Charizard Matchup Discussion - Villager

[Swamp Sensei]

The mayor from Animal Crossing is here to fight.

Can we beat his dead stare with our fiery gaze?

Link to Archive: https://smashboards.com/threads/let...-14-arrives-ive-given-up-on-photoshop.407883/

 

[Remi45]

I sometimes come across charizards that try to catch my landing with flare blitz(?), it's pretty easy to avoid with a double-jump or delay my landing with lloid rocket and then either edge guard if they go off-stage or punish somehow.

I would consider myself an average player so I don't have like super in depth tactics, but defo don't go offstage with flare blitz, it's seems to put charizards pretty far and low off stage.

 

[Swamp Sensei]

but defo don't go offstage with flare blitz, it's seems to put charizards pretty far and low off stage.

I mean. You're preaching to the choir here.

That's something Day 1 Zard players learn.




Either way, I feel we lose this matchup pretty badly.

Villager is able to control space so efficiently that we can't do much.

His projectiles are weak and can be flare blitzed but he can put them out so fast it doesn't really matter.


Good tools would probably be jab, tilts, dash attack and Flamethrower. We have to corner him.

 

[Remi45]

I mean. You're preaching to the choir here.

That's something Day 1 Zard players learn.

Well not on FG, sorry if my contribution sucks

 

[kendikong]

My advice, avoid the rockets and fairs entirely and approach from above with autocanceled fast fall nairs. Otherwise, powershield as best you can.

 

[charizardbro]

It's pretty bad but the ball is entirely in Zard's court. There aren't a whole lot of crazy setups Villager has for us that he doesn't have for anyone else so you should sort of know what he wants to do. You just have to play around it. In my experience, flamethrower is actually awful in this MU because Villager almost always gets a free fair off of it and gets stage control back. This is the kind of MU where you want to always stay grounded in neutral and try to rush down your opponent. FF AC nair is good if Villager gets you on the ledge but you're usually better off keeping your feet on the ground and trying to powershield his stuff if you're just approaching from neutral. Recovering high with flare blitz is pretty good here as well because we lose so much from getting trapped at the ledge. Having said all of that though, don't forget to play the other player instead of just playing the other character. Knowing when he is going to throw stuff at you is way more useful to you than just knowing he is can throw stuff.

And one really important thing to note is that if you wait out just a little bit of Villager's invulnerability at the edge and then Fsmash where he is grabbing as well as the balloons, you actually end up hitting him too. The freeze frames from hitting his balloons cause the Fsmash hitbox to stay out a lot longer and clip him right at the end of his invulnerability. I don't know what happens if he mashes a getup option though.

 

[Nathan Richardson]

Actually charizard's flamethrower cancels out a ton of villager's moves. Lloyd rocket detonates prematurely when hit with flamethrower and because fair and bair need a straight line to hit zard flamethrower cancels that out too.
Almost all of villagers smashes have horrific range so as long as charizard stays at his maximum tilt range villager has an impossible time responding to anything that charizard can do. This is especially bad if villager is trying to get back up from the edge, flamethrower can't pop the balloons without hitting villager and resetting his recovery but it gives charizard a ton of cheap hits, autocancel that into a down smash and villager is essentially screwed no matter what he comes up with.

Now mind you this is on the Final Destination stage (since I only play one-on-one for glory mode) but on a flat stage with no platforms villager is in a ton of trouble because he can't cross up or mix up charizard the way he wants to.

tl;dr charizard's flamethrower makes a lot of villagers moves useless and with proper application can set villager up for a down smash.

 

[Lyserdon]

I randomly ran into Dabuz the other day for a ranked match on Anther's. Here, have a video:

Please forgive my embarrassing panic rolls, and "I-meant-to-tilt-and-got-a-smash"s as I slowly realized I was actually playing the real Dabuz.

Accounting for some of my questionable decisions and (probable) mutual MU inexperience, maybe this can be a window into how the MU plays out. Fair/bair are frustrating. We ledge trap Villager very well. Flamethrower is a godsend.

 

[Nathan Richardson]

Please forgive my embarrassing panic rolls, and "I-meant-to-tilt-and-got-a-smash"s as I slowly realized I was actually playing the real Dabuz.

Accounting for some of my questionable decisions and (probable) mutual MU inexperience, maybe this can be a window into how the MU plays out. Fair/bair are frustrating. We ledge trap Villager very well. Flamethrower is a godsend.

Don't feel bad I run into a lot of problems like that myself. Seems like every time I want to do a tilt my zard does a smash instead and vice versa.
The biggest problem I noticed is that you kept dropping your guard right as the lloyd rocket was about to hit. You also stopped using flamethrower as often after you took out villager's first stock (hindsight is 20/20 I know) it shouldn't matter who you're facing because as soon as you thought about that you psyched yourself out.

 

[charizardbro]

Actually charizard's flamethrower cancels out a ton of villager's moves. Lloyd rocket detonates prematurely when hit with flamethrower and because fair and bair need a straight line to hit zard flamethrower cancels that out too.
Almost all of villagers smashes have horrific range so as long as charizard stays at his maximum tilt range villager has an impossible time responding to anything that charizard can do. This is especially bad if villager is trying to get back up from the edge, flamethrower can't pop the balloons without hitting villager and resetting his recovery but it gives charizard a ton of cheap hits, autocancel that into a down smash and villager is essentially screwed no matter what he comes up with.

Now mind you this is on the Final Destination stage (since I only play one-on-one for glory mode) but on a flat stage with no platforms villager is in a ton of trouble because he can't cross up or mix up charizard the way he wants to.

tl;dr charizard's flamethrower makes a lot of villagers moves useless and with proper application can set villager up for a down smash.

It cancels against the aerials and Gyroid but all you get is a few percent. If you hold it too long, he can lob a fair right over it and take stage control. Maximum tilt range for Zard is still well outside of Villager's fair and bair range. The range on Villager's smashes do not matter. Dsmash at the ledge is a 2frame. Fsmash is legitimate cheese. I encourage you to try it.

Flat stages without platforms let villager run away and spam his ranged stuff as well as hide behind trees. Take him to thinner stages with platforms almost everytime. I think Zard covers them way better.

I randomly ran into Dabuz the other day for a ranked match on Anther's. Here, have a video:

Please forgive my embarrassing panic rolls, and "I-meant-to-tilt-and-got-a-smash"s as I slowly realized I was actually playing the real Dabuz.

Accounting for some of my questionable decisions and (probable) mutual MU inexperience, maybe this can be a window into how the MU plays out. Fair/bair are frustrating. We ledge trap Villager very well. Flamethrower is a godsend.

Fair and bair are annoying, yea. And gyroid from neutral sucks too. He either smacks your shield again with a fair or jumps above you and crosses up with a nair/bair. Try not to let your shield get as low next time though. Makes his pressure a lot easier to deal with. And also remember that he will probably throw a fair or bair when he lands or gets off the ledge so tapping your shield can be helpful. You lose nothing if he doesn't shoot anything.