Falcon Mind-Meld: A Captain Falcon Matchup Thread (now on: EDGEGUARDING))

[0Room]

Agreed, Walt.
But yeah Hax I love the sheik match up too.

I wanna learn the shield grab timing for ftilt xD
I know it's possible, I've done it a few times

Personally, I think as far as MUs go
It's Falco/Sheik tied for hardest, depends on how they play of course [laser happy falcos, tech-chasing sheiks come to mind]
****ing jiggs [dthrow->kneeeeeeeeeeeee]
Fox
Marth

everyone else

Ganon

 

[MikeHaggarTHAKJB]

how the hell are you gonna shieldgrab a sheiks ftilt? unless they space like a mentally ******** 4 year old with add?

 

[Walt]

I think if it hits your shield as it's starting up you can grab her leg? Sheik is my secondary and ftilt is totally not safe on shields. Neither is her jab if her hand goes into your shield, if she hits you with just the tips of her fingers it's safe. what you should worry about is dtilt. dtilt comes out and ends exactly the same time as ftilt only she is really low and won't get grabbed.

 

[0Room]

I think if it hits your shield as it's starting up you can grab her leg? Sheik is my secondary and ftilt is totally not safe on shields. Neither is her jab if her hand goes into your shield, if she hits you with just the tips of her fingers it's safe. what you should worry about is dtilt. dtilt comes out and ends exactly the same time as ftilt only she is really low and won't get grabbed.

Yeah you totally can. I think I have to start the grab before it actually hits my shield though, which is kind of a problem :/
So it has to be more of a 'oh, you ftilted, hope you ftilted again!"

Appreciate that info on the jab though.
What can you do? Shield grab? Or just **** in general?

And yeah that dtilt is stupid :/ on repeated dtilts stomp oos->grab ***** though

 

[Walt]

Yeah just shield grab, once they catch on they can cover it by doing the second jab and probably dsmash.

 

[0Room]

Also, going off of the discussion about getting new "How to" guides, do you think it would be cool if I made one for Falcon?
We were discussing how the old ones were, well, old, and new players would really benefit from new ones. Also, since Scar isn't on often [not his fault], I guess I would have to make my own thread.

I know we've been kind of kicking this idea around a bit [Hax] but I think it would be cool to make a new one.
Not just the whole "this is an ftilt, wheee" thing, but I think it would be cool to dissect how to play MUs. I was thinking of a kind of edited-in red circles around Marth, for example, indicating all of the spaces he can control while DDing, or something like that.

A very simple video with lots of easy to see symbols [giant green checks, big red x's] would be cool, for given MUs

For example:
It shows Falcon playing against a Marth, they're both standing on the floor of DL64
Text pops up:
"In this Match up, it's all about who makes the first move. If you make a move first, you'll probably die."
~It shows a Falcon rushing at him with a nair, getting grabbed, then dthrown, then dair'd to death~
~Screen changes to big Red X~
"Patience is key in this Matchup. Dash dance around until you see an opening."
~Shows a Falcon and Marth DDing, then Marth does a dash attack, misses, and Falcon punishes~
~Screen changes to a big Green Check~
"To help your spacing, you need to remember just how much area Marth controls at any given moment. I've outlined all of the spaces in which his moves hit, so as to see the areas that he can hit you, if you misspace your DD"
~Marth's standing, I draw the outlines of utilt, Fsmash, ftilt, dtilt, and grab in succession, then an arrow for how far he was WD~
"Now here's what's really happening while he's dding"
~Overlay those outlines on the clip of Falcon and Marth dding~



What do you think?
cool idea?
Lame?

Lemme know

 

[ryankam10]

Also, going off of the discussion about getting new "How to" guides, do you think it would be cool if I made one for Falcon?
We were discussing how the old ones were, well, old, and new players would really benefit from new ones. Also, since Scar isn't on often [not his fault], I guess I would have to make my own thread.

I know we've been kind of kicking this idea around a bit [Hax] but I think it would be cool to make a new one.
Not just the whole "this is an ftilt, wheee" thing, but I think it would be cool to dissect how to play MUs. I was thinking of a kind of edited-in red circles around Marth, for example, indicating all of the spaces he can control while DDing, or something like that.

A very simple video with lots of easy to see symbols [giant green checks, big red x's] would be cool, for given MUs

For example:
It shows Falcon playing against a Marth, they're both standing on the floor of DL64
Text pops up:
"In this Match up, it's all about who makes the first move. If you make a move first, you'll probably die."
~It shows a Falcon rushing at him with a nair, getting grabbed, then dthrown, then dair'd to death~
~Screen changes to big Red X~
"Patience is key in this Matchup. Dash dance around until you see an opening."
~Shows a Falcon and Marth DDing, then Marth does a dash attack, misses, and Falcon punishes~
~Screen changes to a big Green Check~
"To help your spacing, you need to remember just how much area Marth controls at any given moment. I've outlined all of the spaces in which his moves hit, so as to see the areas that he can hit you, if you misspace your DD"
~Marth's standing, I draw the outlines of utilt, Fsmash, ftilt, dtilt, and grab in succession, then an arrow for how far he was WD~
"Now here's what's really happening while he's dding"
~Overlay those outlines on the clip of Falcon and Marth dding~



What do you think?
cool idea?
Lame?

Lemme know

pretty cool idea. also add in somewhere spots in marths approach that you can attack, for example if he full jumps rising fair and falling fair, most falcons would usually uair after his first fair since hes above you? stuff like that

 

[0Room]

pretty cool idea. also add in somewhere spots in marths approach that you can attack, for example if he full jumps rising fair and falling fair, most falcons would usually uair after his first fair since hes above you? stuff like that

Mmhmm. I thought it would be a cool idea.

 

[Skeletom]

brilliant idea!

 

[CommonerCoffee]

Do it PLEASE

 

[MikeHaggarTHAKJB]

sounds like a good way to oversimplify matchups

 

[0Room]

sounds like a good way to oversimplify matchups

Yeah but we continuously rehash the same things over and over.
It's a basic starting point, rather than a complete extensive forum.

 

[CaptainFalcon9000]

good thread is good, you should add the match up of others characters that are above falcon in the tier list, like falco and peach or jigglypuff.

 

[DuckPimp]

ive started compiling things on fox that hadnt been posted when i made the first draft of the fox "guide". now that its summer hopefully i will have some time to be able to continue this thread at a rate more suitable than before.

something that ive noticed is that chunks of what we say about certain matchups can be applied to about 90% of other MUs. for instance, upthrow on to a platform to easy techchase.

what we can do is create a compendium of things like that to refer to when discussing characters. stage specific things would be nice as well.

ill pose a couple of questions now, and any others would be appreciated

best/good ways to techchase oppenents on platforms, i.e. sh knee on yoshis, dbljump waveland to grab/aerial, fulljump stomp, fulljump knee on dl64, etc. things/tricks that work on certain stages are really useful and can help people greatly

more notes on techchasing

percents (always always always. never want to miss out on those guaranteed kills)




and i believe i said we'd be moving on to falco next


all that said, get at me, bros



edit: i really like 0rooms idea about the videos on spacing and approach exploits etc. if its well done, it could be a really nice theory video that would help many new and old players.

 

[0Room]

Yeah I need to actually get on it lol
I'm gonna try to start it but you know how it is
Life is busy

As far as Falco goes, everything that we said about Fox works on Falco, just add 10%
Since he's heavier, it's that data that needs to be changed.

As far as psychological stuff
Non-fastfalled nairs go over low lasers, and raptor boost under high lasers. You have to control platforms and lock him down, the same way he wants to lock you down.
But the tools you have to work with are very different.

Mostly you wanna get in there and get a grab off. Shield grab works on Falco's shield pressure not after the dair, but after the shine. I'm pretty sure if Falco does an earlier dair it will stop you but not 100%.
Offstage, being aggressive in edgeguarding is a must. Jump off uair will stop everything, and don't forget that upb has NO HITBOX until he starts moving. The hardest part is side b's speed, and don't forget you want A) knee them out of it, and B) grab them out of it.

That's all I've got at the moment. I'll add more if I can.

 

[DuckPimp]

yeah man i know how it is. its been a while since this thread was active last, and that was because of stuff i had going on. i just think it would be great if youre ever able to do that

dtilt sweetspot attempts for sideb. its pretty easy to time. if youre able to get it so that you know they have to recover from below, dash off the edge and rising uair when firebird comes out. i do that sometimes and it makes me feel like m2k. except with FALCON WHAAAAT

if they go too low just upb to the edge and let them die. once you start punishing sweetspot attempts with sideb theyll try and go on th stage, where youll b waiting with a knee.

be wary of shortened sideb's.

if you move your shield up while getting hit with an early dair youre a pretty good spot for a shieldgrab.

 

[Da Shuffla]

Just here to encourage you guys to keep up the good work. I like threads like this b/c I can use it as a quick reference source rather than walk into Scar's thread and ask matchup questions that have been heard a thousand times. That said, after Falco, I'd like to request Sheik because. . . well. . . ouch.

 

[DuckPimp]

sheik was my plan after falco.



so yes

 

[0Room]

Sheik is pretty easy once you know what to do. It's not 100/0, but the way it works is that you play to your strengths and you'll be able to pull it out.

Basically
RUN AROUND
Sheik can't keep up. She just can't. So he's going to have to resort to mostly camping/platform camping, throwing out needles, and stuffing your approaches.
What you're going to have to do, is to have her approach you. This, like CF/Marth, revolves around patience and grab camps. Neither character can really approach the other, and so it again, revolves around patience.

Important things:
Grab percents and what you can do about them: 0-13% can dthrow chain, if Sheik DIs away, she can escape. Usually not after the first throw. You can uthrow chain too, but she can double jump after like 13ish.
~30ish on, Nair can come out
80-~110 uthrow knee works
~130 dthrow knee works

Mostly you want to realize that ftilt will **** you
Offstage you're dead
and like Peach/Marth, your gameplay basically should revolve around getting percent up to guaranteed throw->knee and then doing that.

That's my simplified version

 

[Deleted member]

i treat shiek like i treat marth

wait for them to throw out a move before a counterattack (don't get baited though) or if you know they are going to spam f-tilt you can crouch it like a pro and grab them

after a million years of conditioning that you are not going to jump at them silly you can do semi-risky approaches

don't be obvious

shiek is combo food, and if you can get her off stage, really easy to grab ledge --> stomp --> (reverse) knee

alternatively, you can fake jumping onto the edge and then hit them really freaking hard when they go on stage

 

[Wenbobular]

What's harder than stomp knee O_O

 

[0Room]

Lol stomp knee is actually quite difficult in this MU
And personally I think the best thing you can do is treat this like Marth MU, but with a projectile and faster attacks

 

[Brookman]

**** stomp knee. Stomp to stomp to stomp to stomp and if they make the error in DI'ing near or over the edge nipple spike

 

[Walt]

I don't think sheik is that bad. Just don't be stupid and remember that ftilt is a dragon punch that will anti-air you all day. Only thing that I find annoying about the MU is getting techchased forever. But you can combo her about as easily as she can do that. She can edgeguard you only a little better than you can edgeguard her.

 

[Brookman]

dash dance for ftilt block dash attack shield grab combo edge gaurd - play mix ups vs. shffl fair, they're probably gona f tilt right after anyway (j/k, but really, they will.)

 

[Wenbobular]

Critique directed at Juggleguy and anyone who gets ***** by Luigi matchup inexperience because I'm still a little salty that Vudujin placed 2nd (grats to him though haha)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmJqK-gg5Dw

1. Every time Luigi does an uncharged side-b above stage level, knee him to death; Uair if he goes below and knee will kill you

My biggest pet peeve of the matchup of all time ever - go into training mode and try out Luigi's side-b and you'll find that it is the laggiest recovery move ever; I've killed Luigis in the side bubble of FD and made it back alive because Falcon has both amazing horizontal recovery and the best aerial finisher in the game ... killing Luigi for every single one of those uncharged side-b attempts is more than half the battle

All you do to get uncharged side-b attempts is first either short hop or full hop (make sure you're below Luigi when he shoots so you don't get misfired) and then doublejump knee for the stock

The timing for it is jump as soon as they do the missile and you can react to misfires by jumping back killing him when he lands on stage or killing him after it ends because your running speed is almost as fast as misfire and it's no less laggy

Edgeguarding charged missiles is much harder because they're almost never forced to use their doublejump with good DI - Knee usually ends up killing you because of lag and Bair and Uair don't kill for a long time, and stomp usually just gets meteor canceled when they have a jump and they'll make it back before you

Usually I just Bair and Uair until they need to jump and Dair them ... but always be ready to smoke their stock if they're careless and don't charge it

Last tip about covering side-b - if you're on stage, there's never a downside to just shielding because missile is so laggy, so if you're ever in a position when you're in misfire trajectory, just shield until he drops out of the way

2. Space around his Nair when comboing

His Nair and Uair are the biggest combo breakers ... but their ranges suck
The only thing going for them is their speed, so when you're comboing with Uair or Nair just make sure you do it outside their ranges and you'll beat it every time
Much more of a problem when you're going for Dthrow knee, but it'll work sometimes if they're slow and if it trades, you get trade 10% for a stock ... seems good to me

Learn how to DI

Not particularly directed at Juggleguy but I know hella people get ***** because they don't know how to DI Luigi's moves ... all you do is hold toward his back when he's on the ground and away when he's trying for aerial combos, just make sure you're not holding away on chops or you'll just die haha

Punish any tornado that lands anywhere close to you

It's also hella laggy but no one seems to react fast enough - wavedash out of shield and stomp knee
I even saw a couple during that set where a simple shorthop stomp out of shield would have worked ... it has very little stun on shield so make sure to use that to your advantage

/rant on Luigi

 

[Brookman]

I dunno why there would be salt over an obviously talented player taking luigi deep into a bracket (even if his bracket was e-z street, i didn't see it)

 

[DuckPimp]

wenbo just knows how to play against luigi from experience, and it pains him to see anyone playing the matchup wrong.

i think its understandable, and i wouldnt really call it salt. well maybe it is salt. idk. but i think its reasonable

 

[Wenbobular]

I'm salty because I don't think he played amazing (he's a good Luigi player, not trying to take away from that), he just played standard Luigi and no one knew what to do (ESPECIALLY when trying to edgeguard him)

He also recovers really poorly (i.e. never charges his missile and should be dying every time)

Also I 2-0'd him at ROM3 and didn't see a better Luigi now compared to when I beat him then

So yes, salt, but I really do think Juggleguy (and anyone else having problems punishing Luigi) should read my post because a lot of punishments are simple recognition and the inputs are almost trivially easy ... I haven't really said anything about neutral game but Juggleguy was doing fine in that aspect but just couldn't capitalize on mistakes properly / hard enough

Vudujin if you read this, not trying to knock you or anything, but ...
Start using charged missiles to recover

 

[Juggleguy]

Very useful post on the matchup, thanks a lot for that. Vudu was the first Luigi I've ever played in tourney, so I did learn a lot of **** on the fly >_> I had a feeling there was more lag to Luigi's side-B and down-B than I previously thought, because I did start punishing with knee a couple times, but by then it was too late to bring back the set. You're right my DI was awful on some of those fairs/dairs/uthrows. Lesson learned.

I disagree with your salt about Vudu's placing though, lol, he really was on fire throughout the day. He had a tougher-than-average bracket (VanZ in quarters, Duck in semis) and took two games off Hungrybox, so I don't see how you can take away from his performance. It's true that almost nobody at the tourney was good at the Luigi matchup, but give credit to Vudu for taking full advantage of that on his way to 2nd place.

 

[Wenbobular]

I can't say anything about Vanz and Duck without having seen those sets so I won't comment on that (though I'm very curious as to how Vanz vs Vudujin played out and I know nothing about the Samus matchup) - Winston was impressed at him beating Vanz, so hats off to him for beating a competent Sheik

First game vs Hbox was pretty eh ... <_< Hbox made some super questionable jumpins and got *****, then adjusted accordingly in the rest of the games (also he got saved by triple misfire on the last stock haha)

I do think it's impressive that he took a game with his tech skill though, because his ledgedashing and wavedashing are pretty far from optimal length - fast / long ledgedashes are super effective in this matchup and I think he might've taken a set or even beaten him ...

Hbox kept jumping in the range where if Vudujin had very good ledgedashes he could've basically gotten a free Upsmash every time

Anyways, sorry for sounding like a big salt shaker haha
I do think I'm qualified to say what "on fire" Luigi play looks like from a technical standpoint and Vudujin was like ... a bit above average in my opinion (although I think the average Luigi is pretty terrible so maybe fairly above average is more realistic) but still far from what I'd call a "very solid technical Luigi"

Which I'm hoping speaks more for him being smart and being able to win despite that rather than his opponents being clueless ^_^

Also if he's doing shorter wavedashes on purpose then that's hella cool and part of what I said about him having meh tech skill is inaccurate
He still needs better ledgedashes though

 

[Brookman]

It's true that almost nobody at the tourney was good at the Luigi matchup, but give credit to Vudu for taking full advantage of that on his way to 2nd place.

This and a half

 

[Windrose]

How often do you guys play luigi?!?!? rofl

 

[Wenbobular]

Winston is my former roommate and current housemate ... he mained Luigi until a couple months ago (maybe a little longer)

So I've been learning how to cheap out Luigis for like, 2 years now haha

Also I'm in the same region as Vist, who is another good Luigi (one of the best active Luigis I'm going to venture to say)

 

[DuckPimp]

vist is the best luigi

 

[Wenbobular]

Just realized I posted in this thread instead of ... whatever ~_~

I think I'm ACTUALLY just salty that I couldn't make it to this tournament

 

[Winston]

I'd just like to add, the last key to beating pretty much every Luigi player is punishing all of his rising aerials on your shield. They're all punishable with aerials OOS. And Luigi players love to spam these.

Punishment out of grab at low percent is kinda cheesy but it's still pretty consistent. You can do like uthrow -> SPACED SH uair -> more stuff. What I mean by spaced sh uair is you're not trying to get forward momentum like you would vs Marth/Sheik/whatever, but rather sort of sh in place or even backwards so you tip uair him. That way it'll beat his nair. Basically just abuse the fact that he's above you with baiting and uairs/grabbing his lag/gay stuff until you land a clean enough uair that you can just spam uair and carry him offstage. Side B can work too with baiting nair. You can probably get a knee at the end if his DI is especially cooperative, but carrying him offstage with uair tends to be good enough if you edgeguard well enough.

dthrow nair can work I think if they don't smash DI, but its pretty bad if they do smash DI and nair you, so exercise your judgment there.

If you ever land a stray aerial that pops him slightly up at low/mid percents, don't waste any time trying to combo him normally. If you can land a knee, you should probably just knee and double/triple knee him.

For neutral game... just sort of imagine that he's a Falcon when he's far away and a Peach when close. Idk if that makes any sense. Most of his stuff is laggy so you can bait that, and approach with like overshot knees/dairs to keep him honest - these are harder to punish than you may think if you do them right. The worst mistake you can make is trying to retreat from him if you are too close. Like if you are one Falcon dashdance length away from him and you try to dash away by habit, cause that would be a safe choice vs almost every character, remember that's it's a risk vs Luigi. It would be safer to retreat while jumping or doing a retreating stomp/bair, etc.

 

[Windrose]

Why is it unsafe to try to dash away from luigi from that distance? just out of curiosity...i'll probably never play a luigi main here in the north

 

[Wenbobular]

Because Luigi's prime range is basically one wavedash away from him

When you're a little less than half a full wavedash away from him (basically right at or just outside your tip Nair range) he can't really hit you with anything if you react to his wavedashing because of the startup frames for wavedash where you're basically immobile but sliding forward

He gets way more dangerous when he gets to start moving (i.e. doing moves), which happens to be farther away from him ... which makes dashing back a worse option with nothing to cover your tracks usually leads to you getting Dsmashed

Also it's really important to note how far Luigi can wavedash because a LOT of them try to exploit slow reactions with Ftilt from a full wavedash away, which is deceptively far and most people just get Ftilted to the face

 

[Windrose]

rofl.....if only you guys knew in depth of a more useful matchup