Advice on how to beat Pika, I know it's a strange request

[KentaKurodani]

Hiya there Pika boards, I'm from over on the Captain Falcon boards, and I solely main Captain Falcon. As such, I regularly get my well-toned Falcon Butt handed to me on a silver platter by your little electric mouse. I was wondering if you guys would be willing to play a little devil's advocate and give me any advice on how to fight him? At least to me, he is Falcon's worst matchup by far, but we don't have very much information on how to deal with him. At any rate, thank you for your time!

 

[Angiance]

We shall reveal no secrets

 

[Nocally]

Captain Falcon is a fat-ass heavy character, so take advantage of this when going in to high rage mode, otherwise the only thing captain falcon really can do is stay on the ground and poke Pika with quick moves, and then go airborne for the kill. dash grab is good, so are some of his specials, but don't get too predictable.

all of this is pretty much just some general advice, maybe Falcon has some combo strings you can use, I have seen some Falcon videos where they claim he can combo everyone.

 

[KentaKurodani]

Thanks for your insight, Nocally. It's hard to develop a good conpetitive meta without information exchange. In return, I can tell you about some of Falcon's few options for Pika to watch out for. Like you were saying, rage is mean, so be cautious about getting caught out of shield by a raptor boost, it kills earlier than you feel it should, guaranteed. Also be careful directly approaching after thunder jolting, if we hold A our quick jab can cancel the thunder jolt and as long as we don't get pushed off stage said quick jab will catch your approach quite often, allowing us to begin strings off of that. Also watch for dairs when you are recovering with quick attack, with good aerial positioning we can slam you right out of it.

 

[Garde Noir]

While we're here, want some Rosalina advice for the same exchange?

Rosalina is comboed heavy by up-air, Pika's up-air is really fast and strong enough to juggle us. The only difficult part about facing a Rosie worth half her salt is the approach game. Be patient against us, and wait for an opportunity to jab Luma. It only takes a quick jab or two for more than half our power to tumble off the stage. After Luma is gone, we dodge a lot, only going for really safe options like Jab-Stun-locks, which is just our standard A pressed at the right time. We stall for 8 to 13 seconds before going aggressive. Also, be aware that all of our off-stage games are really good. With Rosalina's ridiculous recovery and her floatiness, we really don't fear below the stage. On common stages like Smashville, Battlefield and FD, we can often tech off the stage on most hits and are in a really good position. Be wary of us when we follow you low.

 

[skiboots]

While we're here, want some Rosalina advice for the same exchange?

Rosalina is comboed heavy by up-air, Pika's up-air is really fast and strong enough to juggle us. The only difficult part about facing a Rosie worth half her salt is the approach game. Be patient against us, and wait for an opportunity to jab Luma. It only takes a quick jab or two for more than half our power to tumble off the stage. After Luma is gone, we dodge a lot, only going for really safe options like Jab-Stun-locks, which is just our standard A pressed at the right time. We stall for 8 to 13 seconds before going aggressive. Also, be aware that all of our off-stage games are really good. With Rosalina's ridiculous recovery and her floatiness, we really don't fear below the stage. On common stages like Smashville, Battlefield and FD, we can often tech off the stage on most hits and are in a really good position. Be wary of us when we follow you low.

Thanks for the advice dude! I don't play against RosaLuma often, so this definitely is helpful.

I wish I had a lot of knowledge to share, but being some what fresh (started taking smash competitively on 3DS) I feel I don't have much to offer quite yet. For now I'll lurk and listen.

Thanks again :D!

 

[pudding7100]

I find captain falcons very easy to fight as pikachu because he is the perfect weight for most of his juggling moves like up tilt. My best advice would be to try to stay near the center of the stage because its easy for pikachu to gimp you and dont do laggy moves for you will get punished hard

 

[Psyant]

You can true combo dthrow to knee on Pikachu at a very wide percentage range and it kills him ridiculously early, sometimes as low as like 70%. It does depend on how they DI the dthrow, but with your incredible dash grab you can get a lot of attempts and they will slip up sooner or later. I think early dthrow knee kills are probably the best thing Falcon has on Pikachu. It's honestly really devastating.

A few other random tips; your side B also kills us very early so take the chance to use that when you get it. Falcon's jab is good for boxing out Pikachu when you're very close to each other. Your fsmash, while laggy, has a lot of reach (more than anything Pikachu has really, besides his own fsmash) and can again KO Pikachu very early, so if you get a hard read that's a good go to. Dsmash can work well against Pikachu at times as well. General Falcon stuff.

Just remember that Pikachu is fragile as hell in this game, and while he has a great combo game, 3 hits for Pikachu is the equivalent of 1 for you. I'd advise just focusing on the player you're fighting more than Pikachu, and make sure you punish hard when they slip up or you get a read on them. Falcon can afford to make more mistakes than Pikachu can.

But yeah, it's kind of a rough matchup and you really need to make some good reads and get some meaty hits off them to win. Pikachu's small frame as well as his great ability to juggle fastfallers and gimp bad recoveries puts Falcon at a disadvantage.

 

[KentaKurodani]

You can true combo dthrow to knee on Pikachu at a very wide percentage range and it kills him ridiculously early, sometimes as low as like 70%. It does depend on how they DI the dthrow, but with your incredible dash grab you can get a lot of attempts and they will slip up sooner or later. I think early dthrow knee kills are probably the best thing Falcon has on Pikachu. It's honestly really devastating.

This confirms a suspicion I have had for a while :D Thanks for letting me know that I'm right!

 

[Wumbo105]

You can true combo dthrow to knee on Pikachu at a very wide percentage range and it kills him ridiculously early, sometimes as low as like 70%. It does depend on how they DI the dthrow, but with your incredible dash grab you can get a lot of attempts and they will slip up sooner or later. I think early dthrow knee kills are probably the best thing Falcon has on Pikachu. It's honestly really devastating.

All these grab tips would be great...if Pikachu wasn't completely impossible to grab. I'm with my fellow Falcon mains saying Pika is our toughest MU, and I think it's due to the fact that we are just completely deprived of grabs in the matchup, which almost our entire game revolves around. Pika is so frickn tiny, and most of his moves end with him being in a small flattened position on the floor so landing a grab is the most frustrating thing in the universe. (Yes, this problem is also apparent against the likes of Puff and Kirby, but since Pika is actually a good character the problem is amplified.)
On top of this, your fair outranges and outprioritizes our nair approaches, and you just gotta Jolt or shieldgrab our dashattacks/raptor boosts.

I personally don't see any other options against a decent competent Pikachu.

 

[Psyant]

The only times your grab should miss is after Pikachu lands with bair, or when he's crouching. I don't think any other moves leave him that low on the ground.

If they're shutting you out with fair then mix up more? Pikachu's fair has a ridiculous hitlag modifier that makes him hang in place for like a full second if the last hit gets shielded, and you can do anything you want to him in that time. It's not that disjointed either apart from the last hit. Overall it's really unsafe to throw out all the time and because of Falcon's dash speed it's not like they can do it on reaction to your nair approach every time if you're fairly close beforehand. They're making a guess and a punishable commitment to wall you out and you can beat that with mix-ups.

It's not a good MU for Falcon but it's far from hopeless.

 

[Flawed]

Hey, any tips from a Pikachu main about dealing with Rosalina? I play a good rosalina on the regular, and as I'm spending more time with Pikachu lately I want to learn how to deal with her without going D3 for the easier matchup

 

[LunarWingCloud]

I'm no pro with Rosalina but being someone who uses both Rosalina and Pikachu very often, I think you want to make sure to stay grounded when possible. Pika's aerial game is much faster and can juggle Rosalina better than Rosalina can hit Pikachu. Also Pikachu like has been said is stupidly fragile, take advantage of that when close to a blast line, because you can kill really early with uair and other stuff.