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

[soju]

Was joking about that tier thing, tierlist can go get rested.

But I also realized that we never really had a discussion on pikachu's thunderjolt and the fact that you can do combos with it, unless I completely forgot or missed something. But anyways I know you can Usmash, Grab, Fsmash, pretty much anything if you hit them with a air jolt. The ground jolt has only led to a grab or a shffl'd aerial from what I've been doing.

 

[iRobinhoood]

I love approaching with an air jolt to fsmash.

I need help with SHFFLing. Any tips? = /

 

[soju]

Hmmm, biggest most helpful tips is practice practice practice, but other then that practice shffling with characters that have a harder shorthop like fox, once you are confident in doing it with him pikachu shouldn't be much of a problem

 

[iRobinhoood]

I can short hop with Pikachu fine now and Falcon as well. I think I'm just missing the SHFFLing concept or something, that fluidness.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=JjZDqYJylZo#t=122s

Are you kidding me??? ^^^

 

[Dial Up]

Yo I am practicing some Pikachu and really want to get better... I was curious what is Pikachu's best stage, and also why?

 

[Dial Up]

nvm I got it.

 

[soju]

07 japan, those were the hype days. And as I said, practice makes perfect, just keep doing it in friendlies and eventually you'll have it down. >:3

And I like to think Pikachu's best stage is player dependent, but if anything probably Dreamland against Fastfallers and FoD against floatier characters, I would say Pokemon Stadium as best overall but its a CP.
Dreamland gives you enough room to do pikachu stuff, you can survive forever due to your superior recovery and how many options the stage gives you, you can CG fastfallers, and you have more control with your edgeguarding due to it's open-ness and higher platforms. Also due to the bigger platforms you are at a much greater advantage if you are under them and they are on the platform. The flaw is that the ceiling is very high but gimping IMO is better with Fastfallers.
FoD is nice against floaties due to its size and low ceiling, I say this stage more then BF or YS because of it's moving platforms, which is amazing for pikachu's who are good with platform control. The openness of under the stage is pretty nice, making for easier gimping and more time to recover. You can catch a lot of players off-guard with an u-smash on a low platform and you can escape CG's a lot easier on this stage.

Loool, nvm then =~=;;

 

[iRobinhoood]

FoD is my current favorite Pika map.

 

[soju]

pffft it's always been my favorite stage, even when it was my worst stage, I dubbed it the fountain of soju <3 haha

 

[iRobinhoood]

pffft it's always been my favorite stage, even when it was my worst stage, I dubbed it the fountain of soju <3 haha

lol Fountain of Soju

 

[N.A.G.A.C.E]

yo very quick shout outs (since i only got to play one pika)

axe: playing you was a blast, and i cant believe how close i came to wining against you, i even remember your % you were at last stock 110%. kinda wish i got another match or two against you, but just doing that well helped me feel more legit as a player. plus i feel playing you will teach me to stop rolling like an idiot b/c you were on me every time i rolled like white on rice. anyway u are a mad chill dude and i kinda wish i hung out with AZ b/c you all seemed like real cool people. but i had so much i wanted to do and only so much time to do it. (for some reason the match against you is the one that sticks in my head the most and the one i am most proud of, i dont know why)

IRobbin: I asked around a little bit about where u were but i had trouble finding anyone at apex. so to bad i missed you. anyway when u r back on LI their are tourneys in Amityville (not sure if i spelled that right) you should come down to them if you can.

well this turned out longer then i thought it was going to be.

 

[N64]

You kids stay away from my stage. Young whippersnappers thinking they know the first thing about using Pikachu on FoD.

*waves cranky kong cane*

Aside: really glad to hear you had a good time at Apex Robin, it looked like a really hype tourney. Good job in teams Axe, and awesome job beating Linguini in singles! I unfortunately missed crews on the stream, but I look forward to checking them out.

Sorry I haven't been around much lately. Too much in the thread to catch up on, but keep on pika'ing pikabros! ...I mean whippersnappers. *hobbles back to rocking chair*

 

[soju]

Silly ol' N64, us hip new chu's will slip n splash and zip n dash in your fountain all day long.

 

[oukd]

Pikachu is flexible enough for him to perform decently on pretty much any stage, and preference should depend on your playstyle. There seems to be a wavering consensus that yoshi's is his worst stage but I don't really mind it. My favorite is DL64.

Hmmm, biggest most helpful tips is practice practice practice, but other then that practice shffling with characters that have a harder shorthop like fox, once you are confident in doing it with him pikachu shouldn't be much of a problem

Once you do get shffling down you should learn how to vary your shffls. For timing you can change when your attack comes out and when you fastfall, and controlling your trajectory left/right while in the air is very useful.

Anyways:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_1C_0mvmus vs falcon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxJ2RB_e7mI vs falco (lots of tech mistakes in this one...also I try to CG last stock but mess up every time <_<)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTEf7euJO3A vs falcon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fq4aIaIqtLc vs luigi (I get 4-stocked. vist 2good T_T)

These were all pre-apex practice videos. I'll buy an actual recording setup eventually. Any advice appreciated

 

[soju]

The more I watch other pikachu's the more I realize I have a quite unorthodox style of play, mainly due to me only practicing as i play matches. Oh well, anyways I'll get around to posting my advice via youtube. And I got to hand it to ya, you look a lot more solid then the last time I saw a video of you which I can't recall when I did. But keep up the good work.

 

[oukd]

Unorthodox is good, redundant playstyles are easier to deal with.

Thanks btw :D you probably saw a video of my pika from last year.

 

[iRobinhoood]

yo very quick shout outs (since i only got to play one pika)

axe: playing you was a blast, and i cant believe how close i came to wining against you, i even remember your % you were at last stock 110%. kinda wish i got another match or two against you, but just doing that well helped me feel more legit as a player. plus i feel playing you will teach me to stop rolling like an idiot b/c you were on me every time i rolled like white on rice. anyway u are a mad chill dude and i kinda wish i hung out with AZ b/c you all seemed like real cool people. but i had so much i wanted to do and only so much time to do it. (for some reason the match against you is the one that sticks in my head the most and the one i am most proud of, i dont know why)

IRobbin: I asked around a little bit about where u were but i had trouble finding anyone at apex. so to bad i missed you. anyway when u r back on LI their are tourneys in Amityville (not sure if i spelled that right) you should come down to them if you can.

well this turned out longer then i thought it was going to be.

I go to school right off the Amityville exit. Please post more info and I'll have a good chance of stopping by.

 

[N.A.G.A.C.E]

I go to school right off the Amityville exit. Please post more info and I'll have a good chance of stopping by.

will do. idk atm when the next one is but last time i talked to the guy who runs it he said maybe at the end of this month, but once its announced i will let u know

 

[Spyro]

Wish I could have gone to Apex and meet all you guys .

 

[Diske]

Hey guys, anyone got recorded at Apex? I would like to see some pika-action.
Also, I would like to know how do you play in the sheik matchup, what do you think work against her, or what not to do. Yeah I know that there are videos of axe against Sheiks, but I wanna read some advices, PLEASE *insert cute pika face* :D

Oh, I almost forgot.
Anyone going to Winter Game Fest? I would like to go, but right now I'm not crossing to USA D:

 

[Deleted member]

What channel on youtube records most of Axe's matches?

I need to watch more matches for my Pika

 

[Spyro]

What channel on youtube records most of Axe's matches?

I need to watch more matches for my Pika

http://www.youtube.com/user/ATVSmash?blend=1&ob=video-mustangbase#p/search

 

[Deleted member]

Thank you sir

 

[soju]

Haha unorthodox isn't always the best. But yeah, I went to seeing your other matches and even though I was thinking of other things you do, for most of combos you did I was thinking, dang my Pikachu isn't that clean and solid. Idk maybe if I don't kick it into gear your gonna surpass me by far haha if that counts for anything. ;] I'm working on my critiqueing right now so no worries~

Oh and this i just highlighted the last match from my most recent stream <3 so i guess i want critiqueing too XD

http://www.twitch.tv/sojuchris/b/305120981

@diske- I'm going :D

 

[iRobinhoood]

Axe any thoughts on how you played or what you could have done better at Apex? Once again Axe is such a chill cool guy <3

 

[Captain Smuckers]

Alriiiiight, hope you guys all had fun at apex, look forward to meeting you all next time perhaps. <_<
As for critiquing your matches Dkuo, thus far I only looked at the first one vs 21 thumbs way up, but I might get to the others later, I dunno.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_1C_0mvmus
0:10 - I liked the combo you started out of the rising up air, but after you hit him off stage it seemed like you also went off stage and tried to jump back up with a bair, an up air would've gimped him
0:25 - uhh, yeah
0:34 - Could've easily forward smashed as he recovered to the stage
0:50 - Obviously try to avoid dash attacking most of the time
0:57 - Sooooo close, I really liked the attempt
1:10 - I would've suggested staying on the stage a bit longer to see exactly how high he could recover
1:16 - Need that safe recovery
1:30 - I wouldn't normally suggest dash attacks, but that one worked really well to quickly keep him off balance
1:34 - A little earlier and that would've reverse tail spiked
2:00 - "That is not a grab"
2:12 - Nice use of jolt to cover your recovery, but try to get to the ledge when he's standing right there
2:15 - Nice call on his ledge recovery and follow up into tail spike
2:21 - Avoid getting taunted at all costs
2:25 - Make sure to avoid them random random knees while dash dancin'
2:30-3:00 - I liked that you continued to apply pressure towards the end of the match until finally getting a tail/wall spike thingy

Another thing I noticed was just that you seemed to occasionally drop down from the ledge and then what seemed like trying to ledge cancel your up+b on the side platforms. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure you can't. Then again you may not have even been trying to do that.
Anyway yeah, maybe I'll get to some of your others a bit later.

Edit: ughhhhh I just saw Soju's post, I guess I may as well critique that too while I'm still here.
http://www.twitch.tv/sojuchris/b/305120981
0:08 - Nice up throw double up smash, always punish poor DI
0:12 - I liked that use of dash attack to catch him off guard and get him off stage
0:18 - Nice tail spike, unfortunate that you couldn't get to the ledge in time
0:29 - CC down smash was a good idea to get him away
0:32 - Rising up air into up smash can never be a bad thing
1:08 - Recovering from below is way more difficult and more easily punished
1:18 - I don't suggest charging a forward smash when he's still that much higher than you
1:37 - DI falcon's down throw away, otherwise it can easily chain grab a decent bit
2:00 - Dash attack is usually a bad idea
2:18 - You probably could've gotten a reverse tail spike instead of nairing
2:27 - I'm guessing you're trying to running up smash, I could be wrong, but if I'm not just try to avoid dash attacking instead as much as you can
2:38 - A simple nair, dair, bair, or forward smash would've sufficed
2:58 - Awaaaaaaaaaaay
3:25 - Sick jab reset, I approve
3:35 - I still approve
3:48 - ------------>

Well, thats about it, I hope this helps guys. I'll actually be putting some more videos up myself pretty soon I think.

 

[oukd]

Thanks cpt smuckers <3 lol @ 2:21 advice, I couldn't do anything about it since he was invincible

0:10 was supposed to be an uair but my thumb is dumb. Almost all of my dash attacks are botched nairs except for ones on edges usually. Also I know my up+B doesn't platform edgecancel from the ledge but people don't usually see it coming so I do it anyways <_<

Most of your advice is just for tech accidents but I really like your advice for 1:10, I'm pretty impatient with edgeguarding >_<

Haha unorthodox isn't always the best. But yeah, I went to seeing your other matches and even though I was thinking of other things you do, for most of combos you did I was thinking, dang my Pikachu isn't that clean and solid. Idk maybe if I don't kick it into gear your gonna surpass me by far haha if that counts for anything. ;] I'm working on my critiqueing right now so no worries~

Oh and this i just highlighted the last match from my most recent stream <3 so i guess i want critiqueing too XD

http://www.twitch.tv/sojuchris/b/305120981

If it's not the best, it's at least refreshing. Bringing something new to the table is how the game advances.

Anyways, here's a small writeup on your video -

Spoiler

Specific things:

• Very clean start up until 0:18 for the missed gimp. Side tilt is faster than edgehog.
• Bad time to start a spacing battle at 0:22, you had no space to retreat to and got grabbed immediately.
• Good CC at 0:27. Personally I would have gone for a grab>bthrow instead of a dsmash.
• At 0:37, you'll want to be careful of Falcon's getup attack option...I want to make a post on this later actually, I'm thinking about platform punishes with pikachu a lot lately.
• At 0:43 tilt your ftilt downwards.
• At 1:18 if you're doing what I think you're doing, you're trying to get the falcon to react with your fsmash charge. when you start charging, you should release it as soon as you see the falcon do his up+B. Obviously he's not going to just fall into it so he's going to either recover above it or airdodge through it (not many falcons think about this). This way you have more time to cover his high recovery.
• At 1:28, your roll was exactly what the falcon was looking for. Personally I would wd oos away from the falcon and continue to hold my shield to give myself more space...and if I could shield drop consistently I'd drop to the main stage and space myself away from him. Bah, tricky situation...invincibility frames are stupid...
• At 1:30, there's no reason to waveland backwards since he's already in jabbing animation, you could have just wavelanded forward and punish faster. Then again, you were still fast enough to uair him...
• At 1:44, be careful of his getup attack option again. Your jolt is forcing him to react but he could easily choose to roll in or getup attack, and jumping in with the jolt is exposing yourself to unnecessary risk.
• At 1:49, I would have uair'd instead of usmash (which he jumped out of). Pretty sure it would have led to usmash/grab/etc. on the platform.
• At 2:38, usmash would have been easier to do than a tailspike.
• At 2:58 (and some other parts), DI dthrow down and away to avoid the chaingrab.

General things:

• Dash attacks - I'm not sure if you're using the dash attack intentionally (I almost always dash attack only when messing up a nair) but you end up using it a lot in the match and get punished whenever it lands on a shield. It leaves you pretty vulnerable so try to avoid using it as an approach. However, it's good if you want an attack to reach an opponent on the edge in time, kind of like Yoshi dash attack edgeguarding.
• DI Falcon's dthrow down and away! You got chaingrabbed from not DI'ing it a few times and it ended up costing you your 3rd stock I believe, DI down+away makes it harder for falcon to combo dthrow>knee.
• Try to cover recovery options with dair every once in a while to mix it up. It's like a mini knee!
• General tech cleanup - self-explanatory lol. There's a few missed techs/jc grabs/etc. It's what's responsible for most of your stocks in this specific game (1st stock missed edge, 2nd stock I'm assuming accidental dash attack) but your tech is decent overall, just keep playing

 

[N.A.G.A.C.E]

iRobbin: just going to keep u updated, the place where the LI tourneys are held is moving yo Massapequa, which is not to bad since i believe its only one town over from amityville. but b/c it is moving their will not be any LI smash tourneys until February according to the guy who hosts them. Just letting you know. also when the tourney is coming I will let u know and if u can try to bring some friends. lets get LI smash scene back on track and bigger then ever b4

 

[iRobinhoood]

iRobbin: just going to keep u updated, the place where the LI tourneys are held is moving yo Massapequa, which is not to bad since i believe its only one town over from amityville. but b/c it is moving their will not be any LI smash tourneys until February according to the guy who hosts them. Just letting you know. also when the tourney is coming I will let u know and if u can try to bring some friends. lets get LI smash scene back on track and bigger then ever b4

The later the better, skill right now is lacking lol

 

[Captain Smuckers]

So guys I was wondering, when you're at home practicing melee in the dark by yourself, what exactly do you practice with pika? It's a lot easier with characters like fox and falco since there are so many technical aspects of their game, but what about poor ol' pika? I'm not saying there aren't technical aspects of his game, but I can't find much other than up+b tricksies. I'd especially like to know what the hell Axe has been practicing to get as good as he is.

 

[Spyro]

You could practicing doing sheild drops, there's proable more things I'm not thinking of right at this moment too.

 

[oukd]

Although I usually practice with falco, I personally have an issue with pika shffl consistency. What I do is go into stamina mode and shffl a cpu over and over and reset at 0 HP - good because:

1. no increase in knockback in stamina mode - essentially a perfect low % ragdoll
2. timing for shffl on an opponent is different from whiffed shffls
3. good practice for rapid shffls
4. in the same vein, if you're trying to shffl as fast as possible it teaches you exactly how much lag you have after landing from an aerial so you can do your next shffl asap
5. it feels good beating the crap out of something with a thousand nairs

This applies for any character btw. Actually, any combination of movement that you want to get consistent is good to practice. Wavelands, jc grabs, retreating shffls, get anything you feel like you botch up occasionally out of the way so you won't make tech mistakes anymore.

Practice combos! Following up your combos can get very tricky at crucial moments unless practiced. Use CPU lvl 4~6 so that the cpu can sort of simulate varying DI, lvl 1 for almost 100% neutral DI and lvl 9 for 100% survival DI...obviously it's best to practice this against other people but no harm in practicing consistency on computers. Playing computers also helps with combo creativity.

I'm learning shield drops atm, slowly getting more consistent. I want to be able to shield drop > aerial consistently, definitely an underused tech in general.

Up+B from stage to edgehog is useful to practice, at least mentally. I say this because even though I can do it pretty consistently, I don't tend to do it in matches because I don't have the confidence to do it without SD'ing from lack of practice, so I might start practicing this more.

IMO don't practice tailspikes on cpus too much, computer recoveries are too predictable and easy to spike. It's okay if you're trying to learn the hitboxes for it but that's about it.

Learn wavelanding if you haven't already so that you aren't flying above platforms all the time. It's good to stick tight to the ground/platform as pikachu for obvious reasons. Also waveland from edgehog is useful, definitely practice that.

 

[iRobinhoood]

Very good post ^

 

[Captain Smuckers]

Yeah what I've been practicing is pretty much just shield dropping and various up+b tricks such as ledge canceling, turning around, and going upwards twice (which is difficult as hell). But, I have another question that isn't really pika specific, but this is my favorite board so I figured I'd ask here first lol. When you try to jab reset someone, why is it that sometimes they get up immediately, while other times they have the get up animation as if they got up themselves? The only things I can think of is that it depends on how strong of an attack you hit them with or what percent they're at, but I really dunno. Any ideas?

 

[oukd]

the definition of the jab reset is to force someone into the getup animation. when the opponent's percentage is too high the jab reset doesn't work and the guy just stands up immediately.

jab resets are useful since your opponent is trapped in lag which you can hit them out of by putting an attack over their hitbox so that the moment their invincibility goes away they get hit, but when the reset doesn't work they can usually defend themselves immediately.

 

[N64]

dkuo's earlier post sums up my feelings on practicing. Practice movement. It's cool and feels good to do fancy stuff, but being completely confident during a match doing the more basic stuff is a lot more useful. Any error can lead to death, and you'll be doing shffl'd aerials or jumpcancelled grabs a lot more often than upB tricks so having those down really counts in match. Practicing crisp, accurate movement is probably the most helpful thing to improving one's pika game.

 

[Captain Smuckers]

Thanks for your input on practicing (as well as jab resets), the reason I generally practice "fancier" things is just because I already shffl with like 99% consistency and I don't think I'll get that much better at it. I also practice wavelanding and just overall movement, but it isn't a main focus. If I'm practicing by myself I'll generally just start running around and practicing various movements, but I don't plan to just practice it, I'll just do it in between other things. I'll even practice wavelands and such during matches. I just feel like I'm running out of technical things that I really need to focus on, which is why I started doing up+b tricks and shield dropping. With falco there is always something for me to practice since he's so damn technical, I just feel like there isn't as much for me to work on with pika which is why I think I'm so much better with falco.

 

[Spyro]

I would like to know, how does every body feel about vs.

 

[indigestible_wad]

IMO don't practice tailspikes on cpus too much, computer recoveries are too predictable and easy to spike. It's okay if you're trying to learn the hitboxes for it but that's about it.

I agree with the theory behind this, but when I stop practicing uair hitboxes, I lose my spacing for them. When someone's off the stage, there's only so many ways their character can get back, and knowing how to use uair successfully in as many situations as possible is an immense help, even if computers have a limited amout programmed in.

 

[Captain Smuckers]

Fox vs pika is an interesting match-up to me. It's probably the match up I play the most and I'm not sure if I really hate it or love it as strange as that seems lol. Obviously I like that he's a fast faller and therefore very easy to combo, but his up throw up airs can be a killer as well. A big problem I find with this match up is that pikachu is very big on out maneuvering his opponent, which is way harder to do against fox since he's faster. Another issue I have is that he (and practically every other character lol) can out prioritize most of pika's attacks/approaches. For example, if I try to nair my friend who plays fox, if he sees it coming he'll either short hop nair or even just jab. If he does in fact see it coming and jabs my approach, he can upsmash right after, which sucks lol. But, the bright side is again, that he is very easy to combo, and easy to edge guard. It seems to me that the match up, along with many of pika's, is just a game of baiting. If he calls your approach, he can really mess you up. But at the same time you can do the same. For this match up you definitely want to get some free kills by means of gimping otherwise it can be quite a tough on.

Edit: just to be clear I put this match up in fox's favor, something like 60-40.