Ridley:
- Slightly taller than Bowser, but much lighter since Ridley is skinny and has to be somewhat lightweight for flight.
- Yes Ridley flies in Metroid games, but so do many others in their games. He can just have multiple jumps
- Ridley can still look very menacing and cool in this game.
- Ridley's physique is skinny and very bird-like. Because of this, Ridley can tuck his appendages closely to his body and still fight. This means Ridley can actually be VERY large, but look deceptively smaller in his fighting pose.
Normal Attacks (Ground)
A,A,A - {Tearing Combo} - Ridley slashes to the right, then left, then extends his neck out and bites the enemy
>A - {Tail Strike} - Extends his tail in front of him to slap an enemy.
vA - {Lawn Scissors} - Ridley extends his neck and snaps at his opponent's legs
^A - {Wall Rake} - Ridley swipes upwards with both claws, standing much taller in the process
Dash A - {Reckless Lunge} - Ridley lunges at the opponent at high speed, floating off the ground for a little bit
Normal Attacks (Air)
J, A - {Talon Gasher} - Ridley thrusts his foot claws forward to rip the enemy
J, >A - {Snake Whip} - Ridley's tail strikes semi-diagonally at the opponent
J, <A - {Beating Wings} - Ridley's wings extend and beat rapidly to slap up opponents behind him
J, ^A - {Windmill Tail} - Ridley spins his tail around rapidly. Can hit on all sides, but can juggle foes that are right above him.
J, vA - {Carnage Spear} - Ridley tries to land his foot claws on an opponent while his tail sticks straight down like a spear. (Hit opponents with the tip of the tail for a possible Meteor Smash KO)
Smash Attacks
Smash >A - {Dragon Batter} - Ridley lunges forward while spinning to strike hard with his tail
Smash vA - {Expose Panic} - Ridley slams his claws on the ground in front and his tail on the ground behind him while making an extremely intimidating pose
Smash ^A - {Billowing Flame} - Ridley exhales a quick blast of fire above him.
Grabs
Z (Grab) - Ridley grabs his opponent with his claws
Z - {Maul}- Ridley snaps at his opponent with his jaws
Z, > - {Body Serve} - Ridley tosses his foe up a little, bends down, and smacks his opponent away with hsi tail
Z, v - {Violent Blaster} - Ridley pins his opponent down underneath his foot and blasts him with flames
Z, < - {Scrap Dispose} - Ridley wraps his tail around his foe and flings him away
Colors:
Red Ridley
Purple Ridley
Mecha Ridley
Meta Ridley
Z, ^ - {Shoot Down} - Ridley throws his opponent high in the air and quickly exhales a fireball that explodes upon impact.
Special Moves
B - {Plasma Balls} - Ridley can exhale intense balls of super-heated energy.
- Hold B to gather flaming energy in Ridley's mouth
- Press B to release a fireball. It doesn't move fast, but it's pretty strong
- The longer you hold, the more fireballs will be exhaled. (Up to 5)
- When exhaling the balls of plasma, use the control stick to control the direction they fly out.
>B - {Dragon Gale} - Ridley crouches onto his hands and beats his wings really hard, creating a strong gust of wind.
- Hold forward while rapidly pressing B to get the gust started. The gust has decent range.
- The longer B is tapped, the weaker the gust becomes. Stop in order to let it recharge to full strength.
- This move is mainly for diverting projectiles out of Ridley's path. The closer the projectile is and the stronger the wind is, the better the diversion.
- Enemies up close to the stronger wind will be pushed back and knocked on their feet. Aerial foes will tumble when up close.
vB - {Full Tail Assault} - Ridley uses his versatile tail to attack anywhere.
- Press vB to whip forward with Ridley's tail
- Keeping B held, move the control stick around to strike a opponents.
- This is like Shiek's Chainl, but it's stronger and knocks opponent's away instead of comboing them and keeping them close
- Whenever the tail does hit an opponent, it retracts back a little and can't be used for a second
^B - {Carry Prey} - Ridley will leap to the height of an average character while moving towards them, then land back down.
- If the opponent is near Ridley, he will capture them in his foot claws
- From here, Ridley can leap up to 3 times high in the air while carrying his opponent before automatically descending to the ground
- Pressing B immediately: Ridley will repeatedly claw-grope his opponent with his claws.
- Pressing B after 1 jump: Ridley will swing his tail around, slapping his foe 3 times, the 3rd hit knocking the enemy away
- Pressing B after 2 jumps: Ridley will drop back to the ground fast, slamming his opponent down.
- Pressing B after 3 jumps: Ridley pushes his opponent away a little, then exhales a damaging stream of fire that also pushes them away a good distance
- With each second and jump, it becomes harder to keep hold of an opponent. Using the claw-grope also makes it easier to escape.
- The opponent can rotate the joystick rapidly to escape faster.
Miscellaneous Abilities:
Floor Tech - Ridley catches himself on one hand while his wings are spread wide open (not necessarily a handstand though.)
Wall Tech - Ridley clings onto the wall with both hands and feet while looking away from the wall.
Ceiling Tech - Ridley's tail pushes against the ceiling in order to prevent his back from slamming into it.
Rolling Towards/Behind enemy - Ridley quickly glides in a speedy arch around any threats. He turns his body nearly 90º in the process, so this would look pretty cool. The distance of the roll would be pretty large...a little less than Mewtwo's distance.
Rolling away from enemy - Ridley pushes off his feet to get away, using a quick flapping of his wings to hover just a bit. The distance for this would also be a little less than Metwo's rolling distance.
Sidestep Dodge - Ridley crouches his upper body and draws back pretty close to the ground. His neck also retracts quite a bit. (This one's kind of hard to explain.)
Aerial Dodge - Ridley's arms, legs, and neck pull closer into his body as he does a barrel roll. This dodge would be your average dodge.
Ridley would have 4 jumps, his first being the largest jump followe by 3 short, quick jumps. He also falls fast, so he can actually be out-jumped in terms of height by other high-jumping characters. His B move would not help as much either. It wouldn't get that much more height. Ridley has to rely on his fast horizontal air speed to recover, similar to characters like Bowser and DK.
*Ledge recovery*
{Jumping up a ledge} - Ridley leaps up pretty high, and his arms and legs pull closer to his body. His neck though stays the same length while his jaws remain open and menacing. (I really like that menacing "Raptor-Like" disposition Ridley has.)
{Evading from the Ledge} - Ridley darts closely to the ground and crawls hastily on the ground in a very animal-like fashion.
{Ledge attack (less than 100% damage)} - Ridley darts forward and reaches out with his claws to scratch his opponent.
{Ledge attack (100% or more damage)} - Ridley struggles upwards while turning a bit to the side, and his tail darts out to hit his opponent.
Taunt - Ridley stands up much more erect than in his attack pose, and lets out a loud, harsh roar (similar to the roars he makes in Super Metroid and Metroid Prime.) while looking towards the sky. He also is arching his back just a bit while pointing his claws to the air. (Warning - Similar to Mario, Ridley will be much larger looking during his taunt, so getting attacked is quite easy.)
Super Smash
Immortal Terror
Ridley roars savagely, then his body begins to become metallic. Ridley rears back as the metallic skin goes up from his tail to his head. He roars once again, then assumes a fighting stance. His transformation into Meda-Ridley lasts for 30 seconds, in which his attack power is heightened, as is his defense. However, his speed decreases and his weight increases. He cannot quadruple jump in this form. When the 30 seconds expire, Ridley roars again, rears back, and the armor begins to crack, with beams of light escaping from the cracks. The armor shatters, damaging anyone nearby.
Knocked onto back - Ridley rolls back onto his front, resting on his claws and feet, and quickly flows into a spin to strike surrounding enemies with his tail.
Knocked onto front - Ridley elevates his entire body off the ground with one hard beat of his wings, and snaps ahead with his jaws while his tail whacks anyone close behind him.
Possible stats and strategies:
Size - Very tall and rather long. Tail usually stays curved around body, but can extend outwards and is long. Because of this, Ridley will make for an even bigger target than Bowser himself, lending him extremely suspectible to huge comboes. [10/10]
Weight - Could be similar to Samus's weight. Ridley is large, but not built to be heavy. This is another weakness of Ridley's, as those who can combo well won't need long before they can KO Ridley. [7/10]
Jump - Ridley would be able to get a great first leap, but while he would have 4 jumps total (excluding Up B), his 2nd-4th jump would not give him that much height. Ridley would be better for horizontal aerial movement.[7/10]
Strength - Because Ridley is large and strong, his strength would be pretty decent. His tail though would excel in strength. [7.5/10]
Damage - Being equipped with sharp teeth, claws, a wicked tail, and flame breath, Ridley would be great for dealing damage. [8.5/10]
Agility - On ground, Ridley would be rather quick, but he would be VERY fast in the air...at least horizontally. Vertically, Ridley can move quick, but it doesn't go far, and he would fall pretty fast. [7/10]
Speed - As a fighter, Ridley's attacks are pretty fast and very snake-like. This speed is a necessity for keeping Ridley well-guarded.
Evasion - Despite his size, Ridley's quick agile bursts better suit his evasive abilities than for offense. [9/10]
The Strategy:
Due to Ridley's large size and deceptively not-so-heavy body, Ridley would be very easy to destroy if somebody comboed him to death. This is why Ridley's abilities lend to striking enemies away with quick, precisive hits. Also having great evasive skills and aerial speed, this allows Ridley to hold his own against those looking to capitalize on his size.
Ridley is capable of good damage without having to combo, and he is generally quite strong, but this moveset caters more to damaging opponents and keeping them away then outright power, so against slower yet bigger and heavier foes, Ridley can be a little more aggressive, but does not have as many KO options as other characters. Ridley's best bet here is to get in hits while remaining evasive to avoid damage. Due to his weight and size, getting too aggresive could be trouble.
I want to delve further into Ridley's ratings, so here is how I see them:
Weight - 7/10
Size - 10/10
Jump - 7/10
Floatiness - 2/10
Fastfall - 8.5/10
Strength - 7.5/10 (Also called "Knockback")
Damage - 8.5/10 (His overall rate of %damage he would deal)
KO Potential - 4.5/10
Combo Potential - 6.5/10
Range - 8.5/10
Walking Speed - 5/10
Dash Speed - 7/10
Aerial Speed - 9/10 (How fast he moves horizontally)
Speed - 7.5/10 (How fast he actually attacks)
Traction - 4.5/10 (Ridley is somewhat slippery)
Evasion - 9/10
Up B recovery - 1/10
Overall Defense - 4/10
He may be very quick, but huge, easy to combo, and little weight to back him up means very easy to take out. His attacks aid his defense, but even then...
Overall Offense - 8/10
With good range and good damage, Ridley can protect his body and still be a decent threat. His only problems his his low KO potential and mediocre combo abilities. Even then, he still puts up a good fight to balance his awful defense.
Overall Jump - 7.5/10
Excellent at horizontal movement while in the air, Ridley does lack good vertical movement, requiring a good deal of his jumps, despite having 4 normal jumps. His Up B jump is lousy for recovery, so he has to rely on that horizontal speed to stay alive.
The Pros:
+ Overall pretty fast. Kind of like Marth in terms of speed.
+ Good ranged attacks AND good damage means a good chance of victory
+ Very fast in the air, Ridley's aerial game is very nice
+ A possible air guarding game due to horizontal air speed
+ Great evasion skills to further improve defense
+ Attacks are ranged and strong enough for a great edgeguarding game.
The Cons:
- Very large, but without the weight...AND he fast-falls. A comboer's paradise.
- Medium-heavy weight isn't enough to prevent easy KOs.
- Terrible Up B recover
- Little KO potential means Ridley needs the range and damage to rack up the foe's damage%
- Vertical climb eats up Ridley's multiple jumps. Even then Ridley isn't the best jumper
Some Neutrals...:
~ Ridley doesn't have many combo attacks, but his speed may help that
~ Although Ridley has lousy vertical jumping skill, his horizontal jumping skill still aids air guarding.
EDIT: W00T W00T 500TH POST!!!
