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In addition to what Bookworm said Ness and Lucas’ DJ allows them to cancel it with an item throw or special move. DJ being cancelable allows Ness to use magnet offensively and defensively as depending on the frame you cancel the DJ with the magnet you gain various amounts of momentum which allow for psudo infinites and zero to death combos. DJ being cancelable also allows for Ness to make use of a tech called PKF Jump in which Ness gains considerable forward (or backwards if you b reverse it) momentum when using an aerial PKF, almost like a third short jump. Useful in letting him cover more space than his current position in the air would usually allow.
) can also use instant double jump out of shield to hit closer to the grounded (and remove the SH multiplier as an added bonus), as you can buffer both double jump and aerial from the jumpsquat. to punish stuff that he normally shouldn't be able to with IDJ F-air, like a spaced F-Smash, for instance.
Thank you for your appreciation, I was worried that I could seem like a salty kid that is angry with the world for talking **** about his main lol, I'm happy that I created a discussionBlueRando brought him up and would love to hear more thoughts on him.
Wi-fi Lucas is defintiely a thing, yeah? Like, he's not good, per se, but if you are a super nervous (or lazy?) player who just wants to sit back and press the B button online, Lucas is about as good as it gets.
I just watched a few matches of Reumina and Mekos, which paints a pretty diffrent picture. They both show a really "balanced", mundane character, whose bread n butter is constantly alternating defensive PK Fire and offensive fair. Zair looks great in the lab and they both use it a lot, but it's a very low-reward compromise between fair/Fire and not what Lucas wants to be landing. (In real matches, zair seldom leads to much.) And then when the opponent is in a compromised position, Lucas can go in with a bair or nair and try to start a respectable little combo.
Lucas's recovery mixup options are good but not great. Lucas's throws are good but not great. Lucas's edgeguard options are good but not great. Lucas's other kill options are good but not great. Lucas is like Banjo in that he has a lot of options for all of these things, but he has less variety than Banjo for better or for worse. You end up with a really ordinary character, whose many quirks just make him odd rather than extreme.
Where does he stand in the roster? I actually imagine it's controversial in the same way that Pit is. A lot of people will be tempted to just say he's severly underplayed at top level, or that there's some cultural substitution factor with Ness. (Who I'll remind you is the most played character!) But I'm not sure how ironclad those assertions are; this ain't exactly Marth. It's just as easy to say that Lucas's decent usage is artificially propped up the same way Ness or Ganon is, and from there say that he really is a bottom 15 or 10 character. (Insofar as that means anything in this game.)
On a personal Lucas note, I miss Brawl dair. That was the coolest move, and the Ultimate version doesn't work at all the same way. (Brawl dair came out super early and could carry the opponents into the air, and a FHFF would still auto-cancel and let you chase their tech--and if they didn't tech, dair jab-locked. Smash 4 neutered the move by making it come out way later and adjusting fall speed and timings so that FHFFAC wasn't a use case. Now in Ultimate you can't even buffer FH aerials anymore, and if you could hit them dair doesn't even lift grounded opponents off the ground at all! Ultimate seems to have an entirely different purpose for dair, repackaged as a SH weapon: either dragging opponents offstage into the spike or serving as some sort of higher-risk nair alternative with far worse dragging and surprisingly low reward.)
or and , for example, both of them have an amazing Dtilt that can contest with Lucas's), or characters that can **** him up in disadvantage, either by outranging him (mainly ), or camping him (like , who I personally consider his worst matchup, but I guess that better Lucas players would say otherwise).'s edge guarding and ledge trapping is that PKFreeze is a really good move. It's like PKFlash but it travels fast and kills off the side which makes it much better in those situations. Freeze would be busted on a better character. I think Lucas is upper mid tier btw.
Yeah, PK Freeze got hella buffed in Ultimate. I basically never clicked that particular button in Brawl/4 except by mistake, then I used it in Ultimate and my friend (an Ike main) promptly flipped his **** when he got flung off the side. Hilarious, to be sure, but also strange in its own way. "Wait, this move is good now?"Another thing about
I like hearing about the gameplans of nonpolarizing, lesser played cast members.about his edgeguarding, not only it is good, it's AMAZING. Lucas is arguably one of the best characters in the game for edgeguarding, PK Thunder alone can gimp the vast majority of the cast, even some of the best characters can struggle against Thunder, like, for example,
I highlighted this in my comments; zair is a great great combo starter in theory, but go watch Mekos or other top Lucas players and you won't see basically any zair combos. They do use zair--a lot!--but more like a poor man's ZSS zair, used at SH height or so rather than landing, used to disrupt aerial footsies.
All of these are good tools, but it's unreasonable to characterize him as among the best.Secondly, I disagree with your comment about his edgeguarding, not only it is good, it's AMAZING. Lucas is arguably one of the best characters in the game for edgeguarding, PK Thunder alone can gimp the vast majority of the cast, even some of the best characters can struggle against Thunder, like, for example,
And I still haven't mentioned his Dair and Bair (both of them can gimp AND spike), coupled with his 2 framing potential with Dsmash and angled Ftilt
, it's no , it's no , it's no , it's no . I would put Lucas edgeguards below a variety of "high tier" edgeguards and ledgetraps, ranging from pressure, zoning, walls, and 2-frame conversions. ironically has a lot of overlap with Lucas in their edgeguards, and offers an overall more threatening application. Mekos's opponents make it back to the stage perhaps less than the average, but much more than you'd see from many of those characters listed.
Online does have the tendency to breed bad habits so that may have something to do with it.
's Double Jump Cancelled Z-air is not used as much as one would think just because of the fear of missing the input, IMO. is fair game. Really easy to do, and no counterplay for certain characters due to the orb being transcendant. PK Freeze is great as well against slow recoveries and will kill at ridiculous %s.starts struggling when he can't force a low recovery by jumping and forcing an airdodge with a PK Fire snipe. If your character usually recovers high () he won't do ANYTHING to you. He has terrible ground speed coupled with an atrocious vertical mobility, and on top of that, his U-air has a very little hitbox to juggle (don't get me wrong it's an awesome move, safe on shield, combos into itself up to like 6-8 times depending on platforms, but as a juggle tool it's mediocre at best). Some characters can recover high, and although it's not their prefered method usually, it often is against (I've seen a japanese start doing this in the middle of a set and have way better success in the match-up).the most. I'd argue that he's high tier on Final Destination, but overall he's certainly low mid. 's PK Thunder would be so much better on him since his own UpB is better for edgeguarding but he's already good at it without the move and he only really lacks a juggle tool.
It's quite embarrassing how I'm performing so maybe I should not play this game anymore lol.
I do find grinding away at quickplay can make me feel worse, even though when I step back and look at the big picture I can still see how I've improved in the past several months. It's very easy to get tilted when going up against faceless opponents, and when you get tilted you get overly critical of yourself and start dwelling on mistakes you'd normally move on from.
. Sorry.
Um, no.
Are you counting the time when Roy uses jab to confirm to a bair, or are you saying that number due to the amount of failed ledge-get ups by Lucas? Either way, it sounds like a different definition of what an "edge-guard" is for some characters. Snake for instance can do drop-down ledge B-air for an edgeguard situation, but he'd rather use Nikita to stay on-stage and intercept the opponent's recovery that way. Could it just be an "edge-guard" situation even though
How did you determine you're becoming a worse player? I sincerely doubt anyone would be better not playing the game at all instead of playing online. At the very least, continuing to play the game online will maintain you muscle memory for some actions and your ability to make certain reads.
I'm basically losing all the time now. Not to mention responsiveness (myself as well as input delay being a problem) isn't helping.
Like......... PK Thunder? ¯\(ツ)/¯
I'm not sure but it seems like you and him are having two completely different conversations. It's almost as if he's talking more about stage spiking while you're talking more about offstage play....am I reading this right? It's like you two aren't on the same page...
Maybe you should care. Silently substituting your own personal definitions for known terms like edgeguarding or matchup charts when trying to make a point makes you sound like a fruitloop.
The problem here is that a lot of smash terms are used interchangeably and often incorrectly on a regular basis. According to the smash dictionary (about as close to we get to a consensus for official terminology) the following is the definition of edgeguarding.
. Here are some observations about his MUs: is probably even. Seph has a strict range where he wins. YL's projectiles out camp him at long rang, if Seph tries to use flare YL can fire 2 arrows; the first to cancel flare and the next will hit him. Boomerang has great diagonal angles that are safe from Seph's sword. Then at very close range YL out buttons him with f4 Nair and jab. Seph wants to zone YL no closer than Nair and no farther than Fair's tip. As always, YL has the better neutral but seph has a much better advantage. They both kill early. Seph is actually lighter than YL. is either even or a slight advantage for seph. Link's not very mobile and unlike YL he can't out spam seph. Link can struggle to get past Seph's zoning. Link is much heavier and doesn't need to hit Seph a lot to win. Link's bomb and arrows are excellent for gimping Seph, which few characters can do. interestingly I think KRool wins this slightly. Hear me out; it's all about character tool interactions. KRool has a unique kit which is effective vs seph. Seph is sluggish to attack and very easy to punish with things like crown. If seph tries to zone with Fair/tilt, crown powers through and puts him into disadvantage. Krool wins trades, being the second heaviest character in the game. Belly armor is also very good for getting around Seph's amazing advantage state. KRool's Nair is an extremely helpful move. KRool can land Nair and combo into things like his f4 14% iirc jab combo. Then when it comes to edge guarding KRool's Dsmash has belly armor on the bottom and hits hard so Seph's great upB is actually a liability. Krool also has a reflector to stop flares.Seph probably wins. He's not as bad as characters who can vortex and keep Rid in disadvantage like Pichu etc but Rid really doesn't have an answer to his zoning. Rid does have a few tools. SH Fair has good range as an OoS punish and Nair is a huge circle that Seph struggles to avoid in disadvantage. Fire lets Rid edge guard him.Not much to say about this; it plays out like you'd expect. Ganon gets walled hard and really struggles. If Ganon can play a slow game of shielding to approach and get good reads he at least kills Seph extremely early. wins. Wolf has great airspeed and can jump over Seph's sword with Fairs to juggle or Bair to kill. Blaster goes farther than seph's sword and is transcendent so it gives him a lot of trouble. Wolf also wins up close. Seph does what Byleth does but better. Although the MU isn't as bad as you'd think. By wins up close with a faster nair and has a lot of power to kill Seph early if she outplays him just a bit. By's arrows are surprisingly good against Seph's tall hurtbox. disclaimer: ZSS is by far my worst character. I can't really say how this MU goes but Seph is hard for her. ZSS normally has an amazing mid range game with Zairs, phaser, etc but Seph controls that area better. ZSS does outbutton him hard with Fairs and quick ground options though.I must admit, the middle portion of your post here strikes me as rather uncharacteristic of you. Typically, your posts contain robust statistical datasets to show a bigger point you're trying to make, or offer a thorough analytical thought process to accomplish the same and stimulate discussion; whereas here, you avoid what you call a "semantic debate" over very basic smash terminology that can be quite easily reconciled even if it is a bit "dry" or "dull." I'm sure you're a busy guy (and so am I), but I think we can do better than that.
does to her opponents to kill them would be edgeguarding and ledgeguarding (via 2-framing or just as they approach ledge otherwise), although she's certainly no slouch when it comes to ledge trapping either; her ability to do this from center stage is unique and exceptional, but her ability to maintain that positioning where others cannot is irrelevant to defining these basic terms./Kola setI agree with most of this but want to add, gimping means to kill your opponent at a lower % range than they usually would die from through edge guarding.I must admit, the middle portion of your post here strikes me as rather uncharacteristic of you. Typically, your posts contain robust statistical datasets to show a bigger point you're trying to make, or offer a thorough analytical thought process to accomplish the same and stimulate discussion; whereas here, you avoid what you call a "semantic debate" over very basic smash terminology that can be quite easily reconciled even if it is a bit "dry" or "dull." I'm sure you're a busy guy (and so am I), but I think we can do better than that.
Perhaps it's the future lawyer in me, but I think it's very important to clarify definitions of terms we use in our discussion, even moreso for basic terms, to make sure we're all on the same page and performing our "due diligence" to post in a thoughtful way that reflects the stated purpose of this entire thread.
Enough with the diatribe; here are the general definitions I use on all of the above terms based on empirical observation and experience:
- Edgeguard: When your opponent is off-stage, and you intercept them so you KO them into side blastzones, regardless of what resources your opponent may have had to recover back to ledge and return to stage to reset neutral.
-Gimp: This one might be a stretch (and it wasn't expressly brought up here); arguably, this is just a subcategory of an edgeguard, but I define this identical to the edgeguard definition above except that more often, the opponent has expended most, if not all, of their resources to get back to ledge, making them easier to intercept. I also find the usage of "gimp" to mean a KO not directly out to the side blastzone, but falling to their death to the bottom blastzone because they don't have the mobility or resources to attempt getting back to the stage's ledge.
-Ledgeguard: Aptly, intercepting your opponent from recovering to the ledge specifically rather than (more) preemptively intercepting your opponent off-stage before they even have the chance to drift back toward the ledge. Two-framing is a good example of this.
-Ledgetrap: Again rather apt, but your opponent has already made it to the ledge and is trying to get off it, giving you the opportunity to react to their get up option, go for a hard read on their get up option, or employ more tactful conditioning that your character has available to make punishing a particular option more likely.
In other words, the only meaningful difference in these definitions is the opponent's relative proximity to the ledge and/or center stage; an edgeguard in practice means the opponent is very likely going to be at a further distance from the ledge, ledgeguard indicates a much closer proximity to the ledge (either just about to use a DJ or up b to recover to ledge, or attempting to snap to the ledge after using those options), and ledgetrap, finally and obviously, meaning that the opponent is already on the ledge and attempting to get off it while you maintain stage control and opportunity to net the kill.
In light of the above, it's clear that much of what
Re: Mekos
Just going to provide some quick thoughts on this: Many of us know that Lucas's disadvantage state is less than stellar, but I couldn't help but notice that Mekos tended to ledge jump a lot and if it wasn't that, it was a ledge drop DJ fair typically. Maybe it was just nerves, but he really should've mixed it up more, especially considering the caliber of player that Kola is (if Mekos mixed it up, Kola very well could've reacted to and/or read his option and kill him anyway, but mixing up options from ledge obviously and inherently makes your opponent's objective more difficult). Also, applying my proposed definitions of basic terms above, Roy got a lot off of ledgetraps (typical Roy stuff, really) and Lucas got relatively more edgeguards and ledgeguards, which I think many of us can agree aligns well with what we expect from the character.
I just figured I'd take the time to give my thoughts on this boring ol' "semantic debate," because while it's rather dry and trivial in the grand scheme of things, if we're not cogent with our definitions and understanding of what constitutes an "edgeguard," "ledgeguard," and "ledgetrap," how can we expect of ourselves -- let alone, expect from others -- to be cogent in applying those definitions and understanding of the terms in an accurate way (let alone more advanced concepts of the game)?! Preferring to not get into the nittier and grittier semantics (even if just occasionally; it obviously doesn't need to take up the lionshare of discussion) of these things is, I would reckon, a substantial factor in why the smash community is so shallow and misinformed about discussions of numerous aspects of the game, and I know for myself and many others that that is a phenomenon we are getting more than just a bit frustrated with contending against at this point.
I think this is less true in this thread than elsewhere, as we'll tend to autocorrect.
I think that made fine sense in the earlier games when edgehogging meant you either get your feet on the stage or die trying. There wasn't this in-between state of being on the ledge but sweating how to get onstage happening all the time, and a lot less ledgetrapping because why trap someone at the ledge when you can just hang on the ledge yourself and watch them slide off to their doom?
-- but who's ability to get from outer space to ledge varies widely between the three of them. It's a useful distinction to make, especially if your main is much better at applying one kind of pressure than the other.
Thinkaman.
I tend to normally be pretty skeptical of "online specifically hurts character X" but man I am totally with you on Sephiroth. I can't think of any characters whose bread-n-butter neutral moves are as negatively affected by lag as much as Sephiroth fair/bair.
I can relate. Personally, I think it's a few factors:
MrGameguycolor
and
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, and they were great--you could tell both sides were playing worse than they would offline, but as long as you're not thinking of it as practice and trying to change your habits, it's fine.
This is genuinely the first time in my life I’ve had this experience, but man, I am in this post, and I don’t like it.I tend to normally be pretty skeptical of "online specifically hurts character X" but man I am totally with you on Sephiroth. I can't think of any characters whose bread-n-butter neutral moves are as negatively affected by lag as much as Sephiroth fair/bair.
I can relate. Personally, I think it's a few factors:
Me and my wife both experience this love-hate relationship with the game, the fact that playing it is a constant reminder that we will never be as good as we used to be. It can feel daunting to boot up the game, like I've got some sort of bizzare responsibility to go find kids half my age and play 1000 hours--all so I can be half as good as I used to and not feel bad for missing executions.
- The most unavoidable fact is, I flat out don't play the game as much as I get older. I played Smash 4 less than a third as much as Brawl, and Ultimate less than a third as much as Smash 4. Boring adulthood just slowly creeps in more each year.
- That adulthood thing sort of spirals. It's harder and harder to find people my age to play with, and I'm past the point where there's more than a decade between me and most of these college kids. Going out of my way to play a video game with kids yelling memes I don't know feels weirder every time.
- And then there's the whole literally-getting-older thing, the slight but inevitable decline of reaction time. You spend your life up until that point playing the game and getting better, only to now have your body be getting worse.
- "I know, I'll play online!" Except now on top of your decline in your reaction time, you add online latency. So you are even farther away from where you used to be, playing in conditions that are frustrating independent of you performing worse.
Honestly? Deep down I have a childish anger that this game is out now, when I'm "too old to enjoy it." I actually had a dream two nights ago, that I was back in high school but snowed in with a friend, and we played Smashdown all night. I've never played Smashdown ever, except once with CPUs to just to see. It was the nicest dream I've had in quite some time.
Wow, this is turning into a downer. My general advice to people is, "don't play online." In a pandemic, ehhhh. I've relied on online to test out the last 3 DLC, and actually enjoyed it as long as I went into it with the attitude that this was better than nothing, some kind of "sneak peak." I had some fun little exploratory games with
Relevant: Did you know that you can drink if you were born on today’s date in the year 2000?
The times I tried out online, made worse by the fact that I was unable to use LAN, it felt like I was brand-new to the game entirely. Gone was my fast movement and ease of reaction. It felt absolutely horrible. I later thought about how it's a hobby of mine to try and improve at the game, mainly just so I could roflstomp my friends even harder (though I might look into locals someday). I thought about how the lag of online would make the timing of so many things different, and how certain things work way better online than offline, and vice versa. The old saying went that playing against CPUs caused bad habits, but I felt like playing online when trying to prepare for offline would cause even worse ones.
this suddenly makes me feel old and I'm not even among the oldest here (although not among the youngest here either)
Not a bad explanation, but I'm not sure if I would be so specific as to say that "edgeguarding" has to KO opponents into the SIDE blastzones. I would count meteor smashes and aerial spikes to be a form of edgeguard. Basically, anything that hits an opponent off-stage so as to intercept their recovery would count as an edgeguard.
Current Min Min MU chart
— Liquid | Dabuz (@DabuzSenpai) January 26, 2021
Winning and losing isn't +2/ -2 on conventional matchup charts. It's more like a +1/-1 but some matchups (such as DK might) might be +2 but Min Min's fragile disadvantage means even bad matchups are winnable for the opponent pic.twitter.com/gxVD2XEHWE
can do in Ultimate. instead of in the tournament), MVD and another big name or 2 that possibly escapes me at this moment. He went to game 3 against Ravenking's (one of Lucario's worst MUs) and lost to Epic Gabriel's Rob 3-1 in Loser's Semis. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to locate any VODs of these notable sets to show y'all (if they've even been uploaded) and we'll have to see how Armadillo does on the big scene once offline returns, but he's a great player on the rise and he's only in his late teens (maybe early 20s) now and I'm excited to see what potential he'll show of the character in the future.You make a good point here and frankly, you're right. I just notice in practice during commentary of tournament sets that a "meteor smash" or "aerial spike" is just called a spike (while absolutely true that it's still under the umbrella term edgeguard, it feels weird to call a spike as an edgeguard even if it's just a more specific form of it), and a kill outright to the side as an "edgeguard." That might seem overly nitpicky in hindsight, but it at least explains where I was coming from in defining the term that way.
I think by-and-large we're all in agreement now that Min Min is strong, the conversation now focused on how strong.
- I need to execute on this advantage situation, because the minute I don't and it's back to neutral, I'm essentially losing again against a character who can blow me up if I guess incorrectly once. , OWA is IMO the strongest comeback mechanic introduced into Smash, bar none. The strength of the mechanic pushes Sephiroth closer to the top - the raw speed and threat increase means a lot of the strategies you can use prior to become far riskier, every poke with fair/bair/ftilt puts you in shield break range, getting counter-read might mean your stock, etc. And unlike other comeback mechanics:The thing that balances outI think by-and-large we're all in agreement now that Min Min is strong, the conversation now focused on how strong.
I don't know how others feel, but when I'm fighting Min Min I feel the same stressors I felt while playing against
Min Min snowballs hard. If you don't have great ways to snap ledge or recover vertically, that might be a handshake right there. It was mentioned in the above video with Tweek and co., but if you have Dragon arm on deck you can essentially cover all ledge options through charged Megawatt into Dragon to catch rolls.
I think the character will only get stronger too, since less input lag means stretch situations where Min Min has to guess on whether you're going to jump in on her go away and you can react to many more potential options. In addition, players will be better at adapting to common escape options and figure out how to space punishes on landing.
On
The 2nd point is important in particular just off of how much harder it is to hit Sephiroth in OWA, due to the speed increases and the third jump. Tweek has emphasized it before but I think it's important to stress again - Sephiroth's third jump is unlike any other in the game. You get great height on it and you have great airspeed while using it - the polar opposite of almost every other multi jumper in the game. It makes it hard to pin down and get finishing blows on Sephiroth, which gives him the opportunity to extend his lead.
- You can't camp it out, unlike Limit
- Hitting/grabbing him doesn't take away from his ability to abuse it, unlike Arsene/Revenge
- He will always get to use it, unlike GO!
- Like Aura, killing him early means you have to play against Super Saiyan for longer
- Unlike Aura, you are not Lucario
's OWA is his extremely light weight paired with a large hurtbox. He's 79 unites, same as Kirby. His hurtbox is fatter than his animations suggest. OWA or not, his staying power is very low. He often dies at 80% and never likes past 120% for me.
I am further down this road, and one of the oldest people on this site.
