Q&A Falco, King of the Birds: Game Play Discussion

[JayWon]

I like what Sakurai did to Falco's lasers for the sake of balance...
and then there are projectiles like Yoshi's egg, Sheik's needles, and Rosalina's custom side-b.

rofl. Buff Falco please.

 

[InkPlum]

So what kinda Prattacks (https://youtu.be/e_9RbkdZTuw) do you guys use at the edge of the stage?

I've found that a mid air shine is a great prattack on platforms.

 

[NotAnAdmin]

This looks like it might need some testing.
Nair at low percent and f-tilt are the only things I would expect to cause the slide animation we're looking for....
Also a late bair at low percent like the DK in the video.

EDIT:
I did a little bit of testing and everything I thought worked.
The only thing of note is that bair does the slide animation regardless of it being the weak/late hitbox at any percent that isn't higher than 10-18% (depending on the weight).

 

[Superbat]

You know Falco is lacking when ROY roasts on us. smh (lol jk)

 

[Dark Dire Wolf]

Some people are saying he's nerfed in terms of damage :/.

 

[Ffamran]

Some people are saying he's nerfed in terms of damage :/.

He was. Check the patch thread: http://smashboards.com/threads/falco-patch-history.375247/page-3#post-19411602. Of all the characters to nerf, they decide to nerf Falco...

 

[AmishTechnology]

Falco might be "nerfed" in damage, but those attacks are actually USABLE now! 11% -> 10% is still better than 0%. Falco's nair buff is so huge for his neutral and the faster fair is just awesome overall.

 

[Ffamran]

Just some thoughts or revelations about Falco you all should think about. Stuff began here: http://smashboards.com/threads/character-competitive-impressions.367669/page-743#post-19419813. Basically, new or a more cohesive and stronger game plan, everyone.

For those who are lazy and don't want to read through things. Notable things, were quoted and reposted over here.

I think you're underestimating N-air. The fact the move connects a lot more consistently really improves Falco's entire gameplan noticeably. Much better oos, for covering approaches/rolls, juggles, EDGEGUARDS ESPECIALLY THIS MOVE CAN KILL, and it's still a 3 frame move. 3 frame aerial that does 11% seriously. Especially nice now that it always sends your opponent forwards meaning D-throw N-air -> other juggle followups is waaay easier.

Falco's N-air in contrast, you can now much more aggressively space it in all situations ESPECIALLY OFFSTAGE AND OUT OF SHIELD. Previously Falco couldn't really use many aerials out of shield, but N-air actually is now not terrible out of shield. And edgeguarding with N-air in all directions is much better allowing you to end stocks in way more situations, for example it's much easier to catch people who hug the stage, something F-air is not that good at doing.

Had anyone used stage hug Nairs before?

Do you mean Falco would Nair while sliding along the stage's ledge? Not a lot of characters tend to hug the stage like that unless they're someone like Ike, Captain Falcon, or Sonic. Wait, shouldn't Zelda, Pit, and Palutena be able to do this as well? Pikachu can from what I remember. Even then, Nair could have done that prior to the patch. Maybe less consistently and Fair still has a large enough hitbox to edgeguard like that on certain characters.

Focus on this. Falco may have went from being a good edgeguarder to an even scarier and better edgeguarder now that his Nair is more consistent and Fair is quicker. He has a ton of tools: Nair, Fair, Bair, Dair, Blaster, Explosive Blaster, and Falco Phantasm, for edgeguarding from killing, gimping, ledge trumping, and stage spiking.

Did Falco just become the ultimate edgeguarder because of this patch? A frame 3 Nair that probably will gimp, a faster Fair, a powerful Bair for stage spiking or outright kills, and the occasional Dair and Falco Phantasm spikes and laser gimps. Uair used to be able to kill people standing at the ledge, but now it probably can't.

Hm, this would be an interesting identity. Something to play around with more.

 

[Superbat]

A stronger edge guarding meta for Falco would prolly equate to more usages of distant firebird custom. We prolly would get gimped to melee hell without the fast fire bird custom but I think it'd be worth. More flexibility with our edge guarding would be great. This patch is a good start for falco. We might not have to repent for our sins we did in brawl and melee for that much longer Burd mains. (Take all my comments with a grain of salt since I'm a novice falco player)

 

[Ffamran]

Falco doesn't need to that deep for like most of the cast. Also, wall jump plus Fast Fire Bird equals the same distance as default Fire Bird. The fact Distant Fire Bird has a really long charging time, travels slowly, and it only adds about 10% to 17% more distance - from 1/3's or 2/5's of Final Destination with Fire Bird to half of FD - is what makes me now want to use DFB. Also, if you end up using it way to close to the ledge, it's going to be an easy gimp, spike, or stage spike since it charges slowly.

Fast Fire Bird is much faster since it travels and charges much quicker, but only travels a little less than default Fire Bird. It's like an aim-able Falco Phantasm. Yes, most characters have strong recoveries, but Falco doesn't need to go really far to land a Nair or Fair to gimp people, especially at high percents where it might just kill them. I'd rather take Fast Fire Bird or default over Distant Fire Bird.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I played a ton of FG Falco. He's definitely way better and I'm confident in sharing replays of some of my gameplay which demonstrate how good new N-air is.

Just...seriously. I can punish people a lot harder in way more situations and actually have aerial spacing tools now that N-air connects properly. I mean it always had a good hitbox, but getting punished on hit for not spacing it a certain way sucked in several matchups. New N-air makes anti-airs waaaay easier for Falco and forces your opponent to play a lot more respectfully, which then lets you take advantage of Falco's stronger ground game to control the game.

I've already gotten a few N-air kills against people who did different low recoveries including stage hugs, heck I'll chase people high with N-air if I think I can either bait the airdodge or they aren't expecting it.

N-air and F-air are sooorta interchangable offstage, but there's important subtle differences. N-air is faster overall has a wider and higher hitbox which covers more space in general. Due to the way Falco alters his own hurtbox, F-air reaches in front of and below Falco a little better for outprioritizing some recovery moves. But seriously guys, new N-air is pretty spammable and it works SO MUCH BETTER IN COMBOS. I can literally do D-throw -> N-air -> N-air for 27% at low percents, and on fastfallers D-throw -> N-air -> U-smash can get you a guaranteed 33%.

Falco normally had an extremely hard matchup against ZSS if I recall, but I believe the new N-air alone saves that matchup and likely makes it very competitive. This lets you contest her aerial spacing and her Down-B, and N-air is also a good tool for edgeguarding her tether recovery. I dare say Falco in this patch is a very good character to play against Sheik, given he's one of few characters that can keep up with her boxing game. His main trouble in that matchup was he had almost no safe response to her air game, but the N-air change helps that tremendously.

Falco is so fun and feels so intuitive right now. I think his matchup spread universally improved about 5-10 points against most characters this patch aside from other characters who also got buffs, but Falco didn't really have specific trouble against any of them for the most part.

 

[Gamegenie222]

Go for it then.

 

[AmishTechnology]

I played a ton of FG Falco. He's definitely way better and I'm confident in sharing replays of some of my gameplay which demonstrate how good new N-air is.

Just...seriously. I can punish people a lot harder in way more situations and actually have aerial spacing tools now that N-air connects properly. I mean it always had a good hitbox, but getting punished on hit for not spacing it a certain way sucked in several matchups. New N-air makes anti-airs waaaay easier for Falco and forces your opponent to play a lot more respectfully, which then lets you take advantage of Falco's stronger ground game to control the game.

I've already gotten a few N-air kills against people who did different low recoveries including stage hugs, heck I'll chase people high with N-air if I think I can either bait the airdodge or they aren't expecting it.

N-air and F-air are sooorta interchangable offstage, but there's important subtle differences. N-air is faster overall has a wider and higher hitbox which covers more space in general. Due to the way Falco alters his own hurtbox, F-air reaches in front of and below Falco a little better for outprioritizing some recovery moves. But seriously guys, new N-air is pretty spammable and it works SO MUCH BETTER IN COMBOS. I can literally do D-throw -> N-air -> N-air for 27% at low percents, and on fastfallers D-throw -> N-air -> U-smash can get you a guaranteed 33%.

Falco normally had an extremely hard matchup against ZSS if I recall, but I believe the new N-air alone saves that matchup and likely makes it very competitive. This lets you contest her aerial spacing and her Down-B, and N-air is also a good tool for edgeguarding her tether recovery. I dare say Falco in this patch is a very good character to play against Sheik, given he's one of few characters that can keep up with her boxing game. His main trouble in that matchup was he had almost no safe response to her air game, but the N-air change helps that tremendously.

Falco is so fun and feels so intuitive right now. I think his matchup spread universally improved about 5-10 points against most characters this patch aside from other characters who also got buffs, but Falco didn't really have specific trouble against any of them for the most part.

Haven't played much of the new patch against good players yet (been grinding Ryu games if anything lol), but having a usable Nair pretty much solves one of Falco's biggest weaknesses from past versions: lack of a good neutral aerial. RAR bair was the closest thing to a usable aerial, and that has very specific uses and execution, especially against a short character like Pikachu. I always felt that Falco needed his melee sex kick back to be competitive again, but this beefed up nair, fair, and uair may very well make up for that.

My favorites, MK and Falco, get huge neutral buffs and Ryu looks to be a very high/top-tier character with complexity to boost, this patch was a good patch for me.

 

[Dark Dire Wolf]

I play Fox a lot so I have a habit of doing the 1,2 jab cancel. Today, I did the same thing with Falco for at least 3 1,2 jab cancels in a row (similar to Brawl's jab cancelling). Was this possible before the patch?

 

[Ffamran]

I play Fox a lot so I have a habit of doing the 1,2 jab cancel. Today, I did the same thing with Falco for at least 3 1,2 jab cancels in a row (similar to Brawl's jab cancelling). Was this possible before the patch?

Yes, but Falco acts out of jab much slower than Fox, Sheik, King Dedede, pre-patch 1.0.6 Link, and I think Little Mac and Charizard. Captain Falcon, Toon Link, and Falco are similar speed with jab canceling.

 

[CommanderVimes]

Your discoveries are getting me quite optimistic about giving Falco a real shot again. I was a little worried that the changes only affected excellent or competitive Falcos because of the cool combos (I'm not at the execution level for those yet), but the OOS and edgeguarding improvements are some things I can utilize right now. I guess for now I'll work on becoming a far better edge guarder, and start compiling information to construct my neutral game with the character.

 

[ILOVESMASH]

In addition to what has already been said, falco can use his new Nair to escape combos. I tried this in a few matches and was able to escape from combos from characters like Pikachu because there is a hitbox next to falco's legs when the animation begins. Even if this was present before, Falco gets even more mileage of hitting the nair near the ground now because it can allow him to punish the opponent's landing with a dash attack or Jump canceled up smash.

 

[Leg]

WE MADE IT FAM.

WE ****ING MADE IT.

 

[ILOVESMASH]

May just be me, but Falco's overall kit seems very similar to Captain Falcon's after the patch. Both have a combo starting U-air, a powerful spiking D-Air, powerful bair's, fast and long ranged jabs, a slow but very powerful and long ranged F-Smash, great juggling games and various other things in common. Biggest difference between the characters is that Falcon is fast while Falco is slow, making falcon seem like the better pick overall. Falco still has a bunch of tools over Falcon though. Falco's punishing game is superior due to his better OOS options (F-tilt, Nair, and D-tilt) and he has a better edge guarding game thanks to his more reliable Fair and Nair as well as lasers. He also fairs slightly better against projectile users due to reflector and has a better grab game now thanks to falcon's down throw being nerfed. It will be interesting to see what Falco tech other players will find to further distinguish him from Captain Falcon.

 

[SDFox]

I've noticed a lot of changes to falco after the ryu patch. For 1, his u-air was changed.

Does around the same damage but now dosen't kill, and has generally less knock back. At first I was really sad that we lost another kill move, but I've noticed I can chase people in the air a lot better, and can combo u-air into another a fast fall jump u-air, or a fast fall jump f-air at low percents. But you could do some of that stuff before the change as well.

What do you guys think, buff or nerf?

 

[BlueBirdE]

You can still kill with it just not as early. I feel its an overall buff. His pressure game just went through the charts imo. That being said using uair for more pressure means itll be stale. I think having a right balance for this move is the key switching between uair,fair and nair with its new properties for aerial pressure

 

[CommanderVimes]

Dumb question I know, but what constitutes Falco's ground game and what makes it so good? I keep hearing about his strong ground game, but given his slow running speed I have real trouble working it to my favor. Compared to say, Fox who is much faster and seems to have a much better punish kill with dash USmash.

 

[Ffamran]

Dumb question I know, but what constitutes Falco's ground game and what makes it so good? I keep hearing about his strong ground game, but given his slow running speed I have real trouble working it to my favor. Compared to say, Fox who is much faster and seems to have a much better punish kill with dash USmash.

Falco is one of the more "ironic" characters. His attacks are as fast as Fox's with only Side Smash and Dair being noticeably slower than Fox's, but aside from that, Falco's attacks are similar speed. Having stronger knockback, more range on certain moves, and more damage on certain moves, Falco out-games Fox up-close and in the air. So, take Little Mac. People have been iffy about Little Mac having an advantage over Fox because Fox's knockback is weaker and Little Mac just eats through Fox's jab cancel like Captain Falcon does. Fox is also lighter than Little Mac. Falco on the other hand is the same weight and falls the same speed as Little Mac, his edgeguard game is stronger than Fox's, and having stronger knockback can put a safer distance between the two. That said, it doesn't mean Falco has an advantage over Little Mac or Fox because he's much slower in the air and on the ground than the two.

Falco like Ganondorf, is a character where if someone gets close to them, the more danger they're in. Ironically, Falco can't force approaches well because of his Blaster being a subpar projectile while Ganondorf doesn't even have a projectile, but he's a ton more durable than Falco. It's when they approach where they get beat up since they're committing to something now instead of punishing. Ganondorf's also fairly quick even though people don't think so. Aside from his Smashes, Fair, and Dair, he's pretty fast on the ground for a heavyweight, but in the air, he's got the same startup as Captain Falcon's Nair, Uair, Bair, and Dair, but a ton more power to them. Falco and Ganondorf work more like defensive boxers compared to Fox and Captain Falcon who are more offensive.

I've noticed a lot of changes to falco after the ryu patch. For 1, his u-air was changed.

Does around the same damage but now dosen't kill, and has generally less knock back. At first I was really sad that we lost another kill move, but I've noticed I can chase people in the air a lot better, and can combo u-air into another a fast fall jump u-air, or a fast fall jump f-air at low percents. But you could do some of that stuff before the change as well.

What do you guys think, buff or nerf?

Both, but leaning towards buff more. So, as a nerf, Falco lost a decent kill move and a strong aerial punish as Uair is weaker in knockback and damage, 11% to 10%. As a buff, it's faster, from frame 10 to 7, and the lower knockback means Falco can combo it much quicker. Basically, Falco lost a punish tool to get a combo tool. Also, merging this thread to the general discussion thread if you don't mind.

 

[Jabzilla]

You can still kill with uair it just takes a bit longer. I noticed a few things in practice mode. I am going to have to take the bird back to the cage (lab) to see what he can do now. I know with CF at around 100% you can combo dair into uair/bair even with the lag from the dair. Did dair get more hitstun or something or has it always been like this? I am kinda liking the changes so far.

 

[Dark Dire Wolf]

Any tips on the doing the combos in Ian's video? For example, the first uthrow>nair>nair combo. I can't get past the first nair. It looks like there's some DI. How exactly should I input that?

 

[A2ZOMG]

Any tips on the doing the combos in Ian's video? For example, the first uthrow>nair>nair combo. I can't get past the first nair. It looks like there's some DI. How exactly should I input that?

You need to just be moving forward as far as possible, and fastfall the N-air. On heavy characters you can potentially chain like 4 of them if the stage is long enough lol.

If I'm not mistaken, buffering a SHFF N-air makes it automatically frame cancel. Like, I can tell I've been frame canceling it unintentionally with a huge amount of consistency. That also helps a lot in linking combos.

 

[Dark Dire Wolf]

You need to just be moving forward as far as possible, and fastfall the N-air. On heavy characters you can potentially chain like 4 of them if the stage is long enough lol.

If I'm not mistaken, buffering a SHFF N-air makes it automatically frame cancel. Like, I can tell I've been frame canceling it unintentionally with a huge amount of consistency. That also helps a lot in linking combos.

So should I have the movement stick forward or downward to FF?

 

[Ffamran]

So should I have the movement stick forward or downward to FF?

You move the stick down to fast fall. More info here: http://www.ssbwiki.com/Fast_falling.

 

[RevolverTurtle]

Does Falco have any frame traps? Like any moves that are fairly neutral on shield but with pushback so you can bait opponents into punishing and punish their eventual whiffs etc.

 

[Ffamran]

Does Falco have any frame traps? Like any moves that are fairly neutral on shield but with pushback so you can bait opponents into punishing and punish their eventual whiffs etc.

On the ground, I don't know. Maybe Dtilt? I remember one of the guys here tested Dtilt and it does shield push and Dtilt has the same end lag as Ftilt. In the air, Uair can confirm into Bair if you hit with Uair, but if someone air dodges, Falco can also immediately Bair if the opponent's in the right place. I think the Uair thing has been a thing since Melee. Before the patch, the sour-spot also acted as a hit confirm, but you'd have to be aware of it and it was an average speed move to begin with compared to now.

 

[NotAnAdmin]

I'd say well-spaced bairs and ftilts are what you're looking for.
They don't push too much, but sense the lag is near zero, you quickly punish with another move that's quick enough. I like to poke alot with ftilt in particular and punish with a quick spot dodge to d-smash movement.

Also Ffamran is right about dtilt, but the timing is a bit slower than dtilt so it still can get caught it reacted to quickly enough. It does push on shield just a little.

 

[Jabzilla]

I'm having trouble with getting the hang of FF Nair. I have been reading on here that it can hit confirm into stuff like ftilt, grab etc. When I try to do it, I either get punished or the enemy escapes. I just want to know at what hit I should be landing at to really make the most of FF Nair?

 

[BltzZ]

I'm having trouble with getting the hang of FF Nair. I have been reading on here that it can hit confirm into stuff like ftilt, grab etc. When I try to do it, I either get punished or the enemy escapes. I just want to know at what hit I should be landing at to really make the most of FF Nair?

The last hit you can FF out of it and follow up with another one.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I'm having trouble with getting the hang of FF Nair. I have been reading on here that it can hit confirm into stuff like ftilt, grab etc. When I try to do it, I either get punished or the enemy escapes. I just want to know at what hit I should be landing at to really make the most of FF Nair?

It's better for combos on opponents that are low in the air. So something like D-throw -> N-air -> N-air is really good at low percents (like 27 damage). If you buffer the fastfall, you should automatically frame cancel the N-air from my observation, and this is important given it helps you maintain your frame advantage.

On fat heavy characters you can combo like 4 N-airs in a row if you're really fast, lol.

 

[Jabzilla]

Thanks for the tips. I have been trying it once the third hit of nair hits I ff and then into utilt/dilt/grab/whatever i can. Seems to work so far. I also tried it on a Ganondorf online. That was fun lol.

 

[Ffamran]

The sad part when Falco's Melee/Brawl Bair was actually a real kick... It's called a flying back kick. Y'know who else has that move? Sheik, except hers is more stylized. Really wished they could patch in Falco's old Bair with the same knockback and damage for the back hit, but make the front hit a hit that can't kill, but is more like the weak hits of Mario, Luigi, Fox, Sheik, and Link's Nair. A real-life RAR Bair.

And Dash Attack, kind of wished it looked the part of being a slow kick when right now, it doesn't; it's just a flying side kick where you lift your legs up after running. That shouldn't be a slow move compared to the flying back kick gif above, Yoshi's current Dash Attack, or Ike's where he has to heave a heavy sword and perform an uppercut. If anything, it could look like the flying reverse side kick - basically Falco's current Bair - that Dante does in this cutscene. Hell, Fox already has two of the same moves: Nair and Dash Attack; Nair is just an aerial version of Dash Attack and vice versa. The turnaround part can be used to justify the 8 frames of startup; 4 to turn and 4 to kick unlike what it means to take 8 frames to lift you legs up as Falco's current Dash Attack is.

Welp, done complaining, but thing about Falco is that's got a solid set of moves right now, but some things could be tweaked and he would be much stronger than he is now. Grab in particular which doesn't make sense for a slowish character like him to take an Up Smash's startup to (do a standing) grab things while really speedy characters like Fox and Roy can immediately grab while standing.

 

[BltzZ]

The sad part when Falco's Melee/Brawl Bair was actually a real kick... It's called a flying back kick. Y'know who else has that move? Sheik, except hers is more stylized. Really wished they could patch in Falco's old Bair with the same knockback and damage for the back hit, but make the front hit a hit that can't kill, but is more like the weak hits of Mario, Luigi, Fox, Sheik, and Link's Nair. A real-life RAR Bair.

And Dash Attack, kind of wished it looked the part of being a slow kick when right now, it doesn't; it's just a flying side kick where you lift your legs up after running. That shouldn't be a slow move compared to the flying back kick gif above, Yoshi's current Dash Attack, or Ike's where he has to heave a heavy sword and perform an uppercut. If anything, it could look like the flying reverse side kick - basically Falco's current Bair - that Dante does in this cutscene. Hell, Fox already has two of the same moves: Nair and Dash Attack; Nair is just an aerial version of Dash Attack and vice versa. The turnaround part can be used to justify the 8 frames of startup; 4 to turn and 4 to kick unlike what it means to take 8 frames to lift you legs up as Falco's current Dash Attack is.

Welp, done complaining, but thing about Falco is that's got a solid set of moves right now, but some things could be tweaked and he would be much stronger than he is now. Grab in particular which doesn't make sense for a slowish character like him to take an Up Smash's startup to (do a standing) grab things while really speedy characters like Fox and Roy can immediately grab while standing.

It makes me want to contemplate life when my dash grab gets beaten everytime. For a character whose combos rely on grabs to have such a slow grab it's a real bummer.

 

[Ffamran]

It makes me want to contemplate life when my dash grab gets beaten everytime. For a character whose combos rely on grabs to have such a slow grab it's a real bummer.

Yeah, and they let characters who get massive rewards off of grabs and people complain about them like Luigi's left untouched. Diddy got rewards, but he didn't get Luigi's rewards which the increases to Diddy's grab end lag didn't seem justified. Yes, Diddy gets things like D-throw to Uair and Fair or U-throw and Uair, but other characters get that too. Few characters get D-throw to Dair, Fair, Nair, or whatever Luigi can do or the whole D-throw to kill confirm with Super Jump Punch and Luigi Cyclone. Few if any characters get those massive rewards Luigi gets.

 

[BlueBirdE]

If anything we do get a good reward for landing front and back side of utilt,dtilt,meaty dash attack, shff nair, sh ff uair for combos. Having 6 combo starters is pretty good especially with how we can followup and weve seen a few example vids already. Still grab speed buff would be rly nice and maybe a jump speed increase as a luxury​

 

[Jabzilla]

I think grab range needs a bit of a buff as well. It's slow and short and you have to really get close to them. But yeah it would be sweet if either his grab speed or range increased.

I'm trying to not put dash attack in my game now since it is so easily punished. So that leaves RAR Bair, SH Nair, Reflector and grabs for approaches. A better, buffed dash attack would be swell. Heck, a faster ground speed will make me satisfied.

Though I am not too fussed, we got some nice buffs in the latest patch. So I am taking what we can get. There will probably be a patch soon because of that Pac-man glitch. Maybe we can get lucky again.