Q&A Ask about Pikachu! Hosted by Axe and N64! feat. dkuo!

[oukd]

imo every character has a strong gimp game lol. you just need to call their offstage options and they're ded
falco/marth can gimp better while staying onstage though simply because of their spikes. this makes their gimp attempts safer. both of them are also good at initiating combos

id pick marth simply because you already play fox, and having 2 spacie counterpick characters means both of your counterpicks can get combo'd easily which makes your selections less flexible
on the other hand i still suggest falco since hes so damn GOOOOOD

 

[FourStar]

I really like falco's dair. mean god damn that move alone is what makes me keep coming back to him. and marth is probably the better secondary for me between fox, falco and marth. idk they are all a work in progress

 

[AXE 09]

Marth sounds solid to me.

But really, it all depends on what your worst matchups are. Who do you have trouble playing against?

 

[FourStar]

Marth sounds solid to me.

But really, it all depends on what your worst matchups are. Who do you have trouble playing against?

really i'm not sure just yet. cuz i play a lot of spacies so i'm used to the MU with my pika and i have no problems whatsoever. i think its mainly characters with weird projectiles like Dr. mario, Link, YL. they give me trouble but i sill magically win . IC's is the only MU that i for sure lose almost every time. other than that i have no problem with other MUs.

 

[FourStar]

Alright Pika bros, so after taking a break from playing Pikachu (sometimes people need rest from their main right?) i've narrowed my secondaries to just Falco and Fox. Mainly Falco because of his shine and spike and his great combo abilities. And plus i like his side smash

Now i know having two spacies as your secondaries is not a great idea but i've invested too much time into both characters and plus i really like how they play. The reason i gave up Marth is due to his slow speed in the air and on the ground. He has great range but i feel like quick characters will get past that and combo me to death.

I would make fox my main secondary but the problem with him for me is that he doesn't combo as well falco. Now with this being said I like Fox's speed and mobility much better. Fox is also alot better at recovering, something Falco very bad at. Fox's Usmash is also very good for me cuz i like usmash for the KO

Now with this all said can someone please tell me if I'm making the right choice or help me explain what i can do to improve?
Thanks

 

[N64]

Pika/Falco is a popular combo (looking at you Axe and dkuo), so there's that. But really, whatever you think works well for you and your style is best. Fox and Falco are both really good characters that don't have any particularly bad matchups, so without taking anything else into consideration each of them is a fine choice.

It sounds to me like you enjoy playing Fox more, which will probably mean you are more willing to invest more time and energy into improving your play with him.

 

[FourStar]

Yeah i love playing Fox. mainly because i'm dedicated to Pikachu and Fox since they were favorites in SSB64 can't leave them now

 

[FourStar]

is there ever a need for pikachu to SHFFL? if so can you tell me why?

 

[oukd]

you need to shffl if you want to hit a grounded opponent with a quick aerial (this usually being nair)
this in itself has several applications, but for the most part they revolve around the above reasoning

 

[FourStar]

you need to shffl if you want to hit a grounded opponent with a quick aerial (this usually being nair)
this in itself has several applications, but for the most part they revolve around the above reasoning

ok that makes sense. cuz i was messing around with it the other day i really can't find a use for SHFFL other than Nair and Uair

 

[oukd]

you can crossup fair for a goofy multihit scare but it's not as solid as nair
you can shffl dair edgecancel to avoid the landing lag but its kind of hard to setup and very limited

you're mostly right though, shffl uair/nair are your primary shffl attacks

oh yeah i also forgot, sometimes doing sh aerial off the edge is the only way you can cover an edgeguard option. dair works out here
(this isnt really shffl though)

 

[FourStar]

Thanks! see i was wondering why Axe pulls out a nair so fast and i tried and it was totally different. but now i got SHFFL nair pretty damn good now.

btw when is fair a safe move to pull out? you said you can crossup fair but is that it?

 

[oukd]

fair is very rarely safe lol. even on crossup its not amazing, i just threw that in there as some gimmick idea for substituting crossup nair with

the idea for crossing up with fair is that the opponent is punishing your early/late crossup nair on shield by attacking during your vulnerable frames (ie - you do an early nair, they attack after nair lands on shield. or you do late nair but they hit you before you hit a)
the threat of fair will make them think twice about attacking oos vs your early/late nair. the problem with this is that you landing that fair doesn't do much for you, and can even get you punished vs some opponents. ofc some people don't know this and it works well in that regard. i havent tested this enough to know effective it is though

if im falling from high up and im a distance from the opponent, i like doing fallback fair since it zones out the opponent more than other attacks i can do. feels better than doing nothing but can be punished if opponent is close enough, so you might want to just freefall to the edge and keep options open

i also like edgeguarding with fair when other aerial attacks wont reach, or catching recoveries with retreating fair when other aerial attacks will trade

 

[N64]

I use fair most often as an air-to-air. On the ground it's too easily cc'd and doesn't really get you much anyways. In the air, it actually has decent priority and holds them in place (while you're still moving in whatever direction), so it can lead to further combos/pressure. For example, you can jump forward at an aerial opponent, fair them and end up on the other side of them after the fair, and then double jump uair to pop them up.

 

[FourStar]

OK i'll try that next time! thanks!

 

[OliClutch117]

What's everyone's opinion here on the sheik MU and how do you play the MU?

 

[oukd]

ill never get over your sig lol



i dont think sheik MU is as bad as others but its still hella tough. sheik is incredibly good at zoning out your approach options with tilts/aerials, not to mention the cg to 60~70

as with most MUs its best to catch her during her movement with nairs/dtilts since she has a harder time zoning out of movement. and as with every MU getting her to jump/in the air/on plats is golden. i think usmash is the best go-to punish vs laggy things but if you're near the edge you could *attempt* a gimp with fthrow/bthrow

make sure you avoid grab setups. be wary of tilts, jabs, aerials, etc and space/cc/di/sdi accordingly, they can all lead into grabs if you aren't paying attention. cc can cancel many tilts and you can followup with a dtilt > nair, or grab, or something. (cc dtilt shffl nair is amazing vs everyone btw). same with fighting vs cc, crossups make cc followups with sheik harder but still puts you in a vulnerable spot

shielding works alright but leaves you vulnerable to grab. if she's tilting your shield you can punish with wd/usmash oos. this can work inbetween the 2 utilt hits btw. watch out for ac fair/needles on shield

if you do get grabbed you can do ambiguous di on the cg (slight behind) to confuse them but its still cg'able. however itll make your trajectory vertical and let you jump out earlier (but i think sheik can usmash tipper/uair KO you out of that lmao). i think its possible to mash nair out of slight behind at mid/high %

your nair can get grabbed btw lol

don't worry *too* much about being offstage since your recovery is beastly, but dont think its a free recovery. watch for needles, recover deeper into the stage if they're going for a hog

combo sheik like marth? idk hard to describe...try to end everything with her above you or offstage

edgeguarding sheik is thankfully easy. tailspike if possible, hog until upb poof where you do NORMAL getup from ledge > punish. the normal getup has enough hog time to hog her upb towards edge, although she can go above the ledge and fall but you can cover that with a smash/tilt



any of you going to lanhammer?

 

[OliClutch117]

I'm going to a tourney this weekend that is streaming hoping to have videos for you guys to critique soon.

 

[Captain Smuckers]

Did you guys know pikachu is like, really good against bowser :0

 

[evan56780]

Alright guys I have been playing competitive melee for about a year and a half now, I have a very large amount of tech skill down and compete in local tourneys in Canada I'm from Toronto. Any who pretty much how I have gone about chossing my mains are just playing who ever I am having the most fun with, this has gone from falco to ganon to captain falcon to now pikachu, if fallen in love with how cool his tail spike is and have been waiting to ask questions for like a month now cause smash boards have been down so I'll just get started.
1. Advice for practicing his tail spike?
2. I saw in a lot of pika videos people shield drop then aerial I know this isn't the best spot to ask but like how do you shield drop?
3. Any just general advice for me?
That's really it for now I'll think of more soon practicing for a tourney so ya
Thanks!

 

[oukd]

tailspike practice works well on cpu's. you want to learn the location of each hitbox
1. practice rising uair both on grounded opponents and aerial opponents. practice both sh uair and fh uair on grounded opponents
2. there are 2 tailspikes, the one above/behind you sends people down/behind you and the one above/in front you sends people down/in front you. bthrow cpu spacies and practice hitting each of them, or try to swat people off platforms with them
3. the 4th hitbox is in front of you, you can usually hit people with it using a ledgehop uair, or you can hit people in front of you if you fall down with it. it flicks people behind/below you

to shield drop effectively you need a good controller, but sometimes you can do it with a worn one. what you do is:
1. be on a plat (duh)
2. have your shield tilted all the way to the left or right. there's a lot of ways to do this, i like bringing up my shield out of dash/walk, or do a tilted shield input during lag frames
3. go from the side down to diagonal down on the side you're holding the shield. you want to go straight to the 45 degree notch in your octagonal gate. if you spotdodge try slowing down a little
4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfAlxODHc48

general advice
pika is cool dont let anyone tell you otherwise B)
learn your options/opponent's options after crossup nair on shield
learn your upb angles and make sure you can get them consistently
get your combo game down, at the very least on fastfallers

 

[FourStar]

how do you fast jabs with pikachu? my fastjabbing is like very inconsistent. also what do i work on next? i feel like now i am just practicing the same things over and i'm getting a little bored with it. should i start entering more tournaments or should i work on practicing with others?

 

[AXE 09]

@Dkuo: I never expected that video to get so many views, or even get uploaded to Youtube lol. I would've been more professional about it if I knew.

But yes =) As for tail spiking, if you're looking for just the normal tailspike hitbox, it'll be above and slightly in front of Pikachu. Try just hitting computers off stage, and jumping out and tail spiking them (espeically against Falco/Fox).


@FourStar: When I want to jab really fast with Pikachu, I actually tense up my entire hand (including my thumb), and kind of vibrate my hand to make my thumb hit the A button really fast. So I don't actually move my thumb when I do it. Look at 2:14: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDhbNFzdEik#t=2m13s

I can't do that for very long though. So if I know I'll be jabbing for a long time, I start pressing A with my right thumb, and then move my left hand over my controller so that my pinky, ring finger, and middle finger grip the left side of my controller, and my thumb goes over the A button. And then I alternate A button presses with my left and right thumbs. Look at 6:20: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MkHEDVD1JQ#t=6m10s

 

[Mormon Mammoth]

I will also recommend the vibration technique. It is both useful for pikachu and for arcade mashing.

 

[oukd]

so if you guys have been following vgbc, gimr has been speedrunning adventure mode very hard with falco. this was his latest video http://www.twitch.tv/vgbootcamp/c/2941037

i decided to take some of his things and incorporate it into a pika run, and ended up beating his record http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtDhQucpWks

now gimr is thinking about going pika for his runs
https://twitter.com/VGBC_GimR/status/380384286269911040
https://twitter.com/VGBC_GimR/status/380352216030134273

you guys should join in on these goofy speedrun attempts :D lol

 

[FourStar]

thanks for the advice AXE! btw where did you get that flash pika shirt? that shirt is so sick

 

[AXE 09]

thanks for the advice AXE! btw where did you get that flash pika shirt? that shirt is so sick

It was a special going on at teefury.com lol. It was only available for a few days. I'm not too sure where else to find it though

 

[oukd]

yea teefury doesn't reprint old designs unfortunately

i have one too, if you want it you can mm me for it next time im in norcal

 

[FourStar]

yea teefury doesn't reprint old designs unfortunately

i have one too, if you want it you can mm me for it next time im in norcal

when will that be? :D i hope you have a large

 

[oukd]

i do have a large! be glad you aren't mm'ing axe for his cus he got xxxxxxxxllll2x or something

unfortunately im gonna be in penn for the year, but if im back i'll probably tell you

 

[AXE 09]

Hey! Don't make fun of me and my big shirts.
That's how I roll

 

[KoopaTroopa895]

Hey! Don't make fun of me and my big shirts.
That's how I roll

Yeah its so big he puts the shirt over his knees rolls down stairs and practices his pikachu nair

 

[OliClutch117]

What would you guys say is pikas hardest MU?

 

[Spyro]

Sheik if things have not changed since I've not been watching these boards or competitive smash as closely.

 

[AXE 09]

I would say Sheik, although that's not my personal worst matchup (Peach, and Wobbles)

 

[oukd]

lol @ wobbles specifically

i struggle vs ics the most personally
i feel like i can still do things vs sheik both defensively and offensively...
ics are sometimes a little easier to get in on, but getting grabbed means you lose a stock if the ics knows *anything* about the mu

 

[KirbyKaze]

regardless of whether sheik is actually harder than ics, sheik will probably seem harder for 95% of a Pikachu player's career because aside from wobbles, fly, and chudat (who only emerges once every 6 months) there aren't good ICs players

 

[FourStar]

idk why but Dr. mario is another hard MU personally. especially living in Nor Cal with Shroomed, the MU just pisses me off. but that's just me idk...

 

[N64]

I still believe sheik is pika's hardest matchup (though similar to axe it is not my personal worst). Sheik has too much to worry about, and is always scary. ICs are only scary when nana is still around, and pika isn't too bad at seperating/killing nana.

Both are awful matchups though.

 

[AXE 09]

I agree that Doc is definitely a tough matchup for Pika, but I'd still put at least Sheik above him.

IC's are brutal. Pikachu has some nice tools for separating them (like N64 said), but if Nana's still alive, Popo can just Dthrow chaingrab until Nana comes back, and then start wobbling or doing hand offs ;_; Playing against Wobbles is insanely hard with Pika (and with any character for that matter lol. But especially Pika).

Although I still don't think they're worse than Sheik.