Carrot Me Bro!: The Bowser Match-up Topic

[Corgian]

any tips against lucas, roy, ryu?

Play against Lucas in a similar way to how you play against Ness. The only big differences are:

• Zair is good, but not amazing, at poking. Just shield it, but opt for spot-dodge if you think he'll be coming in.
• He's going to to be way more up close and personal compared to Ness, so the spacing is a bit different.
• You should not try to gimp Lucas off-stage. It's super difficult, and you're better off simply doing ledge-guarding stuff.
• PK Fire is annoying and can auto-space, so don't play too patiently as Lucas will abuse this. Wave bounced PK Fire is super unpunishable.

Another thing I should mention about both Ness and Lucas that I recently learned from Seibrik and MVD:

Their airdodges put on them on the Z-axis, much like D3's sidestep in Brawl. As such, they are invincible for a few frames longer than their actual air dodge animation. As such, punishing their airdodges is weird and tricky. Practice with a friend to get the actual timing down. Some Lucas and Ness players do abuse this, so its good to know.

Despite Ness being the better character, I currently think that Lucas provides a bigger threat to Bowser by about 5% on the matchup, because of his nair and disorganized jank.

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

@ anaglyphix What are you having trouble with? Asking for tips will just give you general answers that we apply to all MUs.

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

@ anaglyphix What are you having trouble with? Asking for tips will just give you general answers that we apply to all MUs.

 

[Big Sean]

Hey can someone confirm that this is true? Does RYU have an infinite on Bowser? https://youtu.be/BXNz9wRzLQs?t=62

 

[Corgian]

Hey can someone confirm that this is true? Does RYU have an infinite on Bowser? https://youtu.be/BXNz9wRzLQs?t=62

Yup, it's true. DK and Bowser are the big victims of Ryu's Focus Attack. I believe there are a few other characters too.

 

[MrEh]

This doesn't even bother me because you're Bowser and you have ways to deal with this.

If Ryu tries to fall on you with FA, you can actually Usmash, autoguard through the FA, and hit Ryu with the body slam portion of Usmash.

 

[Zapp Branniglenn]

If Usmash is too slow or if you're stuck trying to land when FA is coming, Your side B will eat through that dumb super armor. Bowser's a grappler, we don't have to fear tactics that rely on super armor to hit us. Aerial Side B for a non-tech landing, then wind up a pivot grab away from him to catch his extended hurtbox.

Just got the DLC characters today, they're all pretty wild. I dunno all the latest tricks people have been finding with them, I just want to play them casually with friends.

 

[Splooshi Splashy]

To add to the list of moves that can wreck Ryu's Focus Attack armor, there's DTilt, Jab string, Fire Breath, Side 1 & 2 (not Side 3, since it doesn't grab, and it only hits once), grabs, DSmash, NAir, upclose & grounded Down B in general, and Up B in general. Multi-hit moves and grabs are the key methods to directly challenge his FA, and these mentioned moves can do so.

 

[anaglyphix]

having trouble getting past roy's side b. any tips for this?

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

@ anaglyphix read the roll or up b that they will perform right after. Roys love doing that.

 

[Kooky Koopa]

I need help against Toon Link fellow Bowsers. Not the usual FG Link, but a short hopping, bomb cancelling, air set up Toon Link. I just fought against a friend who has taken on Toon Link as a main and I am at a loss how to approach or how to fight him in the neutral. Either his boomerang hits me into an air attack set up or a bomb and boomerang does the same. I still cant get the shield, bomb grab to air toss down, but its mainly the bombs.

He will toss it at my feet if I'm trying to shield bounce them or just chuck a boomerang at me followed by a bomb right behind it. As soon as I am hit outside of my shield, he swoops in for a quick air attack or ground attack, places damage, then resets back to before. My approach was to try to shield, then run in and attack or wait it out and try to be defensive, but neither option seemed to work. What am I to do?

 

[anaglyphix]

Neutral b is your friend in this matchup. use it to get through his projectiles and rackup some damage.

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

Why not run in and shield. If he always boomerang then bomb, you should have plenty of time to run into shield and then just watch him.

 

[Corgian]

I need help against Toon Link fellow Bowsers. Not the usual FG Link, but a short hopping, bomb cancelling, air set up Toon Link. I just fought against a friend who has taken on Toon Link as a main and I am at a loss how to approach or how to fight him in the neutral. Either his boomerang hits me into an air attack set up or a bomb and boomerang does the same. I still cant get the shield, bomb grab to air toss down, but its mainly the bombs.

He will toss it at my feet if I'm trying to shield bounce them or just chuck a boomerang at me followed by a bomb right behind it. As soon as I am hit outside of my shield, he swoops in for a quick air attack or ground attack, places damage, then resets back to before. My approach was to try to shield, then run in and attack or wait it out and try to be defensive, but neither option seemed to work. What am I to do?

Some general stuff about from one of the best players in SFL, and also from playing the matchup pretty often:

• Toon Link is different from Link in that he tends to keep people out using his Projectiles, while Link uses them to get in. As such both characters utilize different spacing. Toon Link likes to keep you at mid to far distance until he can get a follow up from something, or you're at kill percents. Use this to your advantage. (Link prefers to keep mid to close distance as Link has tons of followups and needs to capitalize on getting in whenever he can.)
• @ UltimaLuminaire has a good idea of the matchup. Another option, which I prefer, is walking to close the distance. Walking provides all the same options as standing, meaning you're at a defensive advantage by slowly approaching like this.
• Short-Hop Air Dodge Cancels are useful for this matchup as well. A SHADC allows you to get in realtively quickly, but if done too much is punishable and can put you at a disadvantage.
• Perfect shielding will save your life so many times, and combining it with walking will severely help Bowser maintain stage control against Toon Link. This matchup is slow and all about patience.
• This being said, sitting in shield is dangerous against Toon Link. He has fun-stuff out of grabs. If you see Toon Link going in, try to spot-dodge it. The endlag on his grab is super long so it's easy to punish.
• While fire does eat all projectiles, don't rely on it too much. It has enough cool down for Toon Link to get in and act if he predicts it. However, when Toon Link is trying to recover off-stage, it can knock Toon Link out of the Up-B animation. He'll be able to perform another Up-B, but it'll give you a little bit more time to react and plan your next move.
• In direct response, to the issue you're having with that Toon Link in particular, if he's throwing bombs at your feet and using that to get in, retreat and either wait or pivot something. Grab or f-tilt are the best options most likely.

 

[Kooky Koopa]

Thanks for the responses everyone. My main issue was two fold: I was either charging forward into projectiles where my shielding was, to say the least, very inconsistent and two, I was trying to "wait it out" in a shield, or hop to avoid projectiles, which was also a bad idea. Running and shielding may have worked, but I was finding it very difficult to consistently block the projectiles. If one hit, it was pain city with Tlink follow ups.

@ Corgian : Cheers for the comprehensive advice. I didn't resort to walking cause I was concerned the insane momentum of projectiles was going to open me up and looking at several of your points, I've been playing this MU very wrong. I felt the urge to go in and try to end things quickly before Tlink walled me out of it, rather than take my time.

I'm slightly confused in your first point, using Toon Links maintained mid-far distance to my advantage. This is exactly why I have such serious trouble. He walls me off so hard with his projectiles, I have very little influence or options to get in on him. Moving backwards he continues to stay back, all while bombarding me from one second to the other.

I also had serious issues when judging when it was safe for me to go in and try to attack Toon Link which just made me take more damage due to failed attempts to catch him. I'll try to treat this MU like a Sonic with ranged weapons, there I keep it to a point to walk 100% of the time, except when I get him in the air. I'll see how that works.

Finally, my attempts to shield and short hop grab-throw the bombs failed spectacularly. I'm guessing as Bowser I should simply shield the bombs rather than try to interact with them?

Thanks again.

 

[Cassius.]

If you're not on point with the instant toss OS, you probably are just better off shielding the bombs.

You can start from level 1 and just try to implement Z-catching items into your game, which is even more important than what I'm talking about. You have to master, or at least be proficient at the basics before you can do anything else.

BUT. I highly, highly suggest that you start incorporating that into your game as soon as possible, especially if you do play against that Toon Link player frequently.

The good/bad thing about that technique is that if you do happen to mess up and don't get an item toss, there is a large enough window for you to buffer a special move. The problem is that Bowser's short hop air dodge isn't good enough to where you can stick in an aerial at the end of it (hi Sheik), so you are forced to commit to a special move so that you aren't stuck with lag at the end of unsuccessfully tossing a bomb back.

So, in your situation, as toon link throws the bomb at you, try to input a short hop air dodge (you don't have to be mobile, a stationary SHAD works fine as well) and press a direction on the C stick. After that, you can do two things. You can either react to Bowser's action (he either tosses the item somewhere, or he doesn't) and you input the B move that way upon recognition of the failed item toss, or you can just buffer it anyway.

Buffering it is probably better so that the input of the special move will be ignored upon a successful item toss, and then you can resume doing normal inputs (instant item toss -> double jump, land xx jab or whatever).

 

[anaglyphix]

So jsut recently i was having trouble with my bowser against a certain character... Bowser. How do you play against another Bowser/ what strategies/moves beat out what?

 

[Zigsta]

So jsut recently i was having trouble with my bowser against a certain character... Bowser. How do you play against another Bowser/ what strategies/moves beat out what?

The ditto is all about breaking down the neutral. When Bowser gets in on Bowser, it's really easy to juggle and to pressure him in the air. Think of an aerial Bowser like Ike--keep your opponent diagonally away from you in the air, as it limits his options against you. You can also get underneath him to bait an airdodge, dair, or Bowser Bomb. Remember that Bowser has a massive blindspot underneath him. Just abuse it.

I go for a lot more Firebreath in this MU in neutral. Pretty safe way to see how your opponent reacts to it.

 

[Cerealisyummy5]

Any edge guarding advice for Captain Falcon?

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

@ Cerealisyummy5 He doesn't have any move he can safely throw out with disjoint to stop you. Just instant ledge snap -> pull away BAir on low recovery. If you're too late, try using Fortress on the ledge to try and catch his hand. It extends out when he's trying to recover and you'd be surprised how often you can catch people with a semi-spike by doing this.

 

[Cassius.]

You can also do a runoff DAir (stand at edge -> TAP forward on joystick + flick down on c stick [DO NOT HOLD OR YOU WILL SD.]) and can spike Falcon as he's recovering. This also works for any character who has their ledge invincibility removed.

If there is a wall under the ledge, A player can just DI into the stage and wall tech, so be aware of that.

 

[Jerodak]

At low percents, if you happen to get scooped by the falcon dive, you should recover fast enough to Forward air Falcon for free. He can't do anything during that flipping animation afterwards, unless that was changed in the recent patch.

 

[Cerealisyummy5]

Was the Kirby MU discussed? If not what are your opinions on it?

 

[Jerodak]

@ Cerealisyummy5

For one, don't compare it too closely to the puff match-up. There are certainly spme similarities but they are largely superficial. First of which being that Kirby actually can legitimately threaten bowser in a few ways. He actually has decent options to deal with shield, better specials, a ground game, a better punish game, and superior frame data. You'll want to avoid letting him take fire breath, and also look out for dair set-ups.

However, if you stay on the move, you can use superior range to hold him off, standing in one place too long is dangerous, you can get mixed up pretty hard that way. Also, you will naturally want to stay on the stage, away from lsnding and recovery situations. Getting the lead is a big factor, both characters are punish based, so being forced to approach puts either character at a disadvantage; it's not like either one has the best approach. If you want a ratio, I'm unsure of what to put unfortunately. It's probably not horrible though, unless you're up against someone really good.

 

[Zigsta]

You just have to play really patient in the Kirby MU--it's all about the neutral, since neither character has a safe way to approach without customs.

Anyone play a Falco regularly? He really throws me off since he plays NOTHING like Brawl Falco.

 

[Corgian]

You just have to play really patient in the Kirby MU--it's all about the neutral, since neither character has a safe way to approach without customs.

Anyone play a Falco regularly? He really throws me off since he plays NOTHING like Brawl Falco.

I'll be playing against a Falco for several hours this Wednesday, if no one has any suggestions before then. I do know that the hitbox for his jab is deceptively large and I often find myself confused by how I got knocked into it.

 

[Sp0nge]

How do you guys deal with Robin? I've found that I've had the most trouble dealing with Arc Fire from a close distance. Bowser can't beat it out like most other projectiles, and if he shields it he just get punished, and then Robin can maintain a safe distance against him. Arc fire is also a great option to keep Bowser away when he's already out of range. It just stops you from approaching entirely.

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

@ Sp0nge If they're just throwing out fire ineffectively, that's in your favor. If you're too close, you can try rolling towards Robin, SHADC towards Robin, or breathing fire, which will trigger the hit detection for Arc Fire. You can also jump over the projectile at a certain distance and aerial Klaw Robin, Fair Robin, land into grounded bomb, or Fortress underneath Arc Fire as a sub-par-yet-flashy option. Just keep practicing the timing and you will learn not to fear Arc Fire.

 

[Cassius.]

I completely agree with everything Luminaire said. Additionally, don't be afraid to just go back in order to reset a situation and try again. You have 6 minutes to work with. No one can give or teach [you] patience, but every shot (s)he takes of Arc Fire means one less you'll have to deal with during crunch time when the tomes runs out.

I have no idea about the Falco MU. I just play it how we used to...just without having to worry about CGs and air lasers lol. Every laser shot now in this game is a chance to move forward. His Jab's still great, he has grab follow-ups. If it's not Jab, it'll probably be NAir or BAir spaced on your shield since they're 3 & 4 frames(?) and NAir auto-links now. I would imagine Falco would be thrilled to get a clean NAir hit on us. UAir apparently doesn't have a sourspot anymore, AND it's faster now (frame 7), so landing can potentially be a hassle. FAir is still a valid way to keep us airborne and away from center stage as well, although it's a bit slower (12).

Like any space animal, if he's sent offstage, killing him is definitely not out of the realm of possibility. If he's forced to recover with Fire Bird, that should be a stock. Don't forget DTilt, Firebreath and the DAir tech (we have to come up with a name for this. Run-off-DAir-that-doesn't-kill-you? Shell Shock?)--these moves can catch Phantasm as he's recovering. I've caught a Falco Phantasm'ing into the stage with the first part of Bowser Bomb before. Up-B works as well, but timing it is a bit more difficult, and who knows if you'd get the vacuum hitbox to send them below the stage anyway.

The only thing I'm really going off of is the fact that I used to play a lot of Falco in Brawl and early Smash 4. I'm kind of aware of the tools he has, but it's been ages since I went into the lab with him. I haven't even touched 1.08 Falco, and I kind of regret that.

 

[Sp0nge]

That makes sense then, as to why I have trouble with it. I almost never roll into someone or go in with an aerial with Bowser, because in most cases it's unsafe. But Robin's grab range is so short and laggy that it would be sort of hard to punish. It seems like in general getting close to Robin when you think they will use Arc Fire is the best option, whether you decide to attack or dodge.

I'll definitely keep that in mind, @ Cassius. When Arc Fire is already out, I'll usually step back like you said and just let them charge their thunder or approach me, it's worth it to not challenge them at that point.

Thank you both for the help :]

Scrub question, how do you SHADC? I've heard the term before but I don't know how to pull it off (Or maybe I do, I just didn't know what I was doing was called by that name.)

 

[Cassius.]

That makes sense then, as to why I have trouble with it. I almost never roll into someone or go in with an aerial with Bowser, because in most cases it's unsafe. But Robin's grab range is so short and laggy that it would be sort of hard to punish. It seems like in general getting close to Robin when you think they will use Arc Fire is the best option, whether you decide to attack or dodge.

I'll definitely keep that in mind, @ Cassius. When Arc Fire is already out, I'll usually step back like you said and just let them charge their thunder or approach me, it's worth it to not challenge them at that point.

Thank you both for the help :]

Scrub question, how do you SHADC? I've heard the term before but I don't know how to pull it off (Or maybe I do, I just didn't know what I was doing was called by that name.)

For SHADC, all you have to do is do a Short Hop, then immediately airdodge, and buffer any special move as Bowser starts his descent into the ground. If done properly, you will not have any landing lag. However, if done incorrectly, you'll see a good bit of landing lag (because of Smash 4 airdodge mechanics.) Bowser's airdodge lasts so long that we can't actually stick out an aerial before landing like some characters can (Sheik), but it's probably better that way anyway. Our special moves in general are pretty good. And, because of that, we have SHADC Item Toss option selects...I highly doubt it's unique to Bowser, but considering how some projectiles are in this game, it's very helpful.

 

[Sp0nge]

For SHADC, all you have to do is do a Short Hop, then immediately airdodge, and buffer any special move as Bowser starts his descent into the ground. If done properly, you will not have any landing lag. However, if done incorrectly, you'll see a good bit of landing lag (because of Smash 4 airdodge mechanics.) Bowser's airdodge lasts so long that we can't actually stick out an aerial before landing like some characters can (Sheik), but it's probably better that way anyway. Our special moves in general are pretty good. And, because of that, we have SHADC Item Toss option selects...I highly doubt it's unique to Bowser, but considering how some projectiles are in this game, it's very helpful.

I was partially right lol. I know how to do it with some characters, but I didn't know it could be done with Bowser because the characters I know how to do it with use an aerial to SHADC. I can see this being really helpful for Bowser especially, maybe it can be used as a landing option. I'll have to practice this, thanks for clearing that up for me.

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

@ Sp0nge Don't use it as a landing option unless you know the opponent isn't just going to try and catch your landing. You're still vulnerable if you fail, and even if you succeed, you may not be able to immediately shield (the fastest defensive option at 1 frame) or throw out a bigger attack, like FTilt. You should see Cassius' twitch links in the Video Thread so you can analyze how he cancels landing frames with Klaw in order to explore other options rather than being restricted to our specials.

 

[Corgian]

Learning some stuff about the matchup tomorrow.

Fun fact: when playing against Falco, as a tall character, always tech
Single laser on a knockdown always jablocks
If Falco is close he can up smash, if mid he can grab, if far nothing but one laser.

 

[Mr. Bones]

Arc Fire from a close distance

This is one of the projectiles we can punish on start-up with instant DA. As long as you're pretty close.

I like having Robin above me so this is usually my go-to option for punishing close/mid-range Arcfire.

 

[Crome]

How does Bowser do against characters like Falcon and Sheik? What are his problems with these characters?

 

[2-2]

Anyone got any advice on dealing with Yoshi?

 

[Jerodak]

@ 2-2 what are you having trouble with specifically?

 

[2-2]

@ 2-2 what are you having trouble with specifically?

Approaching Yoshi is a pain, Dair is a pain, overall, what should/shouldn't I be doing against him?

 

[Jerodak]

Approaching Yoshi is a pain, Dair is a pain, overall, what should/shouldn't I be doing against him?

Well, try not to respect eggs too much. They are annoying, but very laggy and can be punished if you're ready. Try to bait a high throw if you can, or just running powershield them. As for Dair, get someone to help you practice sdiing out so you can punish with a bowser bomb.

Sdi the opposite direction Yoshi is moving for best results.

If he uses up his double jump, grab him before he lands and he won't get it back. Makes gimping him a lot easier.

Hope that helps