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Do elemental attacks (fire, electric) have any special properties in Ult?

Jayron Auron

Smash Rookie
Joined
Sep 8, 2018
Messages
2
This is something that always confused me a lot in Smash 4...the claims that certain elemental attacks had specific properties based solely on them being that element (I have no idea what fire does though). The best example I had heard was that electrical attacks cause more shield stun, which makes sense, but I never got a chance to test it.

That said, I'm trying to figure out differences in ultimate, and playing around with Samus/Dark Samus has left me wondering if there is any difference between the fact that one has electrical based tilts/aerials/smashes and the other has fire ones. I tried testing it and couldn't find anything, but I don't have anyone to test it with so it's hard to determine it objectively.

Has anyone figured anything out regarding this and whether it returned in Ultimate? For all I know it could just be some huge myth I've been believing since Smash 4, so I'm just trying to see if someone can set the record straight.
 

Luigifan18

Smash Master
Joined
Feb 19, 2015
Messages
3,134
Switch FC
SW-5577-0969-0868
This is something that always confused me a lot in Smash 4...the claims that certain elemental attacks had specific properties based solely on them being that element (I have no idea what fire does though). The best example I had heard was that electrical attacks cause more shield stun, which makes sense, but I never got a chance to test it.

That said, I'm trying to figure out differences in ultimate, and playing around with Samus/Dark Samus has left me wondering if there is any difference between the fact that one has electrical based tilts/aerials/smashes and the other has fire ones. I tried testing it and couldn't find anything, but I don't have anyone to test it with so it's hard to determine it objectively.

Has anyone figured anything out regarding this and whether it returned in Ultimate? For all I know it could just be some huge myth I've been believing since Smash 4, so I'm just trying to see if someone can set the record straight.
Subspace Emissary and Smash Run gave certain NPC enemies increased vulnerability or resistance to certain damage types, such as Ridley being weak to ice in Brawl's Subspace Emissary and Chandelure auto-absorbing fire attacks in Smash 4's Smash Run. This does not extend to playable characters outside of the "type effectiveness" gimmick Pokémon Trainer had in Brawl, which everyone hated for disproportionately screwing Ivysaur over and benefiting Squirtle against half the cast. The only "NPC enemies" in Ultimate are the bosses, and as far as anyone is aware, none of them have any special vulnerability or resistance to certain elemental damage types. Certain Spirits do modify damage taken from specific elements when equipped, though, and others modify damage dealt with certain elements. (Oddly, there appear to be no spirits that modify attacks of the darkness element used by Ganondorf and Mewtwo — perhaps because people might think those Spirits had special interactions with Dharkon.)

As for your question, electrical attacks did indeed increase hitstun by 2 frames in Smash 4, but according to SmashWiki, this is no longer the case in Ultimate.
 

Jayron Auron

Smash Rookie
Joined
Sep 8, 2018
Messages
2
As for your question, electrical attacks did indeed increase hitstun by 2 frames in Smash 4, but according to SmashWiki, this is no longer the case in Ultimate.
Gotcha. And yea, electric was the only one off the top of my head that I could think of, since the other effects of elemental moves always seemed to be tied to the properties move itself and not necessarily the element the move was utilizing. Thanks for the info.
 

TakeTheCan

Smash Rookie
Joined
Dec 22, 2018
Messages
6
The effects of elemental attacks are often minuscule and don't make or break a character. Despite this, they may effect matchups. A good example of this is Simon and Richter. Simon's Holy Water is classified as the Fire Element so it doesn't stop red pikmin, making him at a disadvantage against Olimar but it does cause explosives to detonate. Richter's Holy Fire is classified as the Aura element so it does stop red pikmin but it doesn't detonate explosives. This leaves him weaker to explosive users.

In other words, it doesn't matter. Their cool, I guess.
 

Lavani

Indigo Destiny
Joined
Oct 24, 2014
Messages
7,256
They're mostly just for flavor.

Fire can't hurt red pikmin and triggers explosives.
Electric causes x1.5 hitstop (normally just a flavor thing, but adds frame advantage on projectiles like (Dark) Samus's Charge Shot) and can't hurt yellow pikmin.
Water removes ink and can't damage blue pikmin.

I think all effects aside from those are just to look pretty.
 
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