’t. It’s literally the same idea)

Defense

Now this is where the difference between a Doc and a Mario are going to be most evident. Mario can flat out throw more attacks than Doc can.

If you’re staying close enough to where Mario keeps hitting your shield, you’ll literally have to let him do more than you would Doc and look for REAL gaps. If he comes in with a jab and starts jabbing the trash out of your shield, you have to let that go. You’re not going to punish him unless he stops. If he puts a b.air or u.air (or a late n.air) on your shield, you pretty much HAVE to respect what he’s going to do next. There’s nothing you can do about it unless he screws up royally (i.e. he hits the top of your shield, lands jacked up in your face, or misses an l-cancel). It’s just not the same as Doc where you could actually n.air out and make him slow down, oh no no no no no. If Mario sees this coming, he can do somethin’ bout it.

Next Mario specific thing you need to watch for is the f.smash. There are really two ways he’s going to land it. One is a setup into it (which 9.5 times out of 10 are going to be u.airs), the other being a wavedash in. When you get to like, mid% (40% till like… let’s say 80% or so), you have to be real mindful about getting hit with an u.air. You’ve got to be ready to DI the hell away from him (realistically in OR out, as he can catch both). This is the MAIN time he can catch you with u.air to f.smash. And realize that he doesn’t have to JUST u.air you, it could look something like D.air -> U.air -> F.smash (d.air -> u.air is guaranteed, remember? That’s a constant between doc and Mario). He also could d.throw -> u.air -> f.smash.

Wavedash -> F-smash is literally THE matchup specific thing you need to get used to. You won’t have a time grasping to the fact that Mario has the same setups you do, but gets more from it, and it’ll be evident that you need to not be carefree with your approaches cause you’ll run into a f.smash, but the ONE thing that’ll screw you up is failure to realize that you need to be “alert” at a slightly longer range than you would a Doc. That’s all there really is to preparing for Wavedash -> f.smash. You just need to know that you need to either stand a further out if you’re waiting on Mario, or you need to be prepared for wavedash -> f.smash.

Last thing, and it’s a quick note, if Mario is fireball approaching and you want to move, you’re green light to jump. If you jump into the fireball, that means he spaced it bad and you should have punished it anyway. If not, it’s going to decay-bounce and you’ll be away from it. Just do mind the Mario that’s probably going to follow behind it.

Aaaaaaaand that’s it.

Again, if you still feel fairly lost about what you realistically SHOULD be doing (which is possible, I’m really cliffnoting this section), just go look at the Doc section, and tack these notes on with it.

Think of the Mario section as a supplement to the worker’s wars.


Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding Mario…. Go read the Doc section for the BnB, I’m just going to give you Mario specific MnP (Meat’n’Potatoes) here.

First, he’s going to throw Fireballs like you would throw pills. His fireballs have a longer trajectory, so they’re going to be HIGHER. That means that if you want to get around them, you normally want to come from BELOW him (as you CAN’T get above him). Coming from above him would normally include you jumping from a platform.

Second, and most importantly about Mario’s recovery is that he has cape lift. That means he can cape TWICE on his recovery. This is important to know because people with Doc experience tend to get a little more aggressive if they see a Doc cape twice because they’re now hurting their recovery. This isn’t true to Mario.

Third, and kinda just icing on the cake. Mario can walljump (and can up+b walljump). Just remember he can do it. I could start listing all the stages where I’ve seen it, just know that if you can wall tech the ledge, he can probably up+b walljump.

Last, and Doc can actually do this too but Mario does it easier. Watch for the low angle up+b. Doc can do this too, but Mario has MUCH easier time doing this.

Recovery

*Points to Doc section* Yeah, there too.

Um, …. –shrugs- Watch for a f.air and meteor that trash. That’s like, the only REAL thing that’s different.

Fireballs are much more effective for edgeguarding than pills since they have a higher trajectory, so be on the lookout for those. I mean, just like most gimmicky projectile edgeguards, you can actually Smash DI them in and have it HELP your recovery, but you still wanna look out for it.

Know that Mario can cover a bigger range (further AND higher) than Doc can due to capelift. It’s not too important as, by default, it’s still a risk for Mario to jump THAT for out at you. I mean, if you’re going to be stupid and recovery the same way EVERYTIME, don’t be surprised if you see him out in China with you.

That’s really all you need to know afai-remember.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
Mario’s Jab: If he keeps mashing a, it’s actually safe. You have to just BACK DA F*** UP or keep taking unneeded damage.
Mario’s U.tilt: ALWAYS sends people up. Don’t think you get free rides.
Mario’s D.tilt: IS OFFICIALLY WORSE THAN DOC’S
Mario’s U.Smash: Has full knockback AT ALL TIMES. AT ALL TIMES. –Kayne face-
Capelift: Mario’s cape gives him lift. If he ever does SH Cape, he can actually do any aerial (except f.air) before he hits the ground, and the hitbox will come out.


015. Link
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 50-50 Even
The General Consensus: 60-40 Doc
The General Flow

Man ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff**** some sword.

Like, that’s how this matchup goes. You’ll run into pretty much one of two kinds of links. The jerks who want to actually TRY and run from you, knowing good and well they need that ’03 Link, or the jerks who plant their feet, chuck stuff, and … swing. Both of them feel the same to you, you either throwing projectiles or having to deal with swords. It’s …. Ugh.

It’s nowhere near as bad as that opening paragraph may make it sound, but it’s just kinda frustrating to know that some of the dumb Link stuff will work from time to time because well, that’s what happens when you have a crap range. Try to run in and get rapid jabbed, try to jump in and get shield-spinned, it’s just… lol.

OH AND THEN THAT N.AIR :3 MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM DAT N.AIR.

But yeah, the gist of this matchup is you running around being annoyed until you actually hit Link. And then he gets the trash kicked out of him by like, everything you do. It’s pretty hilarious. Chain mcgriddles, juggles, and then just, edgeguards. It’s another one of those kool matchups.


Offense

Attacking Link is actually pretty hard. It’s like, he’s got something to slow you down at EVERY step of the way, and even when you’re in on him, you’ve got to stay right on top or he can get out fairly easily. It’s just a lot of frustration.

At long range, you’re going to throw _ _ _ _ _. One vowel. You realistically should never hit link with one unless you’ve just caught him landing or teching or something. The only thing you want is to close distance. You’re really NOT going to get him to stop throwing projectiles, that’s just in his nature. If you do catch him slacking on projectiles, however, move in closer and continue to chuck stuff at him.

At mid range (or the edge of it, atleast), throwing stuff at him will actually PREVENT him from using his projectiles. This is the range where you can expect to get the most benefit for your mythical items of mystery. He can’t use his projectiles, and he has to defend against yours. So if you’re looking to force him to move somewhere (whether it be to you, away from you, etc etc), here’s the main place you want to chill out and lay on him at. He’s not fast enough to where he can get TO you and punish you, and he can’t throw anything at you to make you stop.

And what are these wonderful little weapons of mass destruction we’ve been talking about? PILLS! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY PILLS.

And coming in behind one is awesome against Link. Yeaaaaaah man. You don’t really want to hang out in midrange with him (the part of midrange where he wacks you with a sword, atleast), because there’s nothing you can really do. You CAN poke at him with f.tilt, but he can beat that with his jab (or CC). Just, don’t spend time here.

However, you come in behind a pill, and you can hopefully catch him with his hands in the cookie jar as you zip into close range. Up in Link’s face, he really doesn’t have a whole lot he can do, especially if you made him swing first or put his shield up. If he swung, you’re probably going to get some free jabs or maybe a grab, depending on what he tried to defend himself with. Take whatever you can get at this point. But if you catch him pulling his shield up, you need to be ready. He’s either going to move or swing again (That’s… kinda how melee works.) Him swinging again at this point is going to be a n.air or spin (or something super gimmicky like a d.air). If he n.airs, -snaps fingers- ****, he got away, and you wanna try to follow him with a u.air if possible. If he spins, hope you’re blocking cause you get to punish the mess out of that. If he moved, well, he moved, hope you went with him.

That n.air stays out for days, by the way. Like, it’s arguably better than Fox’s because it stays out for 7 years and all. So if you’re looking to jump behind him and he’s n.airing, don’t be surprised if the b**** PUTS HIS LEGS AWAY AND YOU STILL RUN INTO A N.AIR. It’s that frickin good.

If he’s neutral, don’t come in from high above, you’re asking to get u.aired, or u.tilted.
Outside of all that, you really want to try to keep on the move as you attack Link. He knows he can’t RUN from you don’t want to, so he’s not going to really try. He’s just going to chill in some area and bear down when you come in. The ONE thing you’re looking for is if he pulls a bomb. It’s the same as Peach and Y.Link. You call him pulling a bomb, you run in. Hell, if he’s just HOLDING one, this is a good time to start moving in. Reason being is because while he’s got a bomb, he’s got NOT good moves on him. He can’t even do his super gimmicky air-hookshot to defend himself. He’s got projectiles, spin, and throwing the bomb.

At the end of the day, you’re going to be frustrated, that’s all there is to it. You’d think Link would be a character that you could run all over once you actually got TO him, but that’s not exactly the case. You always have to be willing to put stop or else you’ll run into a n.air.

Or a random spin attack.

And random spin attacks tend to suck.

Suck a lot.

K

Defense

Defending against Link…. –drums fingers on desk-

-Taps fingers on chin-

Well really, the best way to defend against Link is to jump away from him. Like, no matter what he’s trying to start, unless he happens to LITERALLY be next to you, you can jump away from it. It’s pretty sad. He himself doesn’t move fast enough to catch you, his f.air isn’t fast nor long enough, and unless you’re jacked up in his face, his n.air WON’T catch you. So, anytime you need to get away from Link, you jump away from him.

Now, what would you need to get away from? Well, if he’s trying to come in behind projectiles, that’s a starter. He realistically is only going to try to come in behind a bomb, maybe some reverse ‘rang gimmick. If you can’t/don’t want to cape the projectiles, then you want to back up some so that he has to run further, and then jump away should he still manage to make it in time.

If he throws a bomb at you and you want to cape it, cape it backwards. That’s the safest way to cape bombs. You CAN cape them forwards, but you run the risk of making it explode. Catching them is OK in the fact that Link can’t chase you down, so you have time to catch it and throw it back. It’s also ok in that if you screw up, you’re not really going to pay for it unless he like… dropped it and you were right there.

You’ve also got jabs. Jabs are actually tricky to deal with, because you can only get away from long range ones. If he manages to get in your face and jab, you DON’T want to telegraph jumping away from this, as this is what he can stop. I’m not saying don’t ever jump away from it, because not jumping away is asking for him to wear on your shield a bit with jabs, try to poke you with tilts, or even –gasp- try to grab you. But close jabs are something you don’t want to make a habit of jumping away from, as you’re asking to get u.aired.

The next thing you have to look for are grabs. Just like any character with a teather grab, he’s not going to just hang it out there at will. He’s going to either tech chase you with it (which you really can’t do anything about), or he’s gunna call you sleeping in shield. Getting grabbed isn’t really the end of the world till you get into high % (im talkin like… 120s?), and then it IS the end of the world. He’s got kill setups at that point. Actually, when you’re in mid%s (like, 80%s), he’s got spin attack setups. Infact, at some percent will get your double jump sniped (I can’t remember the percent off my head, as the one Link player I frequently play has a vendetta against Spin attack, lolol). But unless I’m mistaken (which is possible), it can happen.

AND THEN THERE’S THAT N.AIR. MMMMMMMM DAT N.AIR :3. If you think he’s going to n.air at you, you need to cut it off or move out the way. The hitbox lasts toooooooo frickin long, it IS tooooooo frickin long. He can actually space this and start some ground nonsense if you let him n.air all day.

With those things on the table, Link has b.airs, which he really uses to just kinda space himself and start pressure, nothing major. Everything else he throws (which are now his smashes, tilts, d.air and u.air) are all punishable. Well wait, I take that back.

Tilts aren’t PUNISHABLE by definition (as in they hit you(r shield), and you punish), but they’re punishable in that you can beat them all out. So if you know what’s coming, throw out your own tilt and stop it, or n.air/b.air if you’re close enough.

Ok, EVERYTHING ELSE is punishable. Smashes you wavedash in on and smash or grab. Be aware that if you let his u.smash finish, there’s no recovery on it. However, Link is tall enough to where you can literally duck his U.smash. D.air and U.air are like, free whatevers .

Put all that together, and your general defensive strategy vs Link is going to look something like this.

1) Move around / cape projectiles as he comes in.
2) Shield a lot. Jump away when he plants somewhere that’s not in your face.
3) If he wants to get on his n.airplane, you cut that nonsense out. (Attack it or more)
4) Punish stuff.
5) ????
6) Profit!

(you knew good and well one of those was going in here)

Edgeguarding

He’s going low, so throw a crapload of pills, or jump out there and b.air.

Like, if you put him any real distance away from the stage, that’s all he’s got, is a low recovery. NOW HE’S GOT A BEAST LOW RECOVERY, but that’s all he’s got. You want to look for the point where he’s going to pass out of your range and attack that. Either you jump out and b.air, or you pill it.

He’s not going to put up a real fight. If he does ANYTHING, it’ll be throw some random projectile while he’s coming in. This kinda thing is really a formality for being in melee. He’s saying “Hey, I’m in this game, I have all these projectiles, so I’m going to throw one. It doesn’t really DO anything, but here it is.” You don’t really have to pay too much attention to it, just get over there, get on your ledge, and do your work.
Link is THE character who’s likely to teather low, so you want to stop that when possible. Jump out and b.air or cape, stay on the stage and pill, whatever. Try to snipe him out of his hookshot. If he gets it off, try to get on the ledge so he can’t take it. Be ready to n.air him when he comes up, or to catch him as he goes over you (if he SSed).

If he’s close and isn’t teathering, you need to watch for up+bs. It’s not a big deal in hurting you, but it will stop your edgeguard. You can’t even CC punish it. So at this point, if you think (or know) he’s going to up+b, you want to be on the ledge so you can hop on the stage and punish him. Alternatively, if he’s going to poke his head over the stage (to try to push you away with the up+b), you can jump OVER the sword hitbox and hit him in the face. That’s completely viable, doable, and suggested. ^_^

Last ditch effort is a bomb jump. Realistically, he’s going to put himself in a position to where there’s NOTHING you can do about a bombjump, and if he’s trying this, you just want to take the ledge and get ready for the up+b. You DON’T want to try to snipe him with a pill after the jump as you’ll turn him towards the stage, which could set him up for the hookshot he probably wouldn’t have. Just let him go, and if he comes in, ledgedrop a b.air on him.


Recovery

Seriously, this is one of the last sections, and I’m tired of thinking of this crap. It’s all the same.

Like, ok. Link can throw projectiles at you like you THINK he should, he could edgehog and d.air you like you THINK he should. He could tilt you as you come up like you THINK he should, but he really only needs one thing to stop your recovery.

DAT N.AIR! MMMMMMMMMMMM OH DAT N.AIR :3.

Link’s n.air is the bane of your recovery, as it doesn’t give 2 s***s or a cup of monkey piss about your pills. It’s cutting straight through it. So, you want to once again pill to keep Link from getting TO the edge or setting up on the ledge. If he opts to jump out, CEASE AND DESIST ALL ATTEMPTS AT PILLING. He’s just coming through with the N.air of 1000 n.airs.

……….-shrugs again-

I mean, just to give you something interesting to read; watch out for projectile setups. Like, bombs tossed up and whatnot. Bombs being tossed and set are indicator that a combo video is about to start, and you need to like… change something. With the way your recovery is, all you can really do is try to change your timing to ruin’s Link’s timing for everything. But then you run into this guessing game of “Did he account for me trying to cape here? Etc etc.” It’s just more hoping and praying.


Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
Link’s F.smash: First hit is actually a viable, good move. Don’t think you won’t ever see it.
Link’s Up+B: It’s possible for him to edgecancel into an edgehog and get a hitbox to come out. Just… dumb random info.

016. Pikachu
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 6-4 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 65-35 Doc
The General Consensus: 50-50“Hey, has this matchup ever happened?”
The General Flow

Super backwards Bros.

This matchup is probably going to feel like THE oddest matchup of them all, fundamentally. I mean sure, you’ll get tripped up with other low-tier setups, or some super gimmicky high tier player, but fundamentally, this matchup will kinda leave you scratching your head for a while if you’re not used to it, and you might not figure out why.

The reason being is because… you actually outrange Pikachu (save pika’s f.smash). Not only that, but you actually have to play the game of poking at Pika and keeping him out, as you can’t really run him down. It’s just weird, because you NEVER get to do this.

When you get past that, you have to remember the number one rule of fighting a Pikachu.

“Never get above the Pikachu.”

Seriously. That is the ONE thing Pika wants. Pika wants you to be above him like Peach wants you to CC, like Falco wants you to put your shield up, like Bomberman wants you to go down that alley. You get the point. THAT’S WHAT HE’S LOOKING FOR. And if you give it to him, you’ll pay dearly. If not with a combo, then a quick tail spike. It doesn’t matter where pika is on the tierlist when you read it, tail spikes work. You really want to go BEYOND respecting it. You want to fear it.

If you keep yourself out of there, you’re pretty straight. Pika is pretty scared of your existence. You chaingrab the crap out of him, ending in a free f.smash, edgeguarding him is pretty simple, especially after you read the agility gimmick, and there really isn’t anything he can do that’s completely safe and sound for him other than run, which leads to you throwing pills at him and pestering the crap out of him.

Like always, don’t assume he’s completely helpless. Pika has plenty of ways to f*** your day up, whether you let him or not. He’s just looking not to get touched by you because all sorts of nonsense will come his direction, even if you really don’t try.


Offense

Playing offense vs Pika is kinda like playing with a dog. (Yet another random-tier dogy analogy, but ride with me, you’ll see). It’s like, you’ll run around with your dog because that’s what you’re supposed to do. If you’re going to chase him, you know good and well you can’t catch him, so you’re not REALLY going to chase him, maybe just run at him and spook him into running away. Eventually you know he’s going to come over to you, and if you want him to go away, you either need to spook him again or kinda poke and prod and MAKE him go away.

That’s how attacking pika works. Pika is fast enough to where he can outrun YOU, so you’re not going to chance him down. He doesn’t even want to be near you, so he IS going to run. With that being said, your offensive spurts are actually going to be fairly short lived outside of your combos.

Ok, so with that in mind, lets break down to the Doc stuff.

Long range, pills, obviously. At long range, Pika might look to stop your pills with a thunder jolt. Other than that, he’s going to be doing business as usual. If you can manage to get all the way in to put some jabs on him, that’s what you’re looking for. Don’t bank on it though, seeing as he’s going to move. You just want to close some distance on him.

Mid range is kinda interesting. Like, you would think that you’d destroy Pika at midrange, which you do, but you have to look out for his f.tilt. Pika’s F.tilt is a super move. It does, like, everything. It’s pretty hilarious. So, of all things, that’s the one thing you need to look out for. Everything else is fine. If you wanna poke at him, feel free, but you’re watching for a Pika f.smash, which beats anything you do so long as it gets out. You want to avoid jumping in unless you can get him to get scared and put his shield up because EVERY aerial he does is going to beat your f.air and atleast trade with your n.air.

In close, you can go to town on Pika. The one thing you want him to do is put his shield up. Him putting his shield up kills just about EVERYTHING he can do. If you get that, don’t go above him, as you’ll get destroyed by a u.air oos, but pester him however else you want. So like, whatever it takes to make him put his shield up. U.tilts to stop jump outs, d.smashes to make him want to block, whatever it takes.

All in all, you want him to block. If you can’t accomplish ANYTHING else with your offense, you want him to block. Pikachu can’t really do ANYTHING to you in block unless you’re above him or jacked up in his face. Pills, jabs, d.airs, whatever it takes, you want him in the shield.


Defense

Again, defending against Pikachu is fairly odd. You actually WANT to throw out tilts and smashes to slow him down. It’ll work, trust me.

You can f.smash or tilt ALL of pika’s aerials, so look for him to jump in and punish it. If you’re not exactly sure when or where he’s coming in, you can do retreating f.airs (or b.airs) and protect yourself.

You don’t want to rely too heavily on aerials, though, because if you jump and he doesn’t, you’re above him. And that gets you u.air’d. That’s not to say you NEVER want to jump, because then you’r asking to get grabbed, but just, don’t telegraph it.

The next thing you need to do is not telegraph a spotdodge. Pika’s d.smash beats spotdodge free. You’re obviously GOING to dodge stuff, unless you’ve got super good spacing and control, but again, you can’t telegraph it, cause he beat’s it free.

Another thing to watch out for is thunder jolts. They’re not horrible, they’re actually pretty easy to take care of. The thing is, you have to keep in mind that if you want to jump, you’re helping Pika out. Now obviously, if you don’t jump, you’re options are limited severely. Caping it is asking him to jump it and punish your cape, blocking it is, bad, if you can pill it kool, but that’s an if. So sometimes you have to jump (and d.air) and try deterring him from jumping at you. Just know that you don’t want jumping thunder jolts to be your default option. Make him guess when you’re going to do it.

In the event that pika jumps in and puts a n.air on your shield, be ready for anything. That’s where his mixup starts. He’s got an answer for anything you can do, so you have to roll dice and hope for the best (or make a good read, depending on how you look at it.)

The next big thing you have to defend against is balls hard to stop. Upsmash -> Thunder. You straight up just have to be psychic and DI an u.smash away from Pika. Even if you do it, you’re only delaying the inevitable. That thunder is pretty much guaranteed, you’re just making it harder for him. If you have enough time, you could try to cape it, which safes you. If not, you just have to be ready to airdodge (and yes, it will take something as desperate as airdodging to get away from it.)

Aside from all that, you just have to be ready to move. Like, I say that a lot in these character sections, but it’s pretty much the same all around. Pika loves a stationary target. He’s used to having to go through stuff, so you planting your feet and swinging all day is no huge problem for him. You’re not Marth. But you don’t want to JUST run from him. Not only can you NOT do it, you actually can get some rewards for trying to stuff him.


Edgeguarding
There is a sad, sad gimmick to Pika’s recovery. All you need to know is that if he’s going to use agility, you probably can cape and beat it.

The gimmick is that Pika CAN’T SS the ledge from below. It’s ********, but that’s how it is. That being said, if he EVER tries it, you just do literally WHATEVER you want and it’s going to hit him (seeing as not only will he be poking over the edge, he’ll be about as tall as you are.)

Beyond that, you’re just looking to hang out by the edge and catch him as he comes in. Pika’s recovery is GOOD. Real good. He’s can cover a range so long that you actually shouldn’t be able to jump out at him (unless you barely knocked him past the ledge), so don’t try it. You might try to fake going out and make him aim short, but it’s no big deal.

Don’t spend your time trying to pill and whatnot, you can’t chase him that far anyway. Be ready to tilt, bair, waveland bairs, grab the ledge, whatever you need to as he comes into the ledge. But most importantly, be ready to cape agility. It’s actually pretty sad how well it works.

Recovery

Recovering against Pika is yet another recovery that sucks. It’s so funny because, yeah, he’s got an app for that.

First off, all he really needs to do to stop you is jump out and n.air / d.air. He’ll recover, you… are doc. So yeah, don’t think because onstage is horrid for him that he’s gunna do bad OFF stage vs you.

So, for the kool stuff. He can throw some thunder jolts at you, and like, if you get hit with one, you’re probably done. You can look to cape one, but if you use your cape to stall, doing a second one is going to kill your recovery.

Next thing he’s got is f.tilt. This move right here. N64 taught me to had pika’s f.tilt more than ANYTHING I’ve ever been edgeguarded with. You would think that a character that small wouldn’t be able to do much with a f.tilt, but I swear to god it beats EVERYTHING when used right. It’s like. Just sweetspot, and pray to god pika doesn’t try it. You’re not going to beat it with ANYTHING. Makes no sense.

If he’s on the ledge, you have to watch for reverse tail spikes from the ledge. So like, if he’s on the ledge, yeah, you’re screwed, he’s just going for flash at that point. Just, be ready for it. He really doesn’t HAVE to reverse tail spike if he’s got the ledge, but hey, why not. You’re Doc, your recovery sucks.

Um, he’s also got thunder edgeguards. I don’t mean the scrubby on stage thunder edgeguard, I mean rejump -> thunder. Makes a wall that you can’t pass. So like, if you’re out of stalling options, you’re probably screwed at this point. It’s kinda depressing. XD

Last trick he’s got is the agility edgeguard. Most times you see this is when you try to pass from high to low, in “the line” that extends past the stage. What happens is Pikachu will agility out and then do the second one back to the ledge. The point of this is to stop your forward momentum. If you get caught with it, you’re pretty much dead as he killed your forward and he’s back on the ledge. He realistically could do ANY direction from the ledge (so I count angles in my head, dunno if Pika can hit smaller angles.)

Um, other than that, more hope and pray. Do the usual stuff, shake’n’bake, hope it works.

Air Traffic Control
I cannot stress this enough, you absolutely have NO reason to be above Pikachu. Being above the Pika is just begging him to tail spike you. The problem is, if you’re not paying attention to detail, you might not catch what qualifies for being over him.

You’ll get the memo to not fall down on him, and you’ll know to try to get away from him when he throws you up, but one place you might not catch is on the ledge.

You straight up cannot be slack when you’re dealing with a pika on the ledge. As dangerous as it looks, him ****ing ‘round on the ledges doing agility nonsense is just trying to get you to put your hand in the cookie jar. And as soon as you reach over there he’s going to chop it off. Don’t forget how dangerous being ABOVE him is.

The next place is in the middle of your combos. Now, Pika is a very comboable character. Gets the trash CG’d out of him and is just “the right weight”. The thing is, you can’t miss when you go to jump at him. If you miss for whatever reason, he’s got enough time to slip under you and throw out an u.air before he hits the ground. Guess what that is? YOU ABOVE THE PIKA. *slaps hands* NEVER GET ABOVE THE PIKACHU. You have to be extrrrrrra careful when you’re doing this, especially when you’re running towards a ledge. Nothing like thinking you’re going to get your first u.air juggle in ages, only to realize you died at 30% to some stupid u.airs.

Just respect that it’s a no-no zone.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Pika’s Thunder (Down+B): You can cape it.
Pika’s U.air: I honestly don’t know exactly where the spike hitbox is, or if it’s even a specific hitbox compared to hitting at a specific time. Know that it’s a thing you should expect a legit pika main to control all the time (as opposed to, say, Y.link hitting d.air meteors.)
Pika’s Agility: When the move ends (like, when he goes for the second burst, or when he’s done) pika momentarily scrunches into a tiny line that’s like, 3 times his height. It’s pretty stupid. This happens all the time, except for when he tries to SS a ledge from above.


Dogy’s Tips vs Pikachu:
- NEVER GET ABOVE THE PIKACHU.
- F.smash is dumb good in this matchup. Beats a lot of stuff pika has, and it obviously hurts. If you have any fear of throwing this out, come off of it a little bit in this matchup.
- Don’t telegraph spotdodges, he can punish those free.
-Pikas are actually real scared to go in shield, if you can get behind them in shield, they’ll panic as they pretty much have NOTHING unless you’re jacked up on them.
-Don’t chase that rat near a ledge. If he recovers and grabs the ledge, you back the **** up. If he runs over to the ledge, you try your best to coax him out. That’s pika’s ledge. He gimps like a champion.
-NEVER GET ABOVE THE PIKACHU.

017. Young Link
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 55-45 Doc
The General Consensus: 50-50 Doc (I’m kinda just makin up numbers for the public at this point)
The General Flow
Passive stalking. That’s how I look at this matchup. Y.Link is fairly mobile, although not highly agile. So you’re going to be hard pressed to flat out CATCH him, and he will do some running. The thing you’re looking for is WHEN you catch him to hurt him to the point of where running doesn’t mean anything to you.

He can’t beat you with his projectiles unless you let him. At best, they’ll just piss you off. You’ve got a cape, some pills, and you can just hit/catch anything he throws at you. That’s not to say you WANT to sit around doing this all day, because you’re liable to screw up. And getting hit by the wrong thing can net Y.Link some variant of a combo.

Beyond that, you do have to watch for his attacks. He’s got you beat with range cause, well, he’s got a sword. Doesn’t matter if it’s an overgrown knife, it still beats your range. He can keep himself fairly safe, but he can’t really put up a wall to stop you. He’s going to be doing a lot of stickin’n’movin. He’ll plant his feet every once in a while, but more often than not if he does, it’s because there’s a flood of projectiles in front of him.

All in all, this matchup isn’t bad either way. You as Doc need to watch out for projectiles and getting shanked, Y.Link has to keep a distance so he doesn’t get pummeled to death, and neither one of you really like the idea of being off the stage too much.

Offense

So yeah, the first goal you have to is get Y.link to stop running around so much. Again, he’s fairly mobile, but not extremely agile. That means he can actually RUN and move when he needs to, but you don’t have to worry about a crapton of feigning behind it (unless you let it happen).

If he’s got any distance between you, the first thing you’re probably going to watch is for him to stop throwing projectiles at you. As long as you mind your distance, you actually don’t have to be too deterred by projectiles. At long range, his boomerang “sour spots”, so jumping into it isn’t going to do too much harm. Arrows fall down, so you can look to jump those if you see one coming (or run under it if he’s doing FH arrow).

Bombs are when you’re looking to close the most distance. There are two reasons for this. First, when Y.link has a bomb in his hand, his options fall down to throwing the bomb, using a b-move, or dodging. You’d think that they’d normally throw it, but that’s scrub Y.Link. The thing to know is that you don’t have to worry about stuff such as grabs, aerials, or any normals. That means you’re allowed to apply more pressure with your shield, and he’s not going to flat out beat it. Not only that, he doesn’t have much he can do TO it immediately. Second reason why you’re looking for bombs is the act of him pulling it takes some time. With that, you could at least jump or WD towards him while he’s pulling the bomb. With that being said, the one thing you want to keep an eye out for is when does your Y.link pull bombs, and you want to start “calling” that (read: predicting with a WD, run in, attack if he’s in range, etc).

Outside of that, you’ve got his projectiles. Now, your pills aren’t actually going to beat any projectiles, just trade at best. In fact, given the opportunity, Y.Link is going to just run around your pills, but the one thing you want to accomplish from this is to get him to stop throwing projectiles. If you get him to do this, you’ve done all you need to. If you can call him pulling a bomb (like mentioned above), you can actually come in behind a pill and take the bomb out of the equation as well. But, your offensive goal with pills is to get him to stop throwing ****.

Once you get in mid range, it’s a coin toss as to what Y.Link’s going to do. He can either try to jet and go back to throwing stuff, or he can try to fight you off. If he tries to fight you, be ready to jump on top of anything with a tilt or a jab. You don’t specifically have to look for anything big at this point, as long as you’re cutting into his room. Don’t force anything as he can push you back out with a d.smash or dash attack and give himself more room. You just want to steadily cut into his space.

And once you get into his space (or if you pin him near the edge), that’s when you can start looking for bigger things. Again, you don’t exactly need to look for anything TOO big, he’s always looking to get out or land ONE specific hit. With that being said, you don’t want to hang out anything too big. Don’t be so hasty to d.smash, as that’s one thing he punishes free with a grab (which, depending on the %, can lead to a kill). Again, you don’t want to pour on too much cause he’s just looking to kick you out. You want to pretty much hover outside of range and press when you either see him hang out something (like a whiffed u.tilt), if you can punish something, or if you can start landing jabs and u.airs on him to pressure him.

All in all, your game is to just cut off his space. If you cut it off, opportunities will come. Y.Link doesn’t really get anything big from up close unless you make a mistake. You keep your mistakes down to a minimum, and he’s going to try to get out, whether it be fight or flight.

Just stalk him.

Defense

Defending against Y.Link is pretty gimmicky. Like, it’s not hard or complicated, but if you’re willing to give him too much credit, it can lead to a huge problem.

First and foremost, there are to ground rules to cover. Don’t ever be above Y.Link and don’t ever be below him. If you’re above him, he’s probably going to u.air, and you can’t beat that. If you’re below him (I mean, a good distance below him), he’s probably going to d.air aaaaaaand you can’t beat that.

Ok, with the easy stuff gone, the first thing you’ve got to worry about is, of course, the total package of projectiles. And, although you would think the cape is a fool-proof for this, it’s actually not. Caping rangs and arrows is as easy as it sounds, but caping bombs is where you’re run into a problem. To save you from all the technical mumbo jumbo, know that the cape’s hitbox will cause the bomb to explode, so you want to either cape backwards (super easy), or you have to time your cape so that the cape hitbox doesn’t hit the bomb.

Beyond that, Y.Link’s projectile game has a slight flowchart mechanic to look for. More often than not, if he throws a rang at you, he’s looking to pull a bomb. If you can cape the rang back at him, kool. If not, just know that he’s liable to do it.

You don’t want to get hit by the bomb, though. That’s worst case scenario when trying to defend against Y.Link. Getting hit by bombs leads to stuff. N.airs, U.airs, more bombs, etc etc. That is the ONE thing you really want to avoid.

Outside of bombs, most of Y.Link’s offense is not going to lead into anything immediate. He’ll look to catch you with all sorts of stuff, pretty much his whole moveset to some degree, but none of it actually leads to follow up damage. The thing you need to keep in mind is that he’s not going to look to throw out a grab too much, as you can punish the crap out of this if he misses. That means you’ve got a lot of leeway to shield, but don’t get too comfy in it.

Don’t be afraid to do move. That’s all you’re really going to do vs Y.Link. You’re going to be hard pressed to punish anything because he can space properly and make pretty much anything safe. So you have to be willing to move away from him and start over. WD back, jump out, roll, whatever you need to, he’s gotta guess where you’re going to even have a chance at it.

When you get in close, he’s going to swing, you’re going to probably block it. You gotta figure out what he’s going to do, swing again, try to chase you do, or run away. Make a right choice, and you’re back in the driver seat. There’s not a lot to it. Just don’t get tripped up on projectiles.
Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding Y.Link is easy, but it’s not. Like, he has to recover low, so you can rain pills and b.airs and whatnot, but his up+b can cut you off from stuff. So it’s like, do stuff but watch for stuff.

More-often-than-not, you can stop him with a well placed b.air, but like I said, you just have to be prepared for him to try and up+b. If you don’t come early or high above him, it’s pretty easy to get sucked into it and straight up lose the exchange with him. You don’t exactly LOSE a whole lot for trying, though, so get at it.

Aside from that, you have to be ready to deal with his hookshot. It’s not extremely long, so you don’t have to worry about chasing him to obscure do-or-die angles. He’s either going to be blatantly out of your range (too low), or in range. You can either chase him with a b.air (or d.air), or you can take the ledge and force him to jump around you. Your pick on how you want to do that.

Outside of that, be careful of him tryin to cover space with a projectile. It’s nowhere near as solid as you throwing pills in front of yourself, but if you’re going to run into it, it’s all the same.


Recovery

Um.

Watch for projectiles, although he can really just jump out, n.air, and be straight. Rangs and bombs, that’s all you really need to look for. Watch out for d.air setups, which normally stem from bomb drops.
The only other huge thing to watch for is d.tilt meteor. Like, it’s nothing amazing, as you can SS and get around it, but if you’re not going to SS, expect him to try it.

With all that, it’s the general “Your recovery sucks, you’re going to die”, logic.”

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Bomb Shielding: If Y.Link is holding a bomb, among other options, he could just shield the bomb explosion. Don’t be too hasty to run in as you’ll get hit and he’ll just combo from it.

Y.Link Upsmash: If you let him swing all 3 times, there’s goin to be no recovery to it. Sooooo don’t run in and get d.smashed for it.

Y.Link D.air: Meteor hitbox is above him when he pulls his sword out (the startup).

Dogy’s Tips vs Y.Link:

1) Watch for when he pulls bombs, that’s a great time to do SOMETHING. Attack, put distance, whatever you’re trying.

2) If he’s on platforms throwing bombs, you can just stay below the platforms. Not so much to avoid bombs, but because he’s not really accomplishing anything except burning time. If he’s flat out camping, you want to wait for him to pull the bomb rather than when he’s coming back (because you’re liable to get d.aired)


018. Roy
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 7-3 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 70-30 Doc
The General Consensus: 90-10 Doc
The General Flow

This matchup is kinda bad for Roy. Chaingrabs, combos, edgeguard setups, and worst of all, he’s the ONLY character in the game who has a worse recovery than you.

Roy having a worse recovery than you actually does wonders for you in this matchup. The main thing you need to do is just push him off the stage. As long as you snipe a double jump, you don’t even have to push him horribly far. Just to the point of where his only option is to up+b on the stage, and then you rinse repeat. It’s pretty sad.

Leading up to that point isn’t any better for Roy either. You’ll spend most of your time harassing him wherever and whenever. Forcing him to wade through pills, threatening him with a grab, he gets no breaks. In a normal matchup, where he tends to enjoy people being close to him for his SSs, he’s going to want you away from him most of the time because you’re a threat up close.

He just doesn’t have a whole lot going for him.

Offense

Watch for random swords. That’s all you really need to worry about when you go on the offensive vs Roy. Roy can do stuff to stop your offense, and actually some to turn things around on you, but most stuff he’ll try will just piss you off if it hits. Nothing major at all.

First and foremost, you’ve got pills (yeah notice the trend here in this guide). Pills are annoying to Roy. Although it’s not a problem for him to jump them, he doesn’t specifically WANT to. If you come in behind a pill and he jumps it, he’s in a pretty bad spot where one more wrong guess could have him going off the stage. And again, his recovery is actually, worse than yours. So with that, pills are a great starting place for an attack. If you can’t get him to jump one, don’t fret. All you have to do is run your plan and avoid getting hit by a sword during the nonsense.

Next, you’ll come into midrange. At midrange, Roy is going to start putting up a fight (if you would call it that). Attacking from this range is identical to attacking Marth, but it’s not as threatening. The big difference is you want to flat out avoid getting hit with a d.tilt if you can. D.tilt is Roy’s saving grace. That means you want to have a tendency to jump in on Roy rather than run. You can poke at him from out here and try to scoot him back to the ledge, just make sure he’s not firing with a d.tilt. If you get hit with just about anything else, it’s not a big problem. You should be outside of his SS range at this point, so you won’t die (too hard) if you get caught.

Now, close range is where things get crazy. He’s going to be scared of a grab, straight up. If he’s not, make him scared of it. You get all sorts of combos, CGs, setups, the whole nine yards. Beyond that, you DON’T want to be too heavy on jabs. Reason being is because Roy will be looking to CC d.tilt (or d.smash) if he knows it’s coming. He already wants to d.tilt anyway, so why not just turn the whole situation around? Aside from all that, you want to work to keep Roy in his shield. He doesn’t have a lot he can do out of his shield, and again, jumping away isn’t always his best option seeing as you can actually contend with his stuff in the air.

Roy is another character where, if you’re going to move away from him, you don’t want to go too far. Although the tip of his sword is not his sweetspot, it’s still a range where you can’t do too much. (Yes, is not his sweetspot as compared to “is his sour spot” there’s a difference). If you have to run all the way out, understand that you’re gone and you should have to work your way back in again.

The last, and most important thing to keep in mind when attacking Roy is to not be blatantly obvious with anything heavy. You don’t want to give Roy a reason to counter. A countered F.smash or F.air hurts. Bad.


Defense

More poking, more guessing. Don’t you love guesses? That’s what happens when you play a character with bad range.

First, let’s talk about how Roy is going to space this matchup (this ENTIRE matchup, really). Throughout a majority of your stock, Roy is actually going to work to keep you at the end of his sword. He’s going to intentionally space non-sweetspotted attacks. Why? Well for one, it’s easier for him to combo at this range, as you won’t go as far, but second, and more importantly, YOU’RE DOC, YOU CANT REACH HIM FROM OUT THERE. So don’t be too surprised when you find Roy “misspacing” a lot of his attacks, he’s actually setting you up exactly how he wants to. Now, when he wants you dead, he’s going to bring you a litte closer. Not too much, but enough to where he’s going to start sweetspotting. So, one of the side jobs you have in this matchup is to figure out when Roy wants to kill you and avoid kill moves when the time comes.

Roy’s offense is going to be very subtle, and it’s actually pretty deceptive. In all actuality, Roy can’t generate a lot of offense. Instead, he’ll quick switch from offense to defense, baiting out a mistake and then milking it for all it’s worth.

Watch for Roy’s Side-B. It’s fast, it pops up, it’s fairly safe, and it leads to him starting nonsense. You’ve got to learn when he would try it, how many hits he likes to do, and how you can avoid it.

You also have to look out for F.airs. F.air is Roy’s main move that can generate any kind of pressure. If you see it coming, you normally have to make one more guess afterwards, but it can’t be wrong. You could also CC the fair, especially if he tries to space it out (which would not be SS), but know that you have to pay attention to this.

The only way you could make Roy’s offense better is if you constantly stay in the air, which you may have to depending on how much he’s laying on the d.tilts. If that’s the case, you’ll have to start contending with his N.air and U.air. Both of these moves are surprisingly ok. Like, N.air is actually good, but U.air isn’t going to destroy you or anything. The problem is you can’t fight back against either of them. The solution to this is to just NOT be in the air, but again, that’s easy for me to say when I’m sitting behind a keyboard without somebody poking at my toes.

All in all, Roy’s offense is huge, it’s really a big defense. You just have to be ready to stop something and not make a bad move afterwards. You have to screw up big and let Roy land a d.tilt if he wants any notable reward from it, so just don’t slip up.

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding Roy is pretty cut and dry. To the point of where I’m not going to make a big deal about it

When he’s out there, you gotta figure out which way he’s going. B.air him. He can’t really do anything to defend himself unless you attack him HIGH above the stage. If you don’t want to attack him, make sure he has to up+b onto the stage, hop up, toss his *** off, rinse, repeat.

Everything you do is a thorn in Roy’s side. If you’ve not used to using pills to disrupt a recovery, now’s a perfect time to practice.

That’s seriously it. I’m not trying to brush this off or anything, but there literally isn’t a lot to edge guarding Roy.

Recovery

Same thing goes to recovery. Because he can’t really recover, don’t expect him to jump out and edgeguard you, he’s gunna keep it on the stage.

That means you have to do two things, keep him off the ledge and sweetspot. If you can’t do either one of those, it’s not a huge deal as Roy will have to do a lot of work to get you off the stage again with any real distance (He has to do a perfect waveland into F.smash.

Pill to keep him off the ledge, sweetspot to avoid d.tilts and whatnot, and if you plan on shooting past the ledge for whatever reason, close your eyes and pray to god he doesn’t counter.


Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Roy’s Counter: Roy’s counter is not busted like Marth’s (yes, marth’s counter is busted). Roy’s actually has a notable startup, and it doesn’t last very long. Unlike Marth, who can somewhat hang counter out and slow you down, Roy actually has to make a good read for his counter to work.

Roy’s DED: Without going into all of his options, know that 3rd hit down beats CC.

019. Zelda
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 40-60 Zelda
The General Consensus: 6000000-400 Doc
The General Flow

Platinum Hits. That’s all it’s about.

Your purpose in this entire match is to basically be a gnat to Zelda. You just move around and just try to annoy her the entire time while avoiding getting kicked in the teeth. And it’s not like she won’t TRY to kick you in the teeth, that’s the only solid thing she has.

(It’s real sad, because she actually has MORE, but due to how this game is, some of her good stuff flat out doesn’t WORK. Such as her upsmash)

In this matchup, you basically get to be a mini-Capfal vs Zelda. You weave in and out, tackin on small hits or piling on huge damage from setups; all while not running into her walls. She can’t really do too much to attack you herself as you can just run away and start over.

So you would think that if you’re at liberty to move around and you’re going to lay into her, it should be easy right? It’s actually not. Like, it’s not hard, but Zelda actually has some solid stuff that works against you.

If she guesses right, she can actually stop any approach you choose, she can push you away if you leave yourself in a disadvantage, or she could flat out punish stuff. And her punishment, while not the most damaging stuff in the world, is pretty disheartening to look at on screen.


Offense

Run up in there, and get to work. That’s your general plan for offense. No matter where you look to start your attack from, the end result is going to be you running in there and getting stuff done.

From long range, you can throw pills at her. As upright as Zelda is, she’s not going to have a hard time avoiding your pills. (I say upright because Zelda isn’t a huge character, but because of her animations she seems a lot bigger than she is.) She’s got no problem weaving in and out while maintaining her distance, and being in the air isn’t a big problem for her. She kinda wants to be there anyway to drop platinum hits.

All in all, if she wants to just, disregard your pills, she can reflect them back at you. You do have the option to run behind them if you think she’s going to do this, go around your own pill, and punish. However, if you’re going to do this, there is actually a too early. Too early gets you hit by her neutral b. She’s going to have some recovery lag behind it, so take your time.

Once you get past there, you’re in, you got it, mid range. From here, you’re basically trying not to get bucked out again. Zelda is going to look to keep you either here or far range, so try your best not to go back out to where you realistically can’t get anything accomplished. Poking at her is ok, but know that she’s gunna look to poke back. If you poke wrong, you’re getting poked in the face with a heel. I would say you want to avoid this range, but you’re going to have to run out here when you weave in and out of close range, so get real comfy and stick to your guns.

Beyond that, you’re going to be in her face. When you get her, don’t assume Zelda is helpless. She’s got outs, and they’re completely viable. Jabs and d.smash to push you back out to midrange, crystal twirl to get out of jail, and retreating foot to create some distance. Know that Zelda’s grab has a slower-than-normal startup, so she’s not very likely to grab you. If she finds out that you’re Pringles to her d.throw -> platinum setup, she’ll be tempted to try and grab more, so don’t fall for it.

The key thing you want to know is that once you get in on Zelda, you don’t want to stray too far. You might have to dip out to avoid something, or wait out a twirl, but don’t run (or jump) real far away or you’re going to have to fight your way back in. it wouldn’t be so bad if most of Zelda’s good tools were on the ground. But they’re aerials, so one you move back, she can move back while stopping you from getting in. Again, and again, and again.

The other big note you need to know is to not smash her shield. You generally don’t want to smash shields to begin with, that gets you punished. But with Zelda, that’s the one thing she’s absolutely looking for. A smash on her shield equals a foot in your face. Everytime. Without fail. She’s not going to try to grab you, it’s slow, remember. And she’s fairly slow on the ground as is, so she’ll just kick you and be done with it. The damage (or potential damage if you’re ******** and like to DI in all the time) isn’t so bad, but the problem comes from you getting sent all the way back to square one.

All in all, you want to stay on top of her, but give her some breathing room. She’s a princess and all, so she’s got rights to do some things here and there, and you just have to let it happen. However, she’s a prick, so if you give her too much, she’ll sit there whining and complaining till she gets her way. And heaven forbid if she actually gets it, she’ll keep on going like there’s no tomorrow. (Think about this wack analogy, it actually makes a lot of sense.)

Defense

Defending against Zelda is dumb easy, you move.

Zelda’s offense is basically non-existent as long as you do stuff that stems from or leads to movement. She has no real mixups, she can’t really chase you far (have you seen those heels?), so her offense is basically to poke, poke, and poke again.

I could try to elaborate on this, but there really isn’t a lot to defending against Zelda. If you want to get out of jail, back up. Roll away, WD away, jump away. Now keep in mind you don’t get those FREE (nothing in this game is really free), but moving away is just hard for her to deal with.

With that, Zelda is the kind of character where you have to watch for tricks. Empty jumps, run bys, etc etc. It’s not to say you never have to watch for those, but Zelda is a character where she needs those things to put any kind of “real pressure” on you. I mean, you’re not going to jump out when she jumps in, you don’t want to get kicked in the face, but what happens if you jump when she lands? She’s liable to jump with you and kick you in the face. It’s not like she took a random guess, THAT’S what she was looking for.

Now, real talk, you might have to watch for stuff like deep-SHFFL b.air -> b.air, or n.air -> u.tilt (or u.smash). She’s got ways to cover your outs. If you wanna try to poke with her, she can suck you into a f.smash (which you can actually DI out of, but DIing out of it might get you d.smashed in return. So be ready). Wavedashing in on block is never a great idea unless she’s going to … not d.smash, because she can d.smash, and there’s not too much you’re going to do to stop that (as long as you’re in range). Same concept goes to jumping in on block. She’s just going to kick you. So rather than trying to hang something out to stop her pressure, just move away and reset. She can’t do ANYTHING to rain attacks on you so long as you’re willing to just move away.

Throwing obstacles in her way isn’t a bad idea, though. She’s not going to warp across any kind of huge distance, so she actually has to deal with whatever comes in front of her. She’s got to actually take the time to maneuver around pills, and she’s got to stop shorter than planned if you want to do stuff like WD in -> f.tilt (this won’t kill her offense, but it could slow her down)

My point in at the end of the day is that Zelda has to be “close” to you to get anything of merit accomplished. As long as you’re willing to move away and take control with you, she’s going to just sit there and hope you come back. That’s how she works.

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding Zelda is pretty ho-hum. She can cover a long distance, but there isn’t a whole lot she can do on recovery.

First and foremost, you want to stay on stage, unless she’s real close to the ledge. Going out far is just asking her to up+b past you, grab the ledge, and turn your edgeguard into your recovery. That’s the worst thing that could happen. She could just, ya know, kick you. She’s in the air, and so are you. She’s got a nice long recovery, she just hates when people are at the end of it.

Beyond that, … there really isn’t much to say. She has horrid recovery on her up+b, so you want to try to make her land on the stage, get up, and punish.

Understand that she has a wide number of angles she can hit (if you’re familiar with the “inbetween” angles Fox and Falco can do with their up+bs, Zelda can do those too). That means that just because she’s slightly above or below the stage doesn’t mean she’s going to land on the stage, she could still go for the ledge if it’s open.

If she’s close to the stage though, be ready to jump out and stuff an up+b. She still has a hitbox out before she actually teleports (and she’s not invincible), so be prepared to do something like waveland off and b.air.

Although Zelda can completely recover out of your range, you actually DON’T want to try to scare her into using the max range unless you’re ready to punish her landing. The reason being is that if you’re slow and she makes it back onto the stage free, you’re now on or near the ledge and Zelda has room to back up. It’s safer to let her come in some to where her onstage option puts her a good ways away from you. That way, if you screw up (or are scared), she’s got to actually cover distance to get back over to you and do anything.

Recovery

Hey, recovering against Zelda actually doesn’t blow. Like, it’s to the point of where there’s not too much to talk about.

First and foremost, watch for din’s fire. It’s stupid, you can cape it, but you just don’t want to get hit at bad times (like below the stage where it could pop you up into a b.air or something. Do know that if Zelda WANTS to throw Din’s fire at you, one of your options may be to take it. If she shoots long, it’ll actually blow you back towards the stage. (Be aware that this could also be a trap, depending on percent)

Beyond that… it’s business as usual. Your recovery sucks, watch for stuff. Zelda is slow to get out there, but if she wants to, she could actually double jump out, kick you, and recovery perfectly fine.

One thing to know is that Zelda isn’t going to be quick to take the ledge. She’s not fast, her WD is short, she has nothing for a quick turnaround, so if you’re racing to get to the ledge, you’ll beat her so long as she’s not already facing backwards.

There isn’t too much to say about it. She has an invincible ledge stall (twirl stalling), so she could theoretically hold the ledge to the point of where you just can’t grab it. That mean’s you’d up+b onto the stage, and then get kicked for your trouble.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Zelda’s Upsmash: Living proof that this game is wack. You can straight up DI out of this if you get hit in the beginning. It’s pretty **** unfair if you ask me. Just, DI away from her hands and you’ll be ok.

Zelda’s F.smash: Same concept, but DI into her.

Dogy Tips vs Zelda:
-If you get kicked at low%, DI away. You DI in, you’re gunna get kicked again. You laugh, but you’re gunna forget and DI in, and get double platinum hits. And then you’ll feel ********.
-if she throws you down, DI behind her (away). DIing in gets you kicked.
-Zeldas like Dash attack. I mean, they don’t have too much to work with anyway.

020. Game & Watch
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 6-4 Doc (Doc Port Priority) – 5-5 Even (G&W Port Priority)
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 65-35 Doc (Doc Port Priority) – 55-45 Doc (G&W Port Priority)
The General Consensus: 0.60-0.40 Doc
The General Flow

This match is pretty aggravating, and it’ll get worse if you don’t have port priority.

I do not joke when I say the matchup changes with port priority, and I’m not joking when I’m saying it’s a clean 10% on the ratio. You got to understand that port priority will cause you to go from having dumb-easy combos and an uber kill setup to ONLY having guaranteed tech chasing. It’s pretty annoying.

All port nonsense aside, you’re going to be dealing with a character who’s entire moveset is longer than your personal being. If it’s not truly longer, it’s disjointed. It’s just frustrating. Boxes, keys, manholes, you pretty much have to go through a minefield to get in on g&w.

But when you get in, YOU GET IN. It gets pretty disgusting when you start putting pressure on G&W. He’s pretty much has to try his best to get some distance and start throwing hitboxes out there at you, or else you’ll just run over him. He can’t sit in shield seeing as he fullshield doesn’t cover him. He also has a small grab range, small enough to where you can land f.airs on his shield and NOT get shieldgrabbed. Pretty much when you make him put his shield up, you get to put in a little work as long as you keep him there.

And that’s pretty much what happens in this match. You’re either in, or you’re out. It’s kinda like a low-tier marth. You’re not doing anything in the middle.

Offense

Offense is going to be your main time to shine against g&w. You’re going to get a huge benefit when you start putting hits on him. It’s flat out hard for him to get out of stuff once he gets his, seeing as he has no low-frame aerials. In fact, if he does get hit, he normally has to resort to something such as up+b’ing or airdodging to get away from you. So once you get a hit, keep it going as long as you can.

With that being said, you gotta get in there first. First place you’re probably going to start is long range with some pills. Don’t bank on them too much. XD Not only is g&w a fairly agile on the ground and in the air, he has more than one way of dispatching your pills. If he can’t move, he can just put a hitbox on it. So with that, feel free to throw one out and check and see if he’s crazy enough to put his shield up, but don’t bank on pills.

So you pass that and get into mid range. Ok, here, it’s like I said in the general part. You’re looking at a lowtier marth. G&W can realistically stop you from coming in if he wants to (infact, I personally believe he actually can stop you from coming BETTER than marth, seeing as a right guess is going to hit you somewhere). Because of that, you have to play some real good rock, paper, scissors to get in (or however you look at this situation. It’s one of those half full, half empty concepts). You don’t really want to spend too much time out here because you’re going to start losing left and right. The only thing you have to poke at him is your trusty f.tilt (and occasional cape), but you gotta understand that he’s disjointed everywhere he goes. It doesn’t help that he can cover all angles, too. Poking at him is going to do you no good if you can’t reach his hitbox. So just get up in there

Once you get in close, you get to do some real work to g&w. You want to make sure you get in quick before he puts distance between you two, but you always have to be mindful of his jab and d.tilt. Both of them are very quick, and both of them will give g&w some sort of reward. If you can avoid those (and the super shortranged grab), then you’re good. Keep some pretty sure on, try not to let him jump, and you’ll be able to work your mixups from there.

In general, it doesn’t really matter WHERE you come in as long as you work your way in cautiously. G&W has the means to slow you down, so you can’t just rush in at all. However, you want to aire on the side of jumping in seeing as his d.tilt is fast, is long, and gives him a knockdown if it hits. Beyond that, you just have to think along the lines of a marth. Be ready to block and backout if you need to.

You also want to use A LOT OF D.AIR in this matchup. D.air controls g&w’s ability to put hitboxes out because he has to respect that you have a continuous hitbox in near him. If he tries to put something out and gets hit, he’s running the risk of getting hit into it, and we’ve already talked about what happens when he gets hit.

Defense

Defending against G&W is pretty straightforward. You’ve got to worry about one mixup, that’s from jab, and you want to move in or out when you have to. You don’t need to stay around him and give him a chance.

For the most part, he’s going to be poking at you. Now, understand that G&W can’t l-cancel most of his aerials. In fact, if you don’t see a f.air or d.air (box or key), he’s not l-canceling it. But any g&w worth their weight is going to just throw stuff to where you can punish it. You’ve got to be mindful of spacing, and/or aerial tricks. If you expect something like a b.air to come at you, feel free to try to step in and shield to mess up spacing. Know that you have to get in pretty deep or else nothing is going to happen. Other than little gimmicks like that, you just want to stay out of the way. Punish bad spacing when you see it, but you don’t want to make the mistake of trying to come in on a spaced f.air only to trip over a manhole.

And yes, you’re going to want to move more often than not against g&w. It doesn’t matter what tier he is, you have to respect that his range beats yours easy. You can punish or move in when he messes up. Until then, respect it. If not, enjoy jumping into u.tilts and f.smashes.

One of the safer places to be against g&w is above him (above and infront/behind to be more specific). Although his n.air is huge and disjointed, it’s relatively slow. That gives you the time you need to MOVE THE F*** OUT OF THE WAY when you see it coming (or shield or whatever). You just don’t want to give him chances he doesn’t deserve. Staying near him is going to give him a chance to put a jab on you, and that’s when trouble starts.

When g&w puts a jab on you, he’s got an answer for whatever you want to do. Wanna jump, u.tilt, f.air, n.air. Wanna roll, b.air or f.air. Spotdodge, d.air. Punish and fail, d.tilt. Stay in shield, get grabbed. He doesn’t have a clue, push you out with f.smash. He’s got stuff to do, all stemming from freezing you up with a jab. JUST DON’T LET IT HAPPEN. That’s the main mixup he has.

Beyond that, there’s nothing really crazy to worry about. Maybe some gimmicky stuff here and there, but nothing of extreme merit. Do be on the for him up+bing at you if you’re high above the stage. It’ll tack on some damage, and it’s relatively safe. It’s not like it’ll kill you or anything, but I mean, you don’t WANT to take damage.

Edgeguarding

G&W has a deceptively good recovery. Not only can he move a far distance horizontally AND vertically, but he’s fairly capable of protecting himself on recovery. With that being said, you have to be careful of how you go about things.
First thing to keep in mind is that g&w’s up+b has virtually no landing lag. That means that forcing him to land is not going to lead to a direct punish. Making him up+b back onto the stage is all but out the window.

So that would mean cutting him off before hand would be the obvious answer, right? It is if your g&w likes to come in and run into b.airs, but he doesn’t specifically HAVE to. G&W’s recovery is good enough to where he can move around your edgeguard pretty well and still make it close enough to sweetspot or land on the stage. So to combat this, you’re going to have to feign pretty far out to make him pull waaaaaaaay the f*** up and cut out the stage option.

Beyond that, you just have to do some solid edgeguarding. Know that, again, his up+b has no lag landing on stage. So if you miss something and he passes you, he’s going to beat you back to the stage and be able to punish you in return.

You really want to keep him from landing on the stage if you can. If this happens and you’re right behind him, you CAN continue to keep pressure on him, but If he’s got any breathing room, he’s going to throw out an u.tilt or d.smash (or d.tilt if he’s facing the right way), or he’s just going to run back to the middle.

Recovery

*Teacher Voice* Ok class, so we know that if a character has a good recovery, they pretty much are going to destroy doc on recovery right? Right. Yaaaaaaaaay. –rolls eyes-

Yeah, it’s pretty much the same here. The good news is, G&W doesn’t really have too much flash on his edgeguard vs Doc. But… he doesn’t really need it. His edgeguard is going to be real fricking simple. Either he’s going to jump out and n.air you, or he’s not. He doesn’t NEED anything else (not to mention nothing else really works).

You want to try to deter him from jumping out as best you can. Know that although pills LOOK discouraging to him, if he’s got enough of room to actually pop the chute, a pill’s not going to stop him. That means you have to plan ahead and have a d.air going if he’s going to jump into you. A d.air is going to make him space his n.air properly or give you a free pass by if he screws up. Your other alternative is to try to get under him and u.air him away. (If you want to get real tricky/grimy, remember that you could turn yourself around and try to b.air him as well)

If he’s not jumping out, you’re not home free. G&W’s onstage edgeguard is pretty beast in its own right. It’s actually more beast than his off stage edgeguarding imo, but it’s all the same to Doc, death. When he’s on stage, you have to look out for all of these super disjointed hitboxes popping off the stage. It’s nothing out of the norm, but the outstanding one you have to look for is a d.air. Reason being is because d.air reaches below the ledge. So that means if he looks like he’s going to d.air, you have to magnet grip the ledge. Getting hit by a d.air isn’t the end of the world, seeing as it WON’T be the spike, but depending on your percent, you could get popped up into a free n.air or worse.

Beyond the d.air, it’s business as usual, don’t linger out in front of the ledge or you’re going to get slapped with something. Dropzone isn’t safe at all either because he can just dropzone n.air.

You just have to be ready for him to come at you. He can do it.


Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

G&W throwbounce and port priority: Know that G&W is the only character with a weird property where if some characters d.throw him, he’ll stick to the ground rather than bounce like he normally should. However, Doc is the only character where these properties will change depending on who has higher port priority.

If you’re higher port than g&w, he’ll bounce like normal. However, if he’s higher port than Doc, he’ll stick to the ground on d.throw. You literally throw him straight into a tech chase (that’s assuming he techs, if not, you can d.smash free).

You really just need to know that if you’re lower port, you can’t rely on your d.throw to set you up. It actually changes A LOT of things, such as the threat of your throw game.


G&W D.air: Has a hitbox when he hits the ground (for a total of 2 different hitboxes)
G&W Throws: All 4 of his throws have the exact same animation.

You just have to use logic for where to DI. It’s not hard. Rule of thumb for DIing most character’s throws are: 1) If you’re in the middle of the stage, they’re going to try to throw you to set something up. Whether it be up or down (or whatever), they want to set you up for guaranteed damage or a tech chase. 2) If you’re about to die, they’ll tend to throw you into a kill setup, assuming they have one. If they can do it straight from their throw they will, if not, they’ll throw you to where wrong di will get you killed. 3) If you’re near the edge, assume you’re going off the stage. If for no other reason, because you (as doc) have a crappy recovery, and it just makes the most sense to rack damage and/or a kill from it.

Dogy Tips vs G&W:
1) D.air is your friend in this matchup. You actually can SH d.air approach and get some worth out of it.

021. Ness
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 5-5 Even
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 60-40 Doc
The General Consensus: A-1Hotsauce Doc (I mean, some people think Doc can chaingrab ness lol)
The General Flow

F.aaaaaaaaaaaair. Ness is gunna be doing a lot of that sparkly nonsense. Not a whole lot you can do about it as long as he’s spacing well. Kinda just gotta go with the flow.

Beyond the f.air, this matchup is kind of backwards. You don’t want to give Ness room to start trying DjC nonsense, and you get the benefit of having a longer overall range than he does. The thing is, if you stay away from Ness and he starts trying gimmicks (PKT, PK Flash gimmicks), you could just… cape and punish. So it’s like, you pretty much can stand anywhere and be fine. Ness, on the other hand, has to watch out for pretty much anything you do. His gameplan is going to be sneaking in stuff in between your gaps. Kinda like that guy who’s in the back instigating fights like “YEAH! THAT’S WHAT’S UP.” That’s Ness.

Only place that’s off limits is above Ness. That gets you comboed to hell and back. Like, you can get around u.tilt and u.smash no problem, but u.airs? You’re running a fairly big risk/reward at that point.

Offense

All you need to really be weary of is coming in from too high.

Ness’s defense, for the most part, will make him a moving target. He can move, but he can’t really throw a lot of stuff out there to slow you down. You just have to watch for gimmicky setups (djc b.airs, pivot f.smashes).

If you’re going to throw pills, be ready to follow up on them. Ness is liable to try to sneak in a pk magnet and snag some life back. It’s totally punishable if you move in on him, but you have to actually GO do it. The only other thing Ness specifically has against pills is the ability to reflect them back f.smash. You getting hit by a pill in this situation is not the end of the world because he can’t follow it. You can, however, catch him in the bat recovery if he tries it and you’re moving in. So don’t fear this at all.

At mid range, you realistically just need to make sure you don’t run into a stray PK fire. Jump it, or be ready to move if it’s some variant of jumping PK Fire. It’s nothing major if you get hit. DI out.

Close range is where you have to start worrying about Ness for real. First and foremost, you need to watch for F.airs and dash attacks. Although they’re fairly long ranged, he’s going to look to catch you with these as you come in. Dash attacks aren’t bad, you can CC or block those and go about your business. But f.air? You have to be ready to move away from that. F.air can lead to combos, or mixups at the least. You don’t want to get hit by that.

Aside from those, the next big thing you want to avoid running into is d.tilt. D.tilt is Ness’s jab, but unlike everybody else’s jab, Ness can obviously keep d.tilting as much as he wants, and he can stop whenever he pleases. You can poke around it and jump over it, but just keep in mind that if you’re going to try to run in and grab him, he’s liable to drop down and start kickin ankles.

All of this is fun and games until you start trying to jump in from too close. Then you’re asking Ness to start using f.air and u.airs. Neither one of these are good for you because f.air beats like, everything you do and u.air begets more u.airs. And that **** sucks. : |. So if and when you jump at Ness, pay close attention to your spacing and there better not be any rhyme or reason to you jumping it. (Read: You better not pattern your aerial approaches.)

Defense

Ness is going to be coming from all sorts of angles.

FH aerial -> DjC is one thing you just have to be ready for. Pretty much anytime he FH’s, he can DjC any aerial and cover a whole new route. You just have to pick up on patterns and plan accordingly. The only one you can really stop safely is something -> DJC d.air. If you see this coming, u.air it.

Outside of that, you have to be prepared for DjC by itself. Ness jumping away from you =\= Ness jumping AWAY from you, he might just be going out to come back with a DjC, he might literally be jumping away from you. It’s like rolling dice. So be a little hesitant if Ness is jumping away from you. You don’t exactly lose anything by him jumping away, he’s giving you room which you want anyway.

Everything else is pretty standard.

His dash has a pretty long range, and he gets a nice reward if he hits, but there are so many ways to deal with it that it’s kinda sad. Move, block, CC, yadayada. ALTHOUGH YOU WOULD THINK YOU COULD, you actually can’t cape it, so don’t try. He’s gotta come pretty close if he wants to grab you, so be mindful if he’s hangin around you.

Again, I can’t stress how important it is for you to not be above Ness. He has ways to put you above him. U.throw, U.airs, U.tilt, Dash attacks, D.throws. If you ever get above him, you really don’t want to make a habit of trying to fight him. It’s not so much that you can’t beat him, but by doing so, you’re actually giving Ness a chance that you don’t need to. So when you can, just try to go around him and make him take one of his lesser options. More specifically, try to go in front of him as getting tagged with a f.air is nowhere near as bad as getting b.aired.


Edgeguarding

First and foremost, the one thing you have to understand about Ness’s recovery is that Ness’s recovery is the ONLY one in the game that is, by itself, a technical skill. If said Ness you’re playing is constantly missing SS PKT2s, missing slopes, etc etc, don’t expect him to magically start sweetspotting. This clearly means he CAN’T do it, and this is a technical flaw that you should hone in on and abuse.

Ness is another funny character to edgeguard. You’re basically looking to do two things. You either want to jump out, take his pk thunder (to stop PKT2), and then recover; or you want to NOT try to cape him out of PKT2.

Caping PKT2 is rolling some dice you don’t need to. The only time you even want to consider this is if he’s trying to sweetspot, or you’re clear out of range. Other than that, just let him have it and punish him when he lands. PKT2 has hoooooorrible landing lag unless Ness is far above the stage.

In general, Ness’s recovery isn’t anything hard to deal with. It’s a huge *** double jump. Note that, when it’s applicable, Ness is going to airdodge back onto the stage rather than PKT2. Just look for it.

There really isn’t a lot to ness’s recovery. Either he can PKT2 or he can’t. Either way, he’s still gunna look to airdodge. Just, be prepared.

Recovery

Ness can’t really abuse your recovery like a lot of characters can, but he’s got enough to stop your recovery because, you’re Doc.

-Insert Talk about normal don’t get hit by stuff.-

2 things to look for.

1) PKT. He could use this to straight up pull you away from the stage (which has to hit behind), or he could do some kind of setup where he hits you towards him and then hits you as you come out of the stun.

2) PK Fire. He could cover a straight line, he could cover down at an angle. That’s about it.

Everything else is just a super gimmick. PK Flash requires a dumb good timing to even have hopes of hitting, let alone them catching you at the right place at the right time (there IS a mixup they can do where they aim to catch you on the ledge as opposed to just hitting you as you up+b). But yes, Ness’s edgeguarding isn’t the scariest thing ever.

D.tilt edgeguards? Sweetspot.

U.smash charge edgeguard? Sweetspot.

… I mean you’re Doc. You’re probably gunna die regardless.

The Human Yo-Yo

Now, if you come across a GOOD ness player (like, I mean a LEGIT NESS PLAYER, not just a person who’s good and can play some Ness.) I want you to shake his hand for sticking with such a character.

But anyway. Ness is an odd character to look at when you find a good one. I’ve only played two good ness mains ever (plenty of good nesses, but they were just people who knew some stuff.) Following a good Ness around is actually a headache.

It’s kinda like sitting in an old car with your crazy, cant-drive relative who keeps starting and stopping for absolutely no reason. There are a lot of herks and jerks in Ness’s movement that looks, just odd. You just have to be ready for it.

It’s so funny, because Ness DJing up to a platform is the slowest thing in the world, but the waveland -> b.air that comes afterwards will happen so fast it will make your head spin. Not to mention that ness on the ground is actually a fairly fast character when WDing is involved.

You just have to be ready for some weird movement. Try not to focus on what’s ACTUALLY happening and look for the end result. It’s pretty tricky. Unless you play with said Ness player often, you’ll have a HARD time catching timings. Ness is just too floaty / fast for it.

It’s just… weird. And I used to LT Main Ness. –Shrug- Just throwing this out there because it WILL throw you for a trip if you’ve never seen/played it.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)


Yo-Yo Glitch: I could explain how it works, but I hate typing this explanation. Here’s what you need to know. If Ness hits you with an upsmash, note that a hitbox can come up from where he hit you to where he is. Warning signs for the YYG are – Ness is blatantly NOT attacking, or Ness did ONE attack, and is blatantly not attacking. If he didn’t attack at all, he’s looking for deathline. If he did ONE attack (usually a d.air, u.air, or PKT2cancel), he’s got a jacket on.

PKT2 Surprise: If Ness does a sloped PKT2 and “misses the sweetspot”, you still have to wait for him to actually FINISH the pkt2 animation and start falling back down before you hit him. He’s still an active hitbox before that time.

Ness F.smash: Reflects projectiles. Just throwing that out there.

Ness’s D.tilt: = his jab. So don’t look for jab mixups from his actual jab. Unless it’s just, a ness player who’s not in the know about Ness. (there are loads of them).

Ness on Corneria: (If that stage is still legal by the time this comes out) Stupid healing gimmick. Nothing major. You just have to stay with him.

022. Yoshi – The Beta Character
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 6-4 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 65-35 Doc
The General Consensus: -i-pi Doc
The General Flow:
For all intents and purposes, this is a pretty straight forward match. There are some do’s-and-don’t that you have to abide by, but when it’s all said and done, there isn’t a lot of crazy stuff that happens.

Yoshi, by himself, is a pretty oddball character. He “has armor” on his double jump (I quote that because I don’t want to go into the mechanics behind it), he can’t JUMP out of shield, he’s got mini spotdodges built into his f.smash and u.smash, a shielding gimmick, etc etc. Yoshi’s whole goal is going to be not to get grabbed, seeing as you can chain-to-pain on him. He’s got the tools to keep you out, and he actually can do a fairly good job of just keeping away from you if he puts effort into it.

All in all, this matchup isn’t bad. Even if you don’t know WHAT to do, logic will kind-of kick in. Although Yoshi “can”, he really has a lot of things he “can’t” do that work against him.

Offense

Watch out for f.smash. That’s one important pitfall you have to look for. Yoshi’s f.smash works like a mini spotdodge because he leans back, and it actually adjusts his hitbox (Think bowser, but faster). The thing with this is that, at times, you’ll have to aim deeper than you normally would. You’d think this would be a problem, but the normal mixup from this comes from you misspacing into your opponent’s shield, they shield and punish.

Yoshi… kinda.. can’t punish from his shield, remember? He can’t jump out of it, so the only thing he has is grab (which is super gimmicky, know that the only way he can get it to work here is if you land in a certain area, AND THEN WAIT LONG ENOUGH TO LET HIM GRAB.) So although he could clearly catch you in a mistake, he realistically can’t do too much about it.

So, what else do you really have to look out for if he’s going to shield? Him light shielding. Yoshi’s lightshield has a mechanic to where he’ll slide if you hit his lightshield. (For the record, you can’t see if Yoshi is actually lightshielding as his egg doesn’t change color, you just have to take an educated guess or play your current stats. “Has he ever lightshielded me yet? Does logic say he wants to get away from me atm?” ).

Sure, he can slide away, but what’s going to happen then? You’re going to just pill your way back in. Although Yoshi has moves to cut through pills (Hell, he could just DJ through them if he REALLY wants to), he doesn’t want to stay out there in fear of having to, once again, go in shield to stop something immediately after a pill.

My point in this is that little episode is that against Yoshi, you’ve got a lot of leeway to do what you want to do. He has ways to actually defend himself (which are going to follow this paragraph), but the important thing to know about Yoshi is that he doesn’t really want to shield. That just leads to all sorts of problems.

Ok, so with that being said. You need to watch out for attacks. F.smash, we’ve already talked about, but you also have to watch for u.smashs, tilts, SH b.airs, and DjC –stuff-. Now, I’m going to blanket most of that and say “Hey don’t be ******** and run into stuff”, but I need to take a little time to talk about Yoshi’s DjC.

*Yoshi’s DjC is special in that he’s the only character who can DjC AND CHANGE DIRECTION WHILE HE DOES IT. What this means is not only does he have the ability to swoop in mid jump to put a hitbox out, he can use any aerial he wants to. With all this being said, the one thing you have to be real weary of is Yoshi jump. It seems innocent enough, but depending on the spacing, all sorts of things can happen. If he wants to actually try to turn the tables on you and attack, he could try something blatant like DjC’ing into you and n.airing from a jump, cutting you off from your f.air (that you probably shouldn’t be trying at this point, lol). But he could do something a little more elaborate like DjC’ing away, f.airing straight in front of you (so that you can’t run in any further), and then jabbing (to punish you for trying to run in.)*

The reason why all of that fits into his defense is the added benefit he has of his armor when he double jumps. One option he has, if you try to cut him off, is to just straight up double jump and work from there. He could try something such as a Dj -> n.air AFTER you hit his armor. DJ -> d.air. He’s got plenty of options. Again, all of this stems from him JUMPING in the first place, so you have to be real cautious of trying to pick him off in the air.


Defense

Defending against Yoshi, on the other hand, can be pretty interesting.

First and foremost: go back and read the *’d section above. I’m not doing this to be lazy, but to stress what kind of stuff can happen from his DjC.

Ok, beyond that, Yoshi has a lot of fairly gimmicky pressure to deal with.

The main thing you’re going to have to deal with is his jab pressure. Where yoshi’s “jabs” are good, and he has viable options out of them, you need to understand that you don’t really have too much to fear as long as you’re willing to shield and/or roll away. The reason being is that jab -> grab is NOT one of yoshi’s options. His grab is super gimmicky, remember? So with that being said, he’s never going to flat out GRAB you. If he’s looking to beat your shield, he’s more than likely going to do something that leads into swallow. Whatever his setup is, all you have to do is roll away from it (or take more if you want to punish it.) As long as you pay attention, everything leading to it is dead obvious, so you have enough time to react to it. Outside of that, you have to look for jab -> d.smash, jab -> aerials, or jab -> -some kind of bait- The key with this is to just not be too hasty. Yoshi can’t really FORCE you to do anything you don’t want to, so don’t make a mistake and jump into a trap.

The second thing you have to deal with is going to sound comical, but it’s real useful for yoshi. You’re going to have to defend against his roll. Now, the reason why I say this is because of the mechanics and animations that go into his roll. Let’s talk through some things.

1) First and foremost, once a character rolls, he’s actually in neutral. A lot of people tend to roll INTO a shield, but you don’t have to. So you can roll -> d.smash, roll -> jump, roll -> whatever you want.

2) When Yoshi rolls, he’s in the egg the entire time, when his roll animation ends, he comes out of the egg. Think about it, he’s rolling into the egg and he comes OUT of it. The reason why I say this is because if you’re not paying attention, you would think that he’s rolling into shield….

3) …But rolling into his shield IS an option, and he can use that as a bait (if he wants you to hit it and let him slide out), or he can just use that for information. If you’re always looking to d.smash there, I guarantee your Yoshi is eventually going to roll -> spotdodge -> d.smash.

Ok, so with that being said, you have to take extra care with how you deal with Yoshi’s roll. Although he doesn’t have an outstanding roll by ANY stretch of the imagination, he has one that he can use as an offensive tool. Yoshi rolling around you is going to pressure you to do SOMETHING. It might not be much, but you’re not going to just stand there and let it happen (unless you’re going for a super Dogy gimmick).

The one thing you’re looking for in this setup is what he does AFTER he rolls. You really can’t do too much to stop him from rolling period. (NOBODY in the game can straight up stop rolls, but they can punish what happens afterwards.) But look for patterns. Does he roll into his shield? Does he roll into a d.smash (You’ll see this a lot), does he roll and then move? Where is he rolling FROM? Is he rolling into f.smash (which would be roll -> mini spotdodge -> punish your misspacing). If you see nothing but THESE options, then you can do something as simple as jumping as he comes out of his roll and you’ll normally turn the tables on him. But what happens if he likes to roll -> jump? If you’re looking to do a f.air, you just got n.aired for it.

Again, none of this is actually out of the norm in a roll game. Infact, if you’ve ever played anybody who has a GOOD rolling game, this should be very familiar. The thing about Yoshi is that he IS going to roll, and his roll looks different from everybody elses. (Note –look in the gimmick section for something hilarious to do vs Yoshi’s roll game-

The next Yoshi tool you have to look for are eggs. Although they’re nothing terribly hard to deal with, understand that if Yoshi sets up an egg right, it’s going to lead to combos. A “right setup” being some shorter ranged eggs that he can actually follow. With that in mind, you really DON’T want him throwing eggs. It’s not hard to stop at all. If you can the pattern, go in when he’s about to throw one (be mindful that he can just NOT hold B and drop it in his face). If he throws one, you can Capedash it (or just cape it)). You normally can just shield it if you want to, just don’t end jacked up in his face. It’s not the end of the world if he starts throwing eggs, you just don’t want to get hit.

The last thing you need to be concerned with is aerial swallow. It’s an airgrab. That means that you don’t want to prematurely shield just because Yoshi is jumping in range. You could shield if you want to try to bait this, but hey, I’m just giving you the simple do’s-and-don’ts and you’re supposed to be molding this into your own strat and style. ^_^

Outside of those things, there’s nothing real extraordinary that you have to deal with. If he wants to f.air, cut it off if you’re in range, move if you’re not, or be prepared to read what else he’s going to do afterwards. Watch for him trying to setup stuff (mainly d.tilts to push you places, smashes cause they’re smashes, forward and up tilts to lead to combos)

Combos. Yoshi can combo. The end. XD


Edgeguarding

-rolls eyes- This dumb character.

Ok, first and foremost, Yoshi doesn’t have a third jump, so if you can ever hit him away from the stage with no second jump, you pretty much win.

Now with that being said if he’s coming back and has a second jump be prepared to play some rock, paper, armor.

Yoshi’s armor is going to make you want to punch somebody. Like, there’s really no way around it. Yoshi’s double jump -> your b.air. That means that if you WANT to b.air him, you have to either do it before he double jumps, or completely after he does it. Two things are going to happen if you refuse to respect this. He’s either going to jump through you and back onto the stage, which isn’t so bad, or he’s going to jump through AND N.AIR YOU. THE LATTER BEING THE ONE THAT MAKES YOU WANT TO SLAM YOUR CONTROLLER DOWN AND KICK THE ******* OF A YOSHI PLAYER IN THE FACE (**** YOU BLOSHI YAH YAH TRICK! SDFL($@#)* ).

Because of the armor, you actually have to take a very different approach to edgeguarding Yoshi. Where you would think to be prepared to b.air him, be prepared to f.air him instead. F.air is your only aerial that will beat armor. (When you’re looking for a move that beats it, think “strong” moves. Smashes and stuff of THAT caliber.) Note that if you ever land a f.air and it stops yoshi, he’s not going to go flying away. Instead, he’s going to just… kinda stop. If it puts him in hitstun, it’s kinda like he ran into a wall instead of him getting hit by a train. You’re probably still going to have to knock him AWAY from the ledge.

With that being said, you’re going to need to do a lot of on-stage edgeguarding, because you’re Doc, your recovery blows. F.air, smashes, and smart edgehogging. Yoshi doesn’t really have to pay a lot of respect to you jumping out at him, because he (theoretically) knows that anything you CAN do to him offstage is going to get dj’d through. So don’t expect him to fall for stuff to make him pull up.

Beyond that you really have to look for 3 things.

The first being an airdodge. THAT’S YOSHI’S THIRD JUMP (surprise! Yoshi’s got 2 and a half jumps). It’s nothing amazing, but note that Yoshi is going to do A LOT of airdodging for recovery. That’s all he has beyond his second jump. Be prepared for it.

The second thing to look for is down+b recovery. If yoshi is in line with the ledge, he’s liable to down+b straight to the ledge. If you can take the ledge from him, that’s kool, do it. If not, JUST DON’T GET HIT. Down+b from Yoshi can be a somewhat usable kill move. I mean, you’ve got to be puttin’ up mcdonalds numbers in the % count, but it IS usable. There is a stupid gimmick to look out for here too. If you’re used to looking for him to go to the ledge, Yoshi could just down+b onto the stage. Reason why this could work is the stars that come out after yoshi hits. You have to actually be ready for them (When I think about it, I don’t know if you can actually CC those stars, and I’m too lazy to turn on my cube right now and find out. Maybe in an update.)

Last thing being a side-b recovery. You can cape it, you can hit him out of it with like, anything. If you’re a manly man, you could just grab him out of it and dunk him for being ********. The thing you need to know is that he’s liable to try it because if he successfully gets past your edgeguard, he’s going to go clear to the OTHER side of the stage before he comes out of his egg. If he hit you with the side-b, he pretty much reset positioning.

So, all in all, Yoshi doesn’t have a sweetdiculous recovery, but you’re gunna have to do things out of the norm to actually stop it. Just, be prepared.

Or knock him clear the **** away so he has to DJ first.

Recovery

I really should just take these sections out and say “DON’T GET HIT. YOU’RE DOC, YOU’RE GUNNA DIE.”

Lets see, Yoshi recovery tricks.

First and foremost, Yoshi has the instant edgehog. Because his dj sends him down and because he can turn around when he djs, he can run off the stage, dj into it, and instantly grab the ledge. This is important because it takes him NO time to grab the ledge. With all of this, Yoshi is pretty much THE character you should expect to grab the ledge, which sucks for you. (I could go into my smash theory of how and why you should expect your average yoshi player to grab the ledge, just know HE’S GOING TO GRAB THE **** THING).

Beyond that, it’s the typical “You’re Doc, don’t get hit” kinda thing.

Kool stuff Yoshi can do –
He can throw an egg at you, which by itself helps your recovery. However, if he puts the egg at the right place and you get hit, he can actually combo you from this. Egg -> n.air, Egg -> d.tilt, egg -> d.smash. It’s pretty comical.

He could d.air and drag you down. Yoshi can SH D.air (no ff), drag you ALL THE WAY DOWN CLEAR OUT OF YOUR RECOVERY RANGE, dj back to the stage, waveland on, and then do the instant DJ dance while he waits for you to come back. … Ok, some yoshi players can’t (or won’t think) to do that. I can. ^_^

Super Lols yoshi edgeguard = waveland off -> reverse f.air -> recover. It’s possible. I mean I can do it, and I suck at Yoshi.

Yoshi really doesn’t have anything that’s straight lockdown on your recovery, but again, he doesn’t really need it. He can jump out and n.air if he really wants to. He’ll make it back. If you get hit, you won’t.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
-Yoshi’s Shield (The gimmick I told you to read about). Yoshi’s shield is an egg. Duh. One thing that a lot of people do, especially Yoshi players, is spotdodge -> d.smash. (Heck, as Doc, you should do some spotdodge d.smash, you have an i5 d.smash). The thing with yoshi, like most characters, is that he hits one direction first, behind him second. However, if he’s in shield, he has to keep track of which way he’s facing because he can’t visibly SEE yoshi in the egg. However, if you cape somebody in shield, it turns them around, EVEN IF THEY BLOCK IT. Yoshi’s Egg is a shield that he can’t see himself in. He wants to spotdodge downsmash. You can flip shields around. Do the math. ^_^

-Yoshi’s F.smash and U.smash: Mini spotdodges because he leans back. Note that if you’re expecting one of these, you’re going to have to aim deeper.
-Yoshi’s D.tilt: Bootleg fox shine
-Yoshi’s F.tilt: Bootleg falco shine (no seriously, Falco’s shine isn’t set, remember?)
-Yoshi’s Neutral B: Air grab. Note that if he ever swallows you, you CAN break out before you hit the ground (You have to have a good mash ability). However, note that you don’t ALWAYS want to break that fast, because yoshi could set you up for that. You actually need to pay attention to what yoshi is doing. He could do something like start charging a f.smash and let it go as soon as you pop out (You ALWAYS pop out). So just be ready, and you might have to take a little damage. That’s your punishment for getting hit by that wackness
-Yoshi’s Eggs: If you can capedash, you can combo off of eggs yourself. Caped Egg -> F.air is golden.
-Edge-Cancelled Eggs (ECE): Yoshi tech. Yoshi ledgehops an egg, and can grab the ledge to cancel out the recovery. It’s a pretty nasty thing to deal with if you’re caught in egg range. It’s nasty if you have to deal with it (read: You’re losing). There are some ways you can actually deal with it, though. Caping eggs back at him from a distance will do nothing to him. Unless the yoshi is dumb and mindlessly gets up, he can respond to the caped egg before it gets back to him. However, doing so allows you to maintain your position. One thing you CAN do is capedash to the ledge. If you catch yoshi trying to do another ECE, he’s going to just fall down and die. ^_^ It’s pretty hilarious. The only other option, which is the safer one that Yoshi wants, is for you to STEP THE **** BACK N****! (In which case you’ll later come and PUNCH A N**** IN THE JEANS! XD)


023. Bowser
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 7-3 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 65-35 Doc
The General Consensus: Doc wins because he’s a smarter version of the character that’s bodied Bowser throughout Nintendo’s history
The General Flow:

Fortress. It’s pretty good. That’s going to be the main thing to slow you down and/or stop you. A lot of this matchup is going to be you picking away at Bowser’s defense, but any and every time you leave something hangin’, you’re gunna get chopped up by the blender. It’s a pretty good move for Bowser. Get-out-of-jail free.

It’s not like Bowser can’t stop you from getting in, he has some pretty nice tools, and he’s got a **** good edgeguard if he ever gets you off the stage; his main flaw is that he’s just too big and, in the grand scheme of things, too immobile. So it’s not like he’s going to be free (if he has a clue what he’s doing). He can punish, he’s got tricks, and he’s got some fairly viable setups.

The main thing you want to do is keep moving and not pattern yourself around him. I mean, that’s a real generic thing to say about matchups, but Bowser can get some beastly rewards if he knows where you’re going to be at. U.airs, u.tilts, koopa klaws, it’s all doable, but you pretty much have to let him do it to you.


Offense
So, offense is going to be the main key to this matchup. Bowser is going to spend a lot of his time trying to set himself up. Spacing himself, shield approaches, etc etc. You just have to not fall for dumb gimmicks and put in the work to him.

In this match, you’re gunna wind up doing a lot of pill work, because that’s the bane of bowser’s existence. See, he’s too big take the easy way around pills, and he’s slow enough to where he’s not going to WANT to try much that could lead to him getting setup, so he’s going to be forced to deal with pills so long as he’s in range.

Pills are going to set you up for a lot of things against bowser, mainly grabs. You want plenty of grabs, because grabs lead to chaingrabs, and chaingrabs lead to edgeguards, and edgeguards lead to wins. The only thing that will REALLY kill you when looking for grabs is fortress. You have to pay some respect to fortress. If you can get him to throw it out there, you can punish it by itself, but you gotta make sure you don’t just run into the thing.

Other than that, you want to do a lot of d.airs in this matchup. D.air is real good at beating a lot of bowser’s moves, and constantly beating moves is going to deter him from doing them and (hopefully) put him in shield where he has to make good guesses. D.air is so good vs Bowser, you actually want just flat out do D.air approaches at times. You have to position yourself so he can’t punish you afterwards (which would normally be a fortress), but as long as you can clear his space and hit l-cancels, you’re going to be able to take some relatively free shots at him.

One random thing to keep in mind about this matchup, if Bowser is going towards the ledge below 100%, be ready for a ledge attack. Bowser is THE character who’s likely to look for ledge attacks because his is beast. It’s fast, pokes out so long, and goes straight back to the ledge. If you’re not LOOKING for it, it’s impossible to see coming as most character who go to the ledge fight from right at the ledge. The most likely time you’ll see this is from a fortresshog. But really, it could be from anything that makes him to go the ledge.

If you ever get bowser in the air, keep him there. There’s not too much he can do except for try to go on a platform or airdodge through you (save the obvious DI well). His d.air isn’t his best option seeing as you can stop, shield, and punish it, so that mainly leaves him with up+b. It’s not a bad option for him if he really needs to get out, but it’s not great either, so don’t be too surprised if you see it. As long as you don’t hang anything ******** out at him, you’re going to be fine.

Defense

Defending against bowser isn’t the worst thing in the world, but it’s odd because it comes at places you don’t exactly expect from a bottom tier character.

More often than not, what happens is you’ll want to move, but you don’t want to give bowser room. So like, you’ll have a situation where he’s moving in, maybe a shield approach or something. If you’re not going to try a grab (or try something that doesn’t get you up+b’d), you’re going to want to move so that you DON’T get up+b’d, but you don’t want to go far away or else he can keep you out of that space with a f.air or something.

Likewise, say you’re on a platform. You’re going to want to move because he probably can u.tilt or u.smash you through the platform, but you don’t want to go TOO far or else he can jump and u.air you (which, unless you’re already coming down, you’re probably going to have no chance in hell of even trading with)

Moving back (or away) is your friend in this match, but you don’t want to go too far. There’s just no other way to put it. You can’t give bowser room, but you can’t be in his face either, that’s just what you have to deal with. He can beat your range, but he can’t chase you down.

SHBAWD and retreating aerials are fairly good in this matchup, but if you throw anything other than a b.air or d.air, you have to make sure he’s not going to try to swing at you (which could beat it).

Beyond moving away, all you really need to worry about is pills to keep him from doing stuff. Again, it’s not hard to do because of how big he is. You just don’t want him to TRY any shenanigans. You can pretty much stop him from doing any real movement with pills unless he wants to try to do aerials through them. Doing so should put him in bad position of your choice.

There’s not exactly a whole lot to this, you just have to understand that you can’t GIVE bowser a lot to work with.

Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding bowser isn’t so bad. His recovery, although very long, is fairly linear. There’s not too much he can do. If he can land above the stage, he’s going to so as there isn’t a huge amount of lag on his up+b. (it really just puts him at disadvantage, and a “good read” for him will probably wind up being ANOTHER up+b to get away.)

Other than that, you just want to make sure you don’t get HIT by the up+b as he comes back. He can’t cover a lot of vertical range, so it’s not like you’ve going to do a lot of movement for that. Just get out there, put a b.air on him, or make him pull up. No need to get fancy with it.

Recovery

Bowser’s got edgeguards. Oh does he have edgeguards. Bowser’s got all sorts of tools to deal with edgeguarding. He’s kind of like, a low-tier marth when it comes to edgeguarding. He can cover just about ANY option, but his range is nowhere near as good as marth’s (due to bowser’s not-so-good recovery).

So like, you have to be ready for anything. You have to be ready for him to jump out and aerial through your pills, you have to be ready for him to try and snipe an u.air if you go over, flame breath for low angles, and d.air or edgehog if you try to ss. It’s not like he CAN’T stop you.

But then again, it’s not like your recovery is super amazing, so you should be used to this by now. (Like really, I think I’m going to take out the recovery section and blanket it as WATCH FOR ****).

The one thing you really do need to watch for is him exploiting your up+b recovery. Bowser has a pretty solid gimmick in that if he lets you up+b onto the stage, he’s just going to KK b.throw you off. If he gets this, you’re more than likely going to be stuck till you die. So, by any means possible, you have to keep him off of the ledge.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
Koopa Klaw: Koopa Klaw is one of the 3 air throws in this game (the other 2 being kirby’s swallow and yoshi’s swallow). At any point and time, if bowser thinks you’re going to shield, he can just koopa klaw and beat your shield, even while jumping. That means you can’t bank on shielding bowser 24/7 unless you’re going to stay parked straight out of KK range. (If you’re out of KK range, he’s not going to hit you anyway).

Flame Cancel: (For whoever still has 1.0 or whatever): although this isn’t going to kill you by any stretch, you really can’t see this coming, you have to just take a guess at it (unless said bowser… NEVER empty hops). You could cape some flames back at him, but again, this isn’t going to destroy you. Just note that if you’re playing on an old version, expect bowser to just, magically start shooting fire at you. XD



024. Mewtwo
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 6-4 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 60-40 Doc (I want to put this closer, but Melee’s hit detection won’t allow me to do it. I’m serious)
The General Consensus: Dark > Psychic cause apparently too many black people play doc
The General Flow:

He’s gunna nair.

This match isn’t exactly as clear cut as people make it out to be. If you find a good m2, you’ll actually be tripped up by al ~~He’s gunna nair~~ a lot of stuff. M2 actually has some good range with his tilts and b.air, he’s got A LOT of comboability leading from his d.tilt, u.tilt, and f.air and u.air, and he’s got a get-out-of-jail free card with his recovery.

M2’s biggest flaw in his desi ~~He’s gunna nair~~ design is his size. Although he’s fairly agile, his size is what gets him into a crapload of trouble. That, and the fact that his tail ISN’T disjointed (which makes sense, but it’s pretty lame in the grand scheme of things). Because of this, you’re always looking at a HUGE FRICKING TARGET of a character, overall the largest target in the game (as he’ll be stretching his tail out a lot). YOU STILL CAN’T GO SLAM IN WITH F.AIRS ALL DAY BECAUSE GUESS WHAT?

HE’S GUNNA N.AIR!

Yes, among all other things M2 has (which again, he actually has some good stuff), he’s got his God-send of a n.air. How you deal with the n.air will, in the grand scheme of things, determine how you~~HE’S GUNNA NAIR~~ you’ll do in this match. You’re not going to deter him from doing it, but if you can that opens up all sorts of opportunities. Instead, you have to work your way around it among all of the standard Doc droppers.

Offense

Don’t get it twisted, M2 is not free. In fact, offense vs a competent M2 can be fairly difficult as he has a nice long reach on all fronts.

If you’re gunna move in with pills, WATCH FOR N.AIRS. Among all of the ways he has to cut through pills, he can just n.air through them. It’s not like you can’t stop or beat his n.air, but it’s pretty good once it gets going. Beyond that, if you’re keeping him in check, he’s a big target, so don’t expect him to be doing too much movement around your pills. He can’t jump over a FH pill, and he can’t run under any pills, so has to cut through them or block.

Once you get in about mid range, you have to deal with his tilts. Again, his stuff isn’t disjointed like Marths, so it’s ok-a-go-go to poke back at him as you see fit. If you look like you’re going to jump in at him, HE’S probably GUNNA NAIR. Retreating n.air at that. If he’s got some nerve, he might take the time to turn around and b.air you. His b.air is loooooong but not disjointed. (I’ve f.aired the tip of a M2’s tail during M2’s b.air and killed him. No trade. It’s pretty dumb honestly.) So you can’t run over him, but you can get in. The other move to note for M2’s aerial defense is his U.air (and u.tilt, in a sense). If he catches you with either one of these, they’re more likely to lead to immediate rewards (read: combos) than him landing a n.air or b.air on you. Be careful not to go too wide on your approaches.

M2 has pretty good handle on the ground too. At long range, he can try to annoy you with shadow balls (charged and uncharged, he’ll mix it. Trust me). They shouldn’t really do anything beyond slow you down and/or stop your momentum should you choose to block them. Think of them as straight lined pills with a jagged path; he can’t cancel them at all, so there’s going to be a sort of delay before he does anything, but it can kill if you’re not ready.

As you get midrange on the ground, you have to contest with M2’s tilts, smashes and grab (which, he has a decent grab range, with a fairly good grab reach). His f.tilt and f.smash? Nothing you haven’t seen before, His F.smash is kind of disjointed, but just be careful not to run slam into it and die. Same with his d.smash.

The important thing to note in his ground defense is his d.tilt. This leads to immediate combos. Most notably on you, this will lead to either grabs or DJC f.airs. All you need to really know is don’t get hit by the d.tilt if you can.

When you get jacked up on him, you have to look out for the heart and soul of M2, THE NAAAAAAAAAAAIR and DjC f.air. You won’t see a lot of DjC f.airs, but it’s relatively safe on its own, and if he can get away from you (retreating fairs), he can make it real safe(ok, I say DjC, your m2 is liable to do ANY kind of F.air to get away with it).

But that N.air? :3 MMMmmmmm dat n.air. I’d ask that n.air out on a date if she was single. It’s pretty beautiful. Comes out fast (5 frames), hits around the entire body, multi hits for days, what more could you ask for? A shine. And that’s pretty much what M2’s n.air is, a low-tier shine.

After you get that first hit, though, you go to town on him. He’s huge, he’s light, and he’s floaty. That’s a combination that’s just begging you to make a combo video out of it. Keep in mind that if he gets enough distance away from you, HE’S GUNNA N.AIR. And even better for him, if you over-commit, he’ll just teleport away. He basically gets that free.

Speaking of teleports, if you ever catch him in a bad spot, be ready for him to teleport out. You’re not going to hit him unless you call it, so it’s basically free for him. The trick to this is spacing yourself so that he can’t teleport through you (that’s with regards that, more often than not, teleporting AWAY from you isn’t an option due to stage sizes). Along with his teleport, watch for his rolls. M2 has loooooooong rolls. ‘Bout as long as this guide, actually. It’s fairly quick too, so M2’s have no problems throwing out their roll.

When the day is done, it doesn’t matter if you’re somewhere higher up and M2’s at the bottom of the barrel, he’s got PLENTY of options of dealing with your offense.


Defense:

Defending against M2 isn’t catastrophic, but it’s not like he can’t do stuff. M2 isn’t going to be doing a lot of attacking, but he’s got some safe options.

At long range, look for him to try a shadow ball approach. It’s not the most solid approach by any stretch, but if he thinks he can’t get in, he’ll have plenty of room to get out, so it’s pretty safe for him.

Mid range, you’re going to have to look for his d.tilt. That … thing wants nothing more than to score some d.tilts. If you’re on the defensive, you want to stay out of this mid range because of this. You can’t really punish anything and if you jump as he’s coming in, HE’S GUNNA N.AIR!!! (or really, he CAN.) He could just let you back up, which is what you’d wind up doing.

Poking at him at mid range with f.tilts and capes is perfectly acceptable, but understand that you have more to lose than gain at this range if he wants his d.tilt.

Retreating f.airs, retreating d.airs, SHBAWD stuff, they’re all good for keeping your mobility up, which you want to do. M2 has a very good wavedash, but outside of that he is not very mobile. Not only does he have some difficulty catching a moving target, he has a hard time dealing with a mobile defense. Don’t be afraid to slowplay him some inch your way in so you can switch on the offensive.

If you ever feel the pressure from m2 and can find the opening, feel free to up+b out of there. He’s floaty enough to where he won’t get down in a timely manner to punish you, and he’s big enough to where you can land some dumb lucky hit if you guess the wrong way or something. Up+b beats a lot of his stuff, but you have to make sure it connects. You run a huge risk by going at the wrong time and getting grabbed.

And getting grabbed is one thing you never want to do vs m2. He’s got all sorts of setups from his throws, some strong, some not-so-strong. The thing you have to avoid is getting grabbed at high %. He’s looking for that up throw, every time. The “magic number”, as the m2s call it, is obvious stage dependant, but it’s not an unreasonable percent for them to look for by any stretch of the imagination (I think the lowest is like, 110s or so? Im not sure). The thing is, getting grabbed by M2 at high percents is dangerous. He’s a character that can straight up kill you with a grab.


Edgeguarding

Edgeguarding m2 sucks.

M2 has to be the most frustrating character in the game to edgeguard. Saving all of his recovery tricks for later, you have to realize that at any time you over commit to an edgeguard and m2 calls it, he can teleport straight through and go about his business. That means you actually have to outsmart something that’s psychic. It’s not impossible, but it’s just frustrating.

With that being said, the one thing you can’t do vs m2 is chase him too far out. If you chase him far out, the problem won’t just be him teleporting through you, but him teleporting through you and turning your edgeguard into his.

Because of that, you want to stay snug tight with the stage. That’s not to say don’t go off the stage, but you don’t want to go far at all. If you go attack him off stage, you want to do stuff in short bursts. Waveland b.airs, ledgedrop b.airs, basically, b.airs. Although it’s technically safe to come on him with a d.air, you don’t want to look too hard for this as you’re asking him to go under him.

The big thing to know about m2 is that if he up+b’s and doesn’t land directly on the stage, there’s no lag on his recover. That translates to (relatively) unpunishable up+bs. Don’t try to bank on it.

If he ever has to make a long recover from either way (down or out), you have to watch for his 2 gimmicks. The first being a double jump -> late aerial. The purpose of this is to give him more height on his recover. If you can call him doing his aerial, you can punish him.. The second thing you have to look for it is reverse fully charged shadowball. This isn’t a huge deal as m2 will be coming backwards in a long animation that you can just hit him out of. Infact, you really won’t SEE this at all, but just know that it can happen.

Once he gets to the ledge, though, his day isn’t done. M2 has an invincible ledge stall (If it’s NOT completely invincible, Taj is the greatest con man I’ve ever seen). It’s a pretty hilarious setup. As long as M2 has the lead, you have no option but to take the ledge. If he calls you taking the ledge, he teleports back to the stage and runs away free. The only thing you can do is hope to time him as he commits to doing down, which is a tight timing. There are ways you can bait him into going back on prematurely, but the important thing to know is you can’t hit him during this.

…. Of course, he could just n.air back onto the stage. XD


Recovery

Recovery. . . . . .-drums fingers on desk-

He can get out there. M2 doesn’t have to pay too much respect to your recovery if he doesn’t want to. The only thing you really can do is throw pills out and keep him from coming out there. He can chase you pretty far, pretty much park in front of you, and b.air. This is actually one of the few situations where he probably…. WONT n.air. XD

But regardless, the main thing you want to keep in mind is that you have a d.air. D.air and pills. They’re pretty much the only things you have to defend yourself in this situation. You don’t want to try to b.air with m2 because a trade is losing in this situation, and you’ll be hard pressed to actually BEAT his b.air since it’s… loooooooooooooooooooong. Oh, and since it’s looooong, watch out for ledgedropped b.airs, because well, his b.air is loooooooooooooooooooooong.

The biggest thing to watch for actually isn’t an edgeguard, but his edgehog. Coming from ?Guess what? YEAH HIS TELEPORT. If can coax you into slowing down (for whatever reason), he doesn’t have to b.air and knock you away, he could just teleport back to the ledge and hold it there. This works so well for him because the turnaround is almost instant, and once he chooses to teleport, there’s nothing you can do about it.
His d.air is a meteor smash, so watch for him trying to go above you and meteor smash you. It’s not a super great edgeguard, but it’s not like your recovery is anything impressive.

Beyond that, recovery is standard protocol. Pick a path, trick yourself along that path, good luck’n’God speed.

Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)
M2’s teleport: If his teleport ends before he touches the ground, there’s no recovery to it (technically there is, but he recovers in the air). That means you have to watch out for gimmicks such as M2 teleport approaches.

M2’s side-b (Confusion? I always get this and disable mixed up because like, the names don’t make sense for what they do or WHATEVER): M2’s Side B DEFLECTS (not REFLECTS) projectiles. So that means if he side-b’s your pill, you can run straight through it. All he’s doing it making it so it doesn’t hit him.


M2’s down b: mad gimmicky, short range projectile move. The move itself is a gimmick in that it only works if it hits you in the front (so if you can just turn around, you avoid it. Caping it works too). The super gimmick is that M2 is tall, Doc is short. You can just duck it.

M2’s reverse shadowball charge: Normally used to punish rolls, spotdodges, wakeups, just know that he can put a continuous hitbox on a spot.

Battlefield vs M2: If you don’t know, M2 can pull people through stages with his Side-B. Most known on for battlefield, although I swear I’ve seen it done on stadium as well. Know that it happens on thin stages if you go by the edge while m2 is on the ledge. You obviously don’t WANT this to happen. If he does happen, recover by caping to turn yourself towards the center of the stage (CAPE BACKWARDS YA BIG DUMMEH!) and then double jumping. If he manages to somehow pull you out of a double jump, YA DONE! Na jk, you get your double jump back.

025. Kirby
​

Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 8-2 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 75-25 Doc
The General Consensus: 65-35 Doc (70-20 from Pervatasaurus. Yes, 70-20, as in the last 10 is lost on the character select screen.)
The Super Special 18Spikes Ratio #2: 20-80 Kirby
The General Flow:
You’re completely behind the wheel in this match. This match will go as fast as you want it to. You as Doc are one of the worst nightmares a Kirby will ever see. He can’t duck anything you throw at him, save u.smash, up angled f.tilt, and up angled f.smash. He can’t realistically run away from your approaches, and he’s not exactly going to chase you down. This matchup looks pretty bad for him.

But don’t mistake this as free. Kirby still a very VERY few tools he can use to put some damage on. Tricks and traps that, if you’re unfamiliar with the matchup, might put some hurt on ya.

The one thing you absolutely canNOT let happen in this matchup is let Kirby copy Pills. Besides the obvious fact that you’re giving him a usable projectile, the real downside is that you’ll be giving him access to his best hat in the game.

Just to add some lols, it’s easy to argue that Kirby’s pill game is actually better than Doc’s. (Hell, I think Kirby’s pill game is better than Doc’s. I LT Main Kirby.)

Offense:

Again, the ball is in your court in this matchup. You pretty much have control of your destiny. There is not a lot Kirby can do to stop you, unless you let him.

However, if you let him, there actually is A LOT you can do to stop you. It pretty much goes without say that there are 2 times when you really have to be cautious vs Kirby. The first being if you’re going to ground approach and he’s not shielding (which he doesn’t have too much of a reason to at this point.)
If you’re going to come on the ground, Kirby’s got his trusty F.tilt and D.tilt at his disposal. Neither one of them are bad by any stretch of the imagination. Infact, Kirby’s d.tilt IS LONGER THAN YOUR ENTIRE MOVESET. Yes, if you’re willing to come in on the ground, you give Kirby the chance to out poke you. So if you want to approach him on the ground, you have to be careful of some

The other position where he can actually do something is with his back to you. This is actually kirby’s strongest position. From here, he can still turn around and F.tilt (although now him D.tilting takes more time), and he can u.tilt which can lead to stuff for him (u.tilt -> u.air), but most importantly he can b.air. Kirby’s b.air is pretty much his savior. I mean, that’s kind of arguable as to WHAT move Kirby lives off of, but b.air is making it to the run-off votes easy. It’s not exactly long, but it’s good. Think of it like your b.air. It’ll stuff f.airs if he’s looking for them.

Now, this isn’t to be confused with attacking strong positions of other characters, but, in the realm of defense, this is most of what Kirby has. He doesn’t get his perk of crouching vs you, you’re a small character yourself. He’s not fast at all, so he can’t outrun you (although if he is moving, he’s still liable to straight up move out of the way. I mean Bowser can frickin do that if he stays in good spots), so you can’t be mindless in this.

Aside from those points, all you REALLY have to do is use some common sense and space well. Kirby’s going to be hard pressed to punish anything unless he’s back is to you, or unless you land jacked up in his face so that he actually CAN grab you. Common sense would be along the lines of if you throw pills, note that he’s a small character and his character perk is having the lowest crouch in the game, so don’t be too surprised if he looks to run under/crouch under/wavedash under/ Cincinnatti slide under your pills.

Defense:

Defending against Kirby isn’t exactly hard, but you there’s a gimmick to it. You can’t let him get too close to you to begin with. Too close being inside his wavedash -> d.tilt range or something to that effect.

If you’re going to start by pilling him, note that you want to throw more ground/sh pills. His air mobility isn’t great. Kirby WANTS to be on the ground, so you want to make that a hazard for him. If he takes to the air, you can throw some FH pills to pester him, but you don’t really want to deter him from being there. That’s where you want him. (Granted, if he’s ANYWHERE that’s kinda where you want him.)

Again, Kirby is not fast anywhere, so it’s not like he’s going to make a ridiculous burst and zip in out of nowhere, you have to LET him do that. So with that being said, he’s a character that you can just keep backing away from if you want to play D. Roll -> Run away from his pressure on, wavedash away, he’s just a character that you can flat out move away from. More often than not, you can actually jump and d.air and he’s got to stop what he’s doing.

Put all this together, and you’ll see that most of what Kirby’s offense revolves around is poking at you. He’s hard pressed to do something that leads into something else, so all he can do is just pepper you with damage and hope to find some mistake to get you off the stage. His problem with that is that he doesn’t have anything with a lot of power. That being said, you can also opt to CC A LOT of his stuff and punish afterwards. You don’t want to make this the norm because you’re giving him damage, but it’s not a bad option by any stretch of the imagination.

The one thing you absolutely cannot do is let Kirby pin you in a corner, and you best believe he’s going to try. This idea might not be as blatant as other characters who are trying to pin you down, but that’s because this is all Kirby really has for pressure. Working positioning to push you off the stage like a zambonee. So if and when you notice you’re running out of real estate, be ready get out of the area.

Fighting out of corners is always an option, but know that again, you’re very capable of going up on a platform and going AROUND Kirby. (You do want a platform for this unless he just doesn’t have his back to you, in which case you could try to just blow by him).

….I mean, there’s not really a lot to say about this. You just have to not be careless.

Edgeguarding:

*Randomly tossed in* Kirby has 5 jumps. Just in case you didn’t know. Count them.

Ironically, edgeguarding Kirby is not too big of a problem. Although he can cover a good vertical with his recovery, he doesn’t have an outstanding horizontal.

That translates to him not flying over your head. But I mean, Jiggs doesn’t really do that either but Jiggs’ recovery is dangerous for other reasons. Kirby doesn’t really have any of that stuff.

Unless Kirby can turn around, you’re not going to have to deal with much of a fight from Kirby on recovery (which he can, but doing so is a player-to-player preference). He can defend himself, but it’s to the point of where he’s going to be more concerned with recovering. On that note, all you really want to avoid is trying to come from below him. I mean, you’re Doc, it’s kind of hard to come from below him anyway, but you’re just asking to get d.aired at that point (and, if of all character you want to come below KIRBY, you deserve it).

So like, throw pills, try to hop out for a b.air, you can even try some Capfal superman u.air nonsense if you want to, at worse he’s going to knock you back to the stage.

If he up+b’s, you can cape that free every time, or just edgehog and punish if he lands on the stage. It’s no biggie.

The ONLY thing that could possibly pose a threat to you is if he tries to stone sweetspot, and that’s a problem if you make it a problem. You can either opt to steal the ledge from him (which is risky), you can cape him as he comes out of stone, or you could try some super nonsense dropzone b.air as he comes out. If you managed to knock him into this situation, you’re normally better off letting him just have the ledge.

It’s Kirby, he needs all the breaks he can get, man.

Recovery

Your recovery, however? It’s still bad. So Kirby has ways to deal with this.

The one thing that will slow Kirby down is pills. Although he can poke through pills with f.air or b.air, it takes too much time for him to do it with f.air, and b.air requires him to be… facing backwards (which cuts his edgeguarding range), so Pills are, for all intents and purposes, ok-a-go-go.

The big thing you’re going to have to watch for is his D.air. He can chase you pretty far, and he can chase you pretty low. The problem being you’re Doc, you’re probably going to have to go low. If he lands a d.air on you, be sure to wait till the last part of it before you try and meteor cancel. ALL of the hits in Kirby’s d.air are meteor smashes, so if you eat one, you’re going to eat more damage for being hasty. On the inverse, don’t fall too far because well, you’re still Doc.

If you try to go above him, you have to watch for b.airs. It’s pretty much the standard procedure, just be careful about where you go.

If Kirby stays on the stage, you need to watch for his d.tilt, which pokes BELOW the stage, and his f.tilt. He also can SH d.airs on the ledge and pick you off out of an up+b.

Oh, and super dumb gimmick, watch for cutters from the stage. This is pretty much a slap in the face edgeguard, but if you want to hang out in that area, you give him a reason to throw it. It has a deceptively long range, but he’s got to make a deceptively good read to catch you with it.

Doctor Kirby

THE ONE THING YOU ABSOLUTELY CANNOT DO IN THIS MATCHUP IS LET KIRBY HAVE PILLS. It’s not the end of the world if he gets them, but it’s like, an equalizer if he gets them. Ironically, his pill game is better than yours. (Pills are his best hat. You can argue Falco lasers)

If Kirby ever gets your pills, then you realistically need to stop WHATEVER you’re doing to and get them away from him. You can’t have him pestering you with a projectile from dumb heights that you can’t attack him at. You also can’t let him control the ground and force you to jump into b.airs and whatnot. Kirby with pills is pretty frickin evil.


Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Kirby’s forward and back throw: Both of these throws are breakable DURING the throw animation. A lot of people think this is “broken” AGAINST Kirby, but actually if this didn’t happen Kirby would have a BUSTED mechanic of guaranteed kills from grabs. You want to know this for Kirbicides.

Kirby’s U.throw: If Kirby grabs you while he is flush on a ledge (i.e. he rolled into the ledge) and u.throws you, both of you are more-than-likely going to die (This is stage, and then ledge dependant, more often than not you both die). If Kirby is looking for a Kirbicide, this one’s guaranteed.

Kirby’s F.air: There’re 3 kicks, but there’s a 4th invisible “hit” as he hits the ground. Just keep that in mind.
Kirby’s D.air: *Points up*

Kirby’s Swallow: Is an Air Grab. Nowhere near as good as Bowser’s or Yoshi’s, but is still an airthrow nonetheless. Not really important enough to note, but know it can happen.

Kirby’s Swallowcide (Neutral B Suicide): If he grabs you near the ledge, and breaking out would not save you, DON’T BREAK OUT. You’re pretty much dead anyway, but breaking out makes it easier for Kirby to make it back.

*Swallow mechanics, for anybody who cares: If you break out of Kirby’s Swallow on the ground, you can either break on the ground or in the air. If you break out in the air, he goes up, you go down. If he swallows you, you go up and he goes down (where applicable).

Kirbicides: The most applicable time for Kirby to look for a Kirbicide is 1) When he is in the lead and 2) When he has a high % (+ you having a low %, but that’s not as important). If and when these situations come up, be careful around ledges. You’re always better off making Kirby come to you.

026. Pichu
Dogy’s Matchup Chart: 8-2 Doc
Dogy’s Matchup Ratio: 80-20
The General Consensus: Why are you playing Pichu (Alpha says 70-30 cause I’m talking to him on skype right now)
The General Flow:
This matchup is fairly wide open for Doc. There’s not a lot you exactly have to worry about. Pichu has to take all sorts of risks to get anything going, where as Doc can stay fairly safe and get ridiculous rewards. Monster chaingrabs, combos, safe pokes and pressure, great defense, there’s not a lot realistically Doc needs to do to win. Pichu has to do all the work.

You really just have to look for dumb, random gimmicks. Stuff like thunder OoS (yeah bet you’ve never seen that) or just completely dumb stuff.

Offense:

Again, there’s not too much you realistically have to feel restrained about when you take this matchup. I’m not trying to say this and blow it off as “do whatever”, but there isn’t a lot Pichu can realistically do to stop you so long as you’re not horribly wrong. The main thing Pichu has going for him is his n.air, which still gets stopped by a large portion of your arsenal.

So long as you space well, Pichu isn’t going to have too many great opportunities to do anything. The only thing you’d have to be weary of is wavedash back -> f.smash, which is disjointed. However, the tradeoff for Pichu is that if you can bait it out, it’s free damage.

Getting a grab is bad for Pichu because he’s a light midweight. That means you have plenty of time to follow up afterwards, and he’s fairly comboable.

Defense

Stopping Pichu’s offense is again, not exactly a hard problem. You can basically pick a move and stop a lot of stuff, tilts vs runins, u.tilts for jumpins, d.airs for jumpins, retreating SHBAWD, retreating fair, etc etc. It’s not exactly pretty for Pichu.

He’s going to n.air, and he’s going to n.air often. That’s pretty much “the approach” for Pichu atm. It’ll go through pills, but you can use that to your advantage and space yourself to punish his landing.

If you’re setting up a pill defense, note that Pichu is small enough to run under FH and SH pills. He’s not going to zip in like marth or sheik, but he can stay low if he wants to.

Look for thunder jolt approaches. You won’t see too many of them because Pichu will obviously take some damage from it for an overall weak setup, but note that it will happen. The one thing you want to avoid doing is jumping if Pichu is coming behind it.

You want to avoid being above Pichu for the same reason you want to avoid being above Pikachu…. Except it’s NOWHERE near as bad as being above Pika. Pichu nets all sorts of juggles if you’re above him (which actually isn’t horrid because you can beat his u.air with your d.air), but it’s one of the few things that “he has going for it”, if anything. So try your best to stay out from above him.

When Pichu is on the ledge, look for quick attack shenanigans to try to mix you up and allow him back on the stage free. He’ll take damage, but it’s better than taking damage from you.

Uuuum. Pichu’s thunder jolts climb walls. I mean, I don’t really have much to say about this matchup because it’s pretty wide open for Doc.

Edgeguarding

Just because Pichu is… horrible doesn’t mean his recovery is bad. Infact, it’s actually fairly good. He can recovery from a long distance, and can recover from pretty low, assuming he’s still alive.

Be prepared for people trying full skullbashes and whatnot. I mean, you kinda have to expect the unexpected. You can try to cape it, but risk-reward goes up the longer he charges.

Unless I’ve been misinformed, Pichu can’t sweetspot the ledge from below. Keep that in mind as Pichu recovers. I’ll explain this more in the gimmicks section. If tries to sweetspot the ledge with quick attack, cape it free.

You also have nothing to worry about from the quick attack as that it does no damage on pass through. It’s free.

Recovery

And because Pichu has a good recovery, he also has a decent edgeguard vs Doc. If you haven’t understood this yet, understand that Doc’s recovery is terrible, so he doesn’t get ANYTHING free. Even though it’s Pichu, in the event that you wind up off the stage, you can’t be predictable.

Pills aren’t failproof, he can nair through them. You can’t take the low road all times, you’re liable to get thunder jolted, and heaven forbid if you don’t want to sweetspot. That’s asking for F.smash and thunder.


Gimmicks (And gimmicks to look for)

Pichu’s Quick Attack: Same applies for Pikachu. When Pichu does quick attack, at the point where he can input a 2nd command, he scrunches up (to do the 2nd attack). During this time, his hitbox stretches to double the length. Because of this, Pichu cannot sweetspot the ledge from below, because he’s scrunch and poke his head over it. Caping this is free.

Dogy1!! – Update Info

Incase you’re wondering, I’ll update this guide as I come across/discover/get completely annihilated by new information. It’s not going to be a one’n’done kind of thing, I’ll update it sometime (don’t expect too many updates, I AM pretty lazy] but like, it’s not going to stay on 06 info if stuff changes.
The changes pretty much are going to come as I go out and see more stuff, because again, this guide is based off of MY experiences. That’s unfair, I know, but that’s how it’s going to be. I sat down and did this nonsense, so if somebody wants to add their 10 cents, they can do their own guide so we can have many opinions!
I mean, there’ve been plenty of Doc projects that fell on their face when others got involved, soooo yeah.

Dogy2!! – FAQ!

PSYCHE! NOBODY THOUGHT THIS WAS GOING TO HAPPEN LOLOLOLOL. But seriously, if people WANT a FAQ, I could make one.

Dogy3!! – Future Guides?

This is one thing people have asked me about a lot of times. I probably will do a lot more guides (for various characters in various games), and maybe a few more for Doc, who knows. I’ve been wanting to do a general fighting game guide for ages, and I think it’d be great. I just needed a starter guide for it and this is it.
But you don’t care about that.
Doc guides, I dunno, might come up with a stage guide, a how-to-play Doc guide, etc etc. I’ve always had this idea of making a how to beat Doc guide, so that you (As Doc) know EXACTLY what characters are looking for against Doc. That’d be a hard one to string together as I’d have to get help from atleast 25 different people (25, 24, some number like that, I’m not counting.

Dogy4!! – Random Info of Randomness

Ok, so, here are some random stats for this guide.

Pages in MS Word: 119 Pages (Calibri Font, 11 pt size)

Words: 68,324 (For Version 1)

Time of Completion: Nov 9 09 -> Jan 7 10. It really took me like, maybe a week’s worth of time to do it? But I’ve put this off so many times that it’s comical.

Awesome things that’ve happen since the beginning of this guide: Got a job. Listened to so much music. Learned how to write a guide. Drank so much soda it’s ********. Learned a whole new level of procrastination.

Credits: Um…. Me. I told you, this is all me, GTF OUTTA HERE LOL.

Current Song as I’m Finishing this guide: Streetlight Manifesto – Here’s to Life. (Pretty white of me, I know.)

Last matchup I studied (read: thoroughly played) before the completion of this guide: Pikachu and Sheik.

Least studied matchup in the guide: 1st, Roy. 2nd DK. 3rd, Kirby

Chairs broken during the making of this guide: 1.

 

[Dogysamich]

Saved for expanding room, although I'll probably just redo the whole guide if it comes to it.

I feel like I left out alot, dont like the format, etc etc.

:|

I TRIED.

 

[#HBC | Mac]

most epic block of text ever. took me like 30 secs of holding down space to get to the bottom...

will read some of it now

 

[Vulcan55]

Shouldn't the terms list start with B, not A1?
(According to the ToC anyway)

 

[Dogysamich]

You're right.

You're gunna get through that guide and be like "Wow the format to this is ********."

It's one of the millions of things I didn't think of till AFTER the fact.

I will say this big thing was a learning experience. XD

 

[TresChikon]

THE TEXT!

IT BURNSSSS!

Do you have a downloadable version?

 

[Dogysamich]

Uuuuum, I don't have anywhere to upload one.

If you AIM me or something, I could send it to you.

 

[Vulcan55]

You're a mod, can't you attach files to posts?

 

[Dogysamich]

Yeah. If only smashboards allowed me to upload .docx files.

I almost want to say the only thing you ARE allowed to upload on here are like, .bin files for brawl pics. Im not sure.

 

[St. Viers]

nice guide. reading it will take awhile XD

1:37 EDIT: finished

 

[forkgirl]

hey just fyi i dont use sheik's chain to edgeguard. I did it in Georgia because I made a Sheik friend who likes her chain and kept telling me to use it, and I was having fun and joking around with it, and kept doing it because it was working and was funny that it was actually working.

I don't really care, but i've seen you mention it a few times on smashboards and thought i'd let you know. I usually run off and bair or nair or throw needles.

 

[unknown522]

Nice guide dogy. Long as hell, but good.

hey just fyi i dont use sheik's chain to edgeguard. I did it in Georgia because I made a Sheik friend who likes her chain and kept telling me to use it, and I was having fun and joking around with it, and kept doing it because it was working and was funny that it was actually working.

I don't really care, but i've seen you mention it a few times on smashboards and thought i'd let you know. I usually run off and bair or nair or throw needles.

lol, I remember when you got raynex with the chain in pools @ tgmtsbco 1. He got so emo after that. That was funny as hell

 

[Dogysamich]

hey just fyi i dont use sheik's chain to edgeguard. I did it in Georgia because I made a Sheik friend who likes her chain and kept telling me to use it, and I was having fun and joking around with it, and kept doing it because it was working and was funny that it was actually working.

I don't really care, but i've seen you mention it a few times on smashboards and thought i'd let you know. I usually run off and bair or nair or throw needles.

And see, that's why it's your edgeguard. XD

It's one of my great stories of TGMT and FAST1 (cause you were definitely all over it at fast1 >.>) and everytime I see a sheik try and fail I'm like "Well, Forkgirl coulda did it better.)

^_^