• Welcome to Smashboards, the world's largest Super Smash Brothers community! Over 250,000 Smash Bros. fans from around the world have come to discuss these great games in over 19 million posts!

    You are currently viewing our boards as a visitor. Click here to sign up right now and start on your path in the Smash community!

Best Project M Falcos To Watch?

DrLobster

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Mar 25, 2014
Messages
241
NNID
DrLobster
3DS FC
4699-5880-7408
Just wondering who you guys would consider the best to be.

I was thinking it'd probably be, like, Larry or Westballz, or maybe even Porkchops since there'd be a lot of videos of him, but what do you guys think?
 

Keith Siquian

Smash Rookie
Joined
Feb 18, 2014
Messages
1
Having watched a lot of Project M matches involving Falco, I consider Axe to be my favorite. His movement and aggression are just really good.

One other player that I like is Westballz. Although his movement in Project M isn't as smooth as Axe's, it's still better than most Falco players. His fundamentals and knowledge of Falco pretty much puts him right up there with Axe.

If you want to decide for yourself who you think is the best, check out this thread.
 

Keman

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Dec 10, 2014
Messages
138
Location
Kentucky
I count those as Melee players, not sure how often you will get to see them use Falco in PM. And then I try to think of PM specific Falco's and not a lot come to mind ><. Weon-X plays a little falco I think(I guess technically a Melee player too). Oreo I believe is a falco player ranked on the WA PR list. I have seen Jaden go Falco before. Gallo also was talking about maybe going more Falco in tourneys but I cant say if he actually has so may not be able to find footage of that.

Edit: Here just watch this on replay non stop and you will be set for life.
 
Last edited:

DrLobster

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Mar 25, 2014
Messages
241
NNID
DrLobster
3DS FC
4699-5880-7408
Yeah, I'm familiar with Melee Falco enough, I just wanted to see if I could find any additional resources for PM specific Falco. I'm guessing that Larry will probably be my best bet. He's probably better at PM than he is at Melee, and he's actually higher than Westballz on the SoCal PM rankings, plus he's familiar with Brawl Falco, so that's all pluses.
 

Nohbl

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Jul 20, 2017
Messages
357
Location
Chicago, Illinois
Well a lot has changed in the nearly 2 years since the last post. The Melee players generally don't play Project M anymore, and when they do, they opt not to use Falco. There are few notable Falco mains active on the scene today, and even fewer solo-mains. Falco as a character is considered by most players in 3.6 to be a mid tier or bottom high tier, but essentially an inferior Wolf. This view discourages players from picking him up, or at least not without taking on a Fox secondary as well. The meta as it stands is terribly underdeveloped so people apparently look to Melee for inspiration, or just do their own thing, neither of which have translated into fantastic tournament results given the unique matchups and stages Project M consists of.

I do not think there is yet a perfect Falco player in Project M. I also haven't seen every player in the United States nor around the world, so my perspective is limited. But I have been paying attention to locals and national tournaments in the United States for many months now, so I feel confident enough to mention at least a few names.

There's Prem, a Falco player in NorCal who I have not looked at closely at all, but is ranked Top 10 on NorCal's Power Ranking for both Summer 2017 and Spring 2017. Given his reputation for random and game-throwing self-destructs, I'm not tempted to explore his style much further, although there is something to be said for a player who supposedly can give ThundeRzReiGN a bit of trouble, I suppose.

I've been paying most attention to Great Value Smash (GVS) in Connecticut, which has two active Falco players in Silver (Alloy) and Daddy's Milk, neither of which solo-main him, but do not consider him their secondary. Daddy's Milk, in my opinion, does decently well, though he could improve a bunch, and Silver is arguably the current best Falco main, though I have some criticisms of his playstyle. I have not had the opportunity to talk with either of them much yet, but I look forward to doing so in the future.

If you want to see a good Falco main today, you should watch and look out for Silver, who has the results and the playstyle to prove himself a serious threat. Silver's arguably best strength is his movement, both on stage and figuratively off-stage. He incorporates a lot of wavelanding and wavedashing, and b-reversing and wavebouncing with laser which is both a beauty to watch as well as being an effective option in-game. He also has the smartest Falco recovery I've seen yet, with lots of sweetspots with Fire Bird and wall jumps and air dodges. Overall he's a solid player but I do think he has his weaknesses. For one, he is less patient in neutral than Daddy's Milk and than he maybe should be. He seems to want to start his punishes as soon as possible, and so his approach consists almost entirely of laser a little bit in place or back and then advancing laser until he's in your face and can shine pressure you or grab you. Strangely, however, his punish game, though not bad, tends to often end prematurely, as he is unable to get the most out of his openings, which is to an extent a fault of Falco but also of the player. I also think he is pretty bad at stage counterpicking, but he makes it work enough I guess. I like how much he believes in Falco; he seems to me usually reluctant to switch off Falco, but when he does, he usually makes the right call about who to pick, whether that's Fox or Marth.

In my opinion, Daddy's Milk plays neutral better as a Falco should. He seems to me to be more patient about his approach and willing to mix it up and use more options than Silver, yet he picks the right option (nair) when he gets in. His punish game is also surprisingly good from what I've seen, as he generally converts his openings into more damage or kill opportunities than Silver does, and his recovery isn't awful, so it's hard to say right off the bat why he isn't as good, or successful rather perhaps, as Silver. His recent set against Switch, a top tier player, at Blacklisted 3 sheds more light on Daddy's Milk ability. You can see a lot of missed techs and flubbed openings in game 1, for one, which makes me think that his technical skill is not where it should be if he can lose it under pressure. His movement is nowhere near on Silver's level, so he could not take proper advantage of the platforms like he really needs to against Wolf, nor could he effectively navigate around Switch at close quarters. In fact, his biggest weakness in the matchup is that he has no idea what to do when nearby Wolf. His pressure is limp, his defense is lacking, and his spacing and precision is bad. While he is farther away from Wolf, he has enough wit to retreating laser and advancing nair through Wolf's lasers, but as soon as he's just a platform width away, he turtles into his shield, whiffs grabs, and throws out the wrong moves on Switch's shield; here, it seems his patience and unwillingness to go in as hard as Silver would works against him. Amazingly, however, as soon as he gets his one hit, he makes that hit go for a fricken mile. His edgeguards also sucked.

I also see that Daddy's Milk doesn't seem to believe in his Falco as much as I'd like, counterpicking to Fox too early and when he doesn't have good reason to. I think that's indicative of an inability to step back and really assess what he's doing right and wrong, what the opponent is doing, and where he needs to go in order to tip the scales in his favor. If he gets beaten badly, it seems he thinks the answer is just switch to Fox ASAP, which doesn't always work out. Maybe we can chalk it up to him not being as smart as Silver, which is what Silver is pretty much known for.

I think Daddy's Milk is like PPMD but at a lower skill level currently, and believe that he has a huge amount of potential. Silver just needs to make some tweaks to his game to be better than he already is. Prem probably has to stop killing himself. I'd recommend these players but with the mentioned caveats. Ultimately, I think once Falco's learn to counterpick properly, the meta is gonna take a huge step forward.
 
Top Bottom