Friends, Yoshi's, Hominids! Lend me your tails.
This is our Smash 4 Yoshi Guide/Metagame discussion. It'll be a project done by you the community.
YES, YOU! THE ONE BEHIND THE CUTE PINK LADY!
It's a work in progress so some areas in this will be empty cause right now just trying to get the thread up. For the past month or two, me and a few others have been explaining to people Yoshi isn't some Top 3 threat or how to punish him accordingly that people don't see/know somehow, which is why this thread is brought upon this world finally.
That and not many people really click the guides tab on this site and checks around for stuff.
So excuse me if there's copy/pastes of some posts only in the future, some of us say something right in a previous wall of text we've said but then another one is completely different on the same subject and might be wrong. So bear with us as we continue updating and fixing this!
1. Frame Data (By Yikarur and Sinister Slush)
Jab 1 | 3-4 | | 17
Jab 2 | 10-11 | | 20
Dash Attack | 10-12 / 13-20 | | 49
Forward Tilt | 5-7 or 6-8 (angled up or down) | | 38 / 39 (tilted)
Up Tilt | 8-15 | | 31
Down Tilt | 8-10 | | 23
Forward Smash | 14-14 | | 52
Up Smash | 11-13 / 14-16 | | 46
Down Smash | 7-8 / 22-23 | | 49
Neutral Air | 3-4 / 5-11 / 12-25 | 11 | 44
Forward Air | 16-20 | 17 | 44
Back Air | 11-11 / 17-17 / 25-26 | 19 | 55
Up Air | 5-6 | 14 | 38
Down Air | 26-26 (6 hits) / 39-40 (7 hits) / 41-41 (Last hit) | 28 | 56
Grab | 14-24 | | 55
Dash Grab | 11-21 | | 67
Pivot Grab | 10-19 | | 64
Pummel | 6-6 | |
Neutral Special | 21-24 | | 43
Neutral Special Lick (2)| 14-19 / 21-23 | | (TBD)
Neutral Special Egg Launch (3)| 20-23 | | (TBD)
Side Special Egg Roll | 1-2 | |
Side Special Heavy Egg Roll (2) | 1-2 | |
Side Special Light Egg Roll (3) | 1-2 | |
Up Special Egg Throw | 15 | | 53
Up Special High Jump (2) | | |
Up Special Time Egg Throw (3) | 1-2 (Egg Hit) 1-4 (Explosion) | |
Down Special | 7-7 / 27-28 (Ground) 20-21 (Aerial) | | 73
Down Special 2 Star Bomb (Star Data and 2) | 3-9 / 10-19 / 20-27 | |
Down Special Crushing Bomb (3) | 19-20 / 51-52
Sources: http://smashboards.com/threads/yoshi-frame-and-misc-data-thread-wip.391441/
http://opensa.dantarion.com/s4/mastercore2/index.php?char=yoshi&mode=view104
http://smashboards.com/threads/yoshis-moveset-data-incomplete.384506/
2. Attack Descriptions, Pros/Cons (By Sinister Slush)
Jab 1 (3%)
Jab 2 (4%) A high kick for the first hit then a roundhouse kick for 2nd hit
Pros:
3rd Fastest Jab in the game
Relatively good slide when perfect pivoted
Fastest option to use as a panic button when in CQC next to Nair
Can reset Jab 1 continuously and chain into other hits
Cons:
Can't Kill
Dash Attack, DA (9% Early Hit, 6% Late Hit)
A long dashing kick with high knockback early on.
Pros:
Good to catch airdodges/landings
If opponent misses tech from any of your moves onstage, a good way to knock them back up if quick enough
Cons:
Destined to use this move numerous times if attempting Perfect Pivots
Only high knockback worth noting at low percents, will not kill at high percents
Was nerfed so laggy and very punishable if enemy shielded or missed it
Forward Tilt, F-tilt, Ftilt (7% Normal, 8% Tilted)
A swinging tail whip in front of Yoshi that can be angled in a cone in front of him.
Pros:
One of the few tilts that can be tilted
1% more damage when tilting
Our fastest tilt
Cons:
Can't kill
Up Tilt, U-tilt, Utilt (7%)
A tail whip that hits above him.
Pros:
One of the better moves to use for perfect pivots
Decent range
Combos into Uair at early percents
Cons:
Can't Kill
Down Tilt, D-tilt, Dtilt (5% if middle of tail, 4.5/4% tip of tail)
A spinning tail smack aimed towards the feet of opponents.
Pros:
Can trip enemies
Possible to hit people that regrabbed the ledge
Has gimp potential if hit confirm from them recovering
The least amount of ending frames so able to use to zone possibly
Cons:
Stops momentum from perfect pivots completely
Forward Smash, F-smash, Fsmash, Side-Smash (15.5-14%)
Yoshi rears his head back and does a devastating head smash.
Pros:
Kills
Highest damaging Smash
Head has intangibility
Can be angled
Able to dodge moves sometimes
Cons:
Slowest Smash attack
Longest duration
Up Smash, U-Smash, Usmash (14-12%)
Yoshi does a back flip kick, knocking anyone who gets hit by it high into the air
Pros:
Can Kill
Intangibility on the feet
Can hyphen Usmash and change your direction
Able to avoid projectiles with the Usmash hop
Smash with the least amount of ending lag
Cons:
Intangibility doesn't last too long
Telegraphed kill move since one of our very few reliable kill moves
Down Smash, D-Smash, Dsmash (12/10% both hits)
A hard hitting tail whip that hits both sides of Yoshi.
Pros:
Can Kill
Able to hit people if they regrab the ledge
Fastest Smash attack
Most damaging Smash if both hits connect
Knocks them down diagonally so able to gimp with it possibly at high percents
Cons:
Hitting with weak hit barely sends them anywhere
Neutral Air, N-air, Nair (10% 7% 5%)
Yoshi sticks out his foot swiftly to hit people away.
Pros:
Can Kill, but not as reliable as Brawl's
Has the least amount of landing lag
One of the fasest nairs in the game
Airdodge into nair works surprisingly well
Cons:
Lasts forever
Forward Air, F-air, Fair (15% 14%)
Yoshi throws his head back and hits the enemy with his Nose.
Pros:
Can Kill
Has a deceptive reach this time around
Cause of change in Smash 4 mechanics, spiking easier to do this time around with it
Can SH fair to auto cancel it
Catches airdodges well
Cons:
2nd slowest aerial in the game
Wind up till move actually out incredibly long
Back Air, B-air, Bair (2.5% 2.5% 5%)
Yoshi swings his tail behind him 3 times.
Pros:
Turned into a kill move
Catches airdodges
Hitstun/Spikes first two hits sometimes
Cons:
No longer a spammable move
Can't SH bair anymore
Attacks so slow people can power shield all 3 hits and still grab anytime between the attacks
Only last hit can kill reliably
Up Air, U-air, Uair (12%)
Yoshi swings his tail above him and hits his enemy hard.
Pros:
Can Kill
Disjointed
3rd fastest aerial in game which is decent since diddy alone fastest Uair, so technically 2nd if not counting him
Cons:
Airdodges better in this game, so landing this is more difficult
Down Air, D-air, Dair (34%)
Yoshi does 14 flutter kicks under him.
Pros:
SDI not as strong in this game, so able to land most or even all the hits for big damage
Catches airdodges really well
Cons:
Can't Kill
Our most laggy aerial in the air by barely 1 frame from Bair (56)
The most landing lag after the nerfs
Neutral B, Neutral Special (7%)
Yoshi sticks out his tongue and swallows his enemy.
Pros:
Possible for people to die from it due to it being harder to mash out of it at higher percents
Wavebounces and B reverses still gives Yoshi great mobility in the air
Cons:
Was nerfed immensely to the point it's our slowest special
Double Jump cancels removed
Side B, Side Special (4% 9%)
Yoshi does a small hop and turns into an egg, rolling around the stage to do damage.
Pros:
You can jump in it now
No longer puts you in free fall animation
Cons:
Still prone to dying if you used it offstage by accident
Less time in egg roll if you hit a shield or enemy
Most likely the worst Side-B in the game
Up B, Up Special (1% 6%)
Yoshi tosses an egg in an arc until it explodes or hits an enemy
Pros:
More mobility during the egg toss animation
Cons:
Duration of move still very punishable
Nerfed to only 3 hops (last one not even worth counting as a hop)
1% eggs are more common than landing 6% eggs
Randomly disappears into ledges
Being between platforms can sometimes make the egg explode before it gets a chance to go anywhere
Arcs can go lower, but in return the distance they travel if a grounded egg toss is much much shorter
Down B, Down Special (19%)
Pros:
Fastest grounded special
Breaks shields more easily from the extra 20% shield damage it does
Cons:
No longer able to slide off ledges
Only breaks shield after a hit or two, or if they hold shield long enough
Laggiest special in terms of duration if we miss
Standing Grab
Yoshi sticks out his tongue to grab enemies
Pros:
Hitbox lasts the longest
Cons:
One of the slowest grabs to come out
Dash Grab
Yoshi dashes in front of him and sticks his tongue out
Pros:
Longest Grab
Faster than Standing grab
Cons:
Our laggiest grab if we miss
Pivot Grab
Pros:
Fastest grab to come out
Cons:
Can no longer use it to wall people out because of the nerf
Yoshi dashes in front of him and sticks his tongue out
Pros:
Longest Grab
Faster than Standing grab
Cons:
Our laggiest grab if we miss
Pivot Grab
Pros:
Fastest grab to come out
Cons:
Can no longer use it to wall people out because of the nerf
3. Neutral, Advantage, Disadvantaged State & More (By Delta, possible changes by others in future)
The Neutral state is perhaps the most important part of any match you play in Smash, so it goes without saying that understanding what it is and how to work it is crucial to your progress as a player.
Naturally, the first thing to do is understand what Neutral is. The obvious answer is that it’s the state where neither player is at a distinct advantage or disadvantage. Not quite the most illuminating statement, so let’s try to identify it in terms of gameplay.
Imagine the game has just begun. You’re playing on Smashville, so you both spawned on the ground, on opposite ends of the stage from each other. What’s the first thing that’s going to happen? Odds are, both you and your opponent will start moving back and forth, weaving into and out of each other’s range, getting a feel for the other’s habits. You’ll probably also see a lot of threats, either from movements or from attacks actually being thrown out.
If your opponent is Diddy, he might start walling you out with SH Fairs, looking to poke you with the move to try and knock you offstage. If your opponent is Sheik, it’s very likely you’ll see things like empty Short Hops from her. She might not be actively throwing out an aerial, like Fair, but the threat of that lightning fast move keeps you from diving right into the fray with her. Alternatively, you could be playing against a character like Villager, who will just keep his distance from you with slingshots, Lloid rockets, and trees.
These are three pretty distinct ways of playing the neutral game, but there’s a common theme underlying all these strategies: your opponent is trying to get you into a situation where you’re uncomfortable, where you’re disadvantaged and they’re advantaged. In other words, the goal of the Neutral Game is to move into an advantaged state.
Naturally, the first thing to do is understand what Neutral is. The obvious answer is that it’s the state where neither player is at a distinct advantage or disadvantage. Not quite the most illuminating statement, so let’s try to identify it in terms of gameplay.
Imagine the game has just begun. You’re playing on Smashville, so you both spawned on the ground, on opposite ends of the stage from each other. What’s the first thing that’s going to happen? Odds are, both you and your opponent will start moving back and forth, weaving into and out of each other’s range, getting a feel for the other’s habits. You’ll probably also see a lot of threats, either from movements or from attacks actually being thrown out.
If your opponent is Diddy, he might start walling you out with SH Fairs, looking to poke you with the move to try and knock you offstage. If your opponent is Sheik, it’s very likely you’ll see things like empty Short Hops from her. She might not be actively throwing out an aerial, like Fair, but the threat of that lightning fast move keeps you from diving right into the fray with her. Alternatively, you could be playing against a character like Villager, who will just keep his distance from you with slingshots, Lloid rockets, and trees.
These are three pretty distinct ways of playing the neutral game, but there’s a common theme underlying all these strategies: your opponent is trying to get you into a situation where you’re uncomfortable, where you’re disadvantaged and they’re advantaged. In other words, the goal of the Neutral Game is to move into an advantaged state.
While these two states are basically complete opposites, they can’t really be discussed in a vacuum. In essence, being in an Advantaged State is having your opponent in a Disadvantaged State, and vice versa. I’ll discuss things mainly from the side of the Disadvantaged Player, since I find it’s a more concrete way of explaining things.
Imagine you’re playing against, say, Fox. He grabs you, winning the Neutral Game, and then he Uthrows you. You now have very few options. You can’t use any grounded options, because now you’re in the air. Looking at your aerial options, we’ll find that Fair, Bair, and Uair are kind of useless now, because they probably won’t hit Fox, since he’s below you. Looking specifically at Yoshi for a moment, you’ll see it’s probably a bad idea to try Dair, since its range is poor. Nair is okay if he gets in close. You could try Down B, but that’s pretty laggy, so it could end poorly. Basically, you don’t have much you can do, and even what you have is pretty poor.
This is the essence of being in the Disadvantaged State. The Disadvantaged State occurs when you are cut off from most of your options, and those that you have remaining are pretty poor.
Naturally, the Advantaged State is the opposite of this. The Advantaged State occurs when you have cut your opponent off from most of his options, giving yourself an easier time obtaining follow ups.
And that’s basically it. The goal of Neutral is to force your opponent into Disadvantage and put yourself into Advantage. So naturally, the next thing to examine is just how to accomplish this goal:
Imagine you’re playing against, say, Fox. He grabs you, winning the Neutral Game, and then he Uthrows you. You now have very few options. You can’t use any grounded options, because now you’re in the air. Looking at your aerial options, we’ll find that Fair, Bair, and Uair are kind of useless now, because they probably won’t hit Fox, since he’s below you. Looking specifically at Yoshi for a moment, you’ll see it’s probably a bad idea to try Dair, since its range is poor. Nair is okay if he gets in close. You could try Down B, but that’s pretty laggy, so it could end poorly. Basically, you don’t have much you can do, and even what you have is pretty poor.
This is the essence of being in the Disadvantaged State. The Disadvantaged State occurs when you are cut off from most of your options, and those that you have remaining are pretty poor.
Naturally, the Advantaged State is the opposite of this. The Advantaged State occurs when you have cut your opponent off from most of his options, giving yourself an easier time obtaining follow ups.
And that’s basically it. The goal of Neutral is to force your opponent into Disadvantage and put yourself into Advantage. So naturally, the next thing to examine is just how to accomplish this goal:
While every character tends to approach the Neutral Game differently, there are three general ways that it is played. Before we get into these general strategies, it’s important to understand some terminology.
Stage Control – The effective areas of the stage that a character controls, either by directly being there, or having threatening access to that area. Stage control can be claimed through a character’s physical location, a character’s potential movement, a character’s attacks, a character’s potential attacks, and projectiles.
Threat – A threat is either a physical option being used, for example, Sheik’s using Fair to swipe at you, or the idea that the character could potentially hurt you. The potential part here is key, as it allows you to not actually use a move to take up the space that it would otherwise occupy, allowing you to remain noncommittal. For example, imagine Sheik is Short Hopping in front of you over and over again. Technically, she’s doing nothing, so you could approach and try to hit her. But in reality, she could swing her lightning fast Fair at you at any moment, making approaches risky. The threat of this move is what keeps you out. This allows Sheik to keep all her options available to her and prevents her from needing to actually commit to the frames of Fair.
Contrast this with say, Shulk, who would want to use something like Fair or Nair in neutral. These moves have moderate start up, so he is forced to commit to these moves early and frequently if he wants to threaten you with them. Therefore, Shulk is less threatening than Sheik.
Zone – Very closely related to Stage Control, a character’s Zone is the area he or she is directly occupying with attacks. Characters that tend to play defensively rely on Zones and Zoning (the act of keeping up a Zone) to win Neutral.
For example, consider Villager. He’ll fire up a Lloid rocket near the ground, forcing you to shield it or jump over it, but he adds in the use of his Fair to occupy the space above the rocket, so jumping is less effective. This space that he continues to occupy with these moves is his zone, and in order to hit him, you must break through his zone. Zones can also be kept up without the need for projectiles. Imagine Sheik staying jusssssssst outside your range and Fairing over and over again. Again, you need to break this Zone to hit her.
Zone Breaker – A movement option, attack, or some combination of both that allows you to break through an opponent’s Zone. These tend to be fast and have long effective range.
Effective Range – The true range that a character has. Taking Fox’s Usmash as an example, we can see that it doesn’t have incredible range while he’s stationary. But since he can run so fast and Usmash out of his run, the Effective Range on this attack is much larger than the move’s hitbox itself. This concept also applies to aerials, which can be done out of a run (you can jump into one), or drift while performing one.
This vocabulary is not entirely standardized everywhere, but it’s convenient to have terms for these concepts instead of having to use long, drawn out explanations every time the concepts need to applied.
With this vocabulary in mind, we can easily list the three main strategies people use in Neutral.
1. Walling the Opponent Out - In this case, characters will tend to use fast, long ranged, high priority moves to take up space, effectively Zoning their opponent. The wall will tend to force retreats towards the ledge, or just hit you.
2. Threatening the Opponent - This is similar to Walling, except that you tend to not have to actually throw out attacks to zone your opponent. This is very characteristic of fast characters, who use their movement speed to give them large Effective Ranges, allowing them to exert a lot of stage control.
3. Camping. – This strategy involves the use of projectiles to force your opponent to approach you. When your opponent is forced to approach in this manner, they are typically disadvantaged (airborne, shielding, etc.) since they must maneuver around your projectiles to approach. Characters that camp also tend to have good anti-air or defensive options to send their opponents away after they’ve broken through the projectile wall.
Smash is quite a dynamic game, so naturally people’s Neutral games are not always this cut and dry. However, I think being familiar with these three concepts is a good starting point for thinking about Neutral.
Stage Control – The effective areas of the stage that a character controls, either by directly being there, or having threatening access to that area. Stage control can be claimed through a character’s physical location, a character’s potential movement, a character’s attacks, a character’s potential attacks, and projectiles.
Threat – A threat is either a physical option being used, for example, Sheik’s using Fair to swipe at you, or the idea that the character could potentially hurt you. The potential part here is key, as it allows you to not actually use a move to take up the space that it would otherwise occupy, allowing you to remain noncommittal. For example, imagine Sheik is Short Hopping in front of you over and over again. Technically, she’s doing nothing, so you could approach and try to hit her. But in reality, she could swing her lightning fast Fair at you at any moment, making approaches risky. The threat of this move is what keeps you out. This allows Sheik to keep all her options available to her and prevents her from needing to actually commit to the frames of Fair.
Contrast this with say, Shulk, who would want to use something like Fair or Nair in neutral. These moves have moderate start up, so he is forced to commit to these moves early and frequently if he wants to threaten you with them. Therefore, Shulk is less threatening than Sheik.
Zone – Very closely related to Stage Control, a character’s Zone is the area he or she is directly occupying with attacks. Characters that tend to play defensively rely on Zones and Zoning (the act of keeping up a Zone) to win Neutral.
For example, consider Villager. He’ll fire up a Lloid rocket near the ground, forcing you to shield it or jump over it, but he adds in the use of his Fair to occupy the space above the rocket, so jumping is less effective. This space that he continues to occupy with these moves is his zone, and in order to hit him, you must break through his zone. Zones can also be kept up without the need for projectiles. Imagine Sheik staying jusssssssst outside your range and Fairing over and over again. Again, you need to break this Zone to hit her.
Zone Breaker – A movement option, attack, or some combination of both that allows you to break through an opponent’s Zone. These tend to be fast and have long effective range.
Effective Range – The true range that a character has. Taking Fox’s Usmash as an example, we can see that it doesn’t have incredible range while he’s stationary. But since he can run so fast and Usmash out of his run, the Effective Range on this attack is much larger than the move’s hitbox itself. This concept also applies to aerials, which can be done out of a run (you can jump into one), or drift while performing one.
This vocabulary is not entirely standardized everywhere, but it’s convenient to have terms for these concepts instead of having to use long, drawn out explanations every time the concepts need to applied.
With this vocabulary in mind, we can easily list the three main strategies people use in Neutral.
1. Walling the Opponent Out - In this case, characters will tend to use fast, long ranged, high priority moves to take up space, effectively Zoning their opponent. The wall will tend to force retreats towards the ledge, or just hit you.
2. Threatening the Opponent - This is similar to Walling, except that you tend to not have to actually throw out attacks to zone your opponent. This is very characteristic of fast characters, who use their movement speed to give them large Effective Ranges, allowing them to exert a lot of stage control.
3. Camping. – This strategy involves the use of projectiles to force your opponent to approach you. When your opponent is forced to approach in this manner, they are typically disadvantaged (airborne, shielding, etc.) since they must maneuver around your projectiles to approach. Characters that camp also tend to have good anti-air or defensive options to send their opponents away after they’ve broken through the projectile wall.
Smash is quite a dynamic game, so naturally people’s Neutral games are not always this cut and dry. However, I think being familiar with these three concepts is a good starting point for thinking about Neutral.
With the generalized Neutral Game discussion out of the way, we can move on to thinking about how Yoshi interacts with all of these concepts. In a vacuum, Yoshi tends to fall under category 2 for the Neutral Game. He generally wants to threaten people with his moves, since he lacks a fast, long ranged attack to wall people with, and his camping game is a bit too slow to be relied upon. He also lacks amazing defensive options to complement his projectiles.
However, characters do not exist in a vacuum, so it is essential that we consider Yoshi’s Neutral Game in relation to other characters. And looking at Yoshi through this lens is what really causes me to love the character. Yoshi is not a character that has just one possible game plan that he always sticks to. Yoshi is flexible, and he can handle every style of Neutral Game out there. This means it is not easy to shut Yoshi down and give him an impossible match up. He always (for the most part) stands a fighting chance if you’re smart enough and patient enough.
This flexibility comes with some downsides, however. Yoshi is basically a jack-of-all-trades, but a master of none. Since he is flexible in his Neutral Game, he can do a little bit of everything.
However, he is not amazingly strong in any of these aspects. Therefore, he is frequently forced to play other people’s games. For example, if Yoshi goes up against a character with a strong walling game, he’s forced to try to beat that walling game. He will not be able to play his own game and force the opponent to change their tactics.
Usually, when a character cannot play their own Neutral Game, they lose the match up, unless they reap fantastic rewards when they actually win Neutral (think of Ice Climbers in previous games). Normally, we’d expect Yoshi to be an incredibly weak character since he is almost always forced to play his opponent’s game, and his punishment game (Advantaged State) doesn’t tend to cripple his opponent.
However, Yoshi’s options are generally strong enough to contend with opposing Neutral Games, and he almost always has an answer to what his opponent is trying to do. This makes it so that he’s not actually disadvantaged by having to play other characters’ games, because he’s more than capable of doing so. And on the off chance that you’re playing a match up where Yoshi decides how the Neutral Game will be played, you’ll find that Yoshi dominates.
Yoshi is a very hard character to shut down, and it’s this strength that allows him to remain competitive. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to provide general advice for playing Neutral as Yoshi, because it all depends so much on who you’re fighting against. In general, the basic idea is to use your mobility to get around your opponent’s traps and to put yourself at Advantage.
Against faster characters, you’ll need to stay grounded more often, as Yoshi can have trouble landing, so jumping for Short Hop Egg Tosses and Fairs becomes risky since your opponents can just run under you.
Against slower characters, Yoshi can control the air with his mobility and long reaching Fair, or set up frame traps through the use of Short Hop Egg Tosses.
Against characters that camp, Yoshi can utilize his mobility to outcamp them using aerial Egg Tosses, or just use his mobility to weave through the projectile walls and punish his opponents. He can even jump out of shield now, allowing him to approach characters from the ground.
It’s important to realize that all match ups with Yoshi are unique, and you must be very knowledgeable about all characters to see great success with Yoshi. You’ll want to know what your opponent’s general game plan for Neutral is, where the weaknesses in that plan are, and how Yoshi can exploit them. Smash is a series of minigames for Yoshi, each one a bit different from the next. However, if you’re patient enough and if you put in the time, you’ll definitely see success using this character.
However, characters do not exist in a vacuum, so it is essential that we consider Yoshi’s Neutral Game in relation to other characters. And looking at Yoshi through this lens is what really causes me to love the character. Yoshi is not a character that has just one possible game plan that he always sticks to. Yoshi is flexible, and he can handle every style of Neutral Game out there. This means it is not easy to shut Yoshi down and give him an impossible match up. He always (for the most part) stands a fighting chance if you’re smart enough and patient enough.
This flexibility comes with some downsides, however. Yoshi is basically a jack-of-all-trades, but a master of none. Since he is flexible in his Neutral Game, he can do a little bit of everything.
However, he is not amazingly strong in any of these aspects. Therefore, he is frequently forced to play other people’s games. For example, if Yoshi goes up against a character with a strong walling game, he’s forced to try to beat that walling game. He will not be able to play his own game and force the opponent to change their tactics.
Usually, when a character cannot play their own Neutral Game, they lose the match up, unless they reap fantastic rewards when they actually win Neutral (think of Ice Climbers in previous games). Normally, we’d expect Yoshi to be an incredibly weak character since he is almost always forced to play his opponent’s game, and his punishment game (Advantaged State) doesn’t tend to cripple his opponent.
However, Yoshi’s options are generally strong enough to contend with opposing Neutral Games, and he almost always has an answer to what his opponent is trying to do. This makes it so that he’s not actually disadvantaged by having to play other characters’ games, because he’s more than capable of doing so. And on the off chance that you’re playing a match up where Yoshi decides how the Neutral Game will be played, you’ll find that Yoshi dominates.
Yoshi is a very hard character to shut down, and it’s this strength that allows him to remain competitive. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to provide general advice for playing Neutral as Yoshi, because it all depends so much on who you’re fighting against. In general, the basic idea is to use your mobility to get around your opponent’s traps and to put yourself at Advantage.
Against faster characters, you’ll need to stay grounded more often, as Yoshi can have trouble landing, so jumping for Short Hop Egg Tosses and Fairs becomes risky since your opponents can just run under you.
Against slower characters, Yoshi can control the air with his mobility and long reaching Fair, or set up frame traps through the use of Short Hop Egg Tosses.
Against characters that camp, Yoshi can utilize his mobility to outcamp them using aerial Egg Tosses, or just use his mobility to weave through the projectile walls and punish his opponents. He can even jump out of shield now, allowing him to approach characters from the ground.
It’s important to realize that all match ups with Yoshi are unique, and you must be very knowledgeable about all characters to see great success with Yoshi. You’ll want to know what your opponent’s general game plan for Neutral is, where the weaknesses in that plan are, and how Yoshi can exploit them. Smash is a series of minigames for Yoshi, each one a bit different from the next. However, if you’re patient enough and if you put in the time, you’ll definitely see success using this character.
4. Defensive Game
5. Advanced Techniques, Smash 4 Mechanics, and Tips (By Sinister Slush)
5.1 - Having C-stick set to Attack for Aerials
This is preference for people, but if you looked at the pros and cons for Smash on C-stick and Attack on C-stick, you'll most likely second guess.
The reasoning for the switch for most players is because in this game, due to C-stick now being able to charge Smash attacks. The game will sometimes mess with your mobility when using cstick smash for your aerials. It's most apparent when you're trying to use a retreating fair.
Basically what happens is you're stuck either going in the direction you jumped, or just unable to move any direction at all if just did a straight hop with no inputs to either direction.
Setting your C-stick to Attack fixes this issue, drawback being we can't use smashes on the ground anymore but I'll get into that later.
5.2 - Shields Being Stronger (click meeeeeeee)
Smash 4 changed shields to be more rewarding when you hit somebody's shield. That's a good thing and all, but it also shows even more reason why to change to Attack.
Might sound weird at first, but most peoples smash attacks are laggy, ours especially. And since one of our few kill moves in our arsenal is Usmash, we can't be throwing that out all the time. So setting C-stick to attack makes us use less laggy moves on shields and gives us more time to react, along with getting us out of the habit of throwing out our smashes even if they're not shielding.
5.3 - Neutral B Techniques
Since our double jump was changed, we can no longer double jump cancel Item throws or neutral B in the air.
Due to this, we've had to figure out other ways to work around that. Sadly we haven't found much, but we still at least have b-reverses.
In order to do this, simply press
then immediately after click the opposite direction you're facing https://vine.co/v/Ojpl7vAjhIK
Recently though (while not new really) japanese Yoshi's has been dropping a bunch of vines illustrating wavebounces with neutral B.
Few Examples: https://vine.co/v/OT9A3xngnzm
https://vine.co/v/OXlZ6b209rj
The way this works is you must have C-stick set as attack and a R button for Special. It's wonky, but a couple (me included) have it like this due to Brawl.
If you don't wanna do this, then the only other option to do this is claw, https://vine.co/v/OEg6z7X9tiV
For inputs it's like so
Say you're facing Left while on the left ledge of the stage.
Run off and still hold
now whenever you feel like it press your (or whatever button you're using for special) and the opposite direction you're facing with (yes this direction) at the same time in order to do the wavebounce.To know if you got it right it'll look like this.
https://vine.co/v/OThniHpTX3t
https://vine.co/v/OTuuuWKLeAw
Be weary of doing this off stage as you'll do an egg roll and die if you mess up (if you do the way in the first vine off ledges at least, doing it from a short hop offstage you should get out quick enough to recover)
If you have enough running momentum when going off platforms/ledges you can go even further when doing Wavebounces.
https://vine.co/v/OErBpvplzrb
https://vine.co/v/OFdegLbYtai
5.4 - Jab Resets
Not too sure for brawl, but setting C-stick for Attack allows you to Jab Reset more successfully when you get it down.
If confused on what Jab reset is, it's basically using your Jab 1, crouching to cancel second jab from coming out, then using Jab 1 again.
Basically what you do with Jab Reset is you hold down the entire time and click your now Attack bound C-stick diagonally.
Here's how you do it along with if you successfully do it, it'll look like this. https://vine.co/v/OQbVYa9MZQj
Not 100% sure who can get out of it, but it can lead into some interesting things if you do it right. If the combo counter goes up during training they probably can't get out of it.
5.5 - Perfect Pivots (click meh)
The last thing (until more is found, or unless I'm forgetting something) for having C-stick set to Attack is Perfect Pivots.
If you clicked the video, then you already know what it can do for you. Here's a couple things it can set up for Yoshi.
https://vine.co/v/Ox3n20nr7Au
5.6 - Tap Jump Off
Having tap jump on leaves you prone to messing up your recovery or just making you waste your double jump when attempting to use Egg toss only.
To show an example of how TJ On can severely gimp you in some way, click the following
6. Egg Toss WIP (By Celes)
This is a WIP.
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