G&W Competitive Discussion (Casual Gametype discussion welcome)

[A2ZOMG]

Fsmash is so bad in this game.

Dtilt is bad too, i get away with it sometimes but know I shouldnt because that move is REALLY bad. The windbox gives it utility though at least but it's very risky even so. Also I think getting 1s are even worse in this game because of rage. Even with rage GW kinda gets better at KOing but he doesnt survive as long in this game because of no bucket braking so that extra damage really hurts him more than it helps. I still use Side-B because swag n' such but that move was nerfed IMO. Rage 9 is hype though and actually does KO at 0% but it doesnt even matter because all i ever get are 5 1s in a row and then a few 3s

D-tilt still is alright as a 6 frame oos poke option. I mean yeah, you normally want to Jab or F-tilt, but D-tilt is far from unusable.

But see, the fact G&W doesn't survive very long is precisely why self damage is actually somewhat useful on him. When you're a character that relies more on not getting hit to survive, and if you're already at percents where strong attacks could kill you, getting a 1 on G&W suddenly doesn't seem quite so bad anymore when at the very least it's extra Rage to work with. I mean yeah, it's not cool that 1s don't even flinch your opponent, but in punish situations where your opponent is in lag, they won't always have enough time to hit you with a really strong move anyway.

The other thing about Judgement is if you take the raw average of how much damage it does, it does 11%, which is the same as F-air. That isn't bad, especially considering some of the bonus effects of Judgement are very useful. 2 has a decent chance of netting a trip combo, 6 can semi spike people which can be amazing in edgeguard situations, 8 freezes people for a free combo, and then of course the 9 is feared by everyone.

Overall Judgement on average does reasonably good damage, and the random chance of a 9 or a potentially useful bonus effect makes it a pretty good punish option overall. You can definitely apply this move either out of D-throw, during edgeguards, or for punishing edge rolls (bait someone to edgeroll by sitting near the ledge, Dash and then SideB to punish the predicted edge roll).

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

If anyone has anything to contribute, regarding Mr. G&W's match-up against Rosalina, the Rosalina Match-Up Analysis thread will be analyzing Mr. G&W until the end of 1/29.

 

[PK Tripping]

Can anyone help me with fighting G&W? I'm having one really stupid problem.

I can't keep my eye on him.

His weird movements make me lose focus of him. And I'm not quite sure what to do. I often find myself getting a headache just trying to follow the guy.

Am I the only one with this issue?

 

[FrameImperfect]

Can anyone help me with fighting G&W? I'm having one really stupid problem.

I can't keep my eye on him.

His weird movements make me lose focus of him. And I'm not quite sure what to do. I often find myself getting a headache just trying to follow the guy.

Am I the only one with this issue?

That's his gimmick tho. If he's too small, then move closer to the TV or change outlines on your 3DS to large.

 

[Kofu]

Can anyone help me with fighting G&W? I'm having one really stupid problem.

I can't keep my eye on him.

His weird movements make me lose focus of him. And I'm not quite sure what to do. I often find myself getting a headache just trying to follow the guy.

Am I the only one with this issue?

The only issue I've had is when the stage background is dark (omega Pac-Maze is lol). Of course, I'm usually CONTROLLING the guy so it doesn't impact me as much. Can't speak for the opponent.

 

[SeanS]

Can anyone help me with fighting G&W? I'm having one really stupid problem.

I can't keep my eye on him.

His weird movements make me lose focus of him. And I'm not quite sure what to do. I often find myself getting a headache just trying to follow the guy.

Am I the only one with this issue?

It's a weird matchup.

Since you are a Ness main, you're actually not at an advantage in this matchup (in my experience), but that will generally not come to light because of how few players are actually good with this character at this time.

Relying on your aerials more than usual is a good start. Your special game is garbage against a G&W played properly and will get you punished the vast majority of the time. (Hint: a good way to tell if they're bad is if they're bucketing PK Fire, which is extremely risky.) The priority on your fair is absolutely ridiculous, so you'll want to use some of that, but bair is pretty decent too, and uair will work decently for you as well so long as you don't get hard read into a key.

After you force a bit of aerial combat, your goal is to get G&W in a position where you can throw him. I'm sure you already know that you have what is possibly the most ridiculous kill method in the game in your bthrow, so you have to abuse that. A whiffed, poorly spaced fair or bair from G&W is usually the setup you need. You can transition from a PK Fire punish on your end more rarely, but I would not recommend relying on this move as, again, G&W can really punish your specials.

 

[PK Tripping]

-snip-

I don't use PK Fire much anyways

Most of the time on him i actually approach with a short hop dair. Nobody expects it so it's generally easy to land.

Thanks for all the other stuff though. I have a G&W at my weeklies so it should help!

The only issue I've had is when the stage background is dark (omega Pac-Maze is lol). Of course, I'm usually CONTROLLING the guy so it doesn't impact me as much. Can't speak for the opponent.

Pac Maze is the bane of my existence in this matchup lol

 

[Game And Guy]

Does Up-Air still refresh moves?

also how do people back air into back air. Or do two airs moves consecutively in general.

 

[TheMiSP]

Does Up-Air still refresh moves?

also how do people back air into back air. Or do two airs moves consecutively in general.

Up air? Yea, I believe so.

Back air into back air is doable on middle weight and above? characters on extremely low percentages, I think. You may need to SJ to back air again similar to how Ness does fair>SJ>fair.

On the other note, I know For Glory really isn't anything to brag about, but killing them with usmash straight from bacon trapping feels soooooo damn good...

 

[BBC7]

Mr. Game & Watch has a true combo in the form of D-Throw to U-Air at around 60%-80% according to training mode. This combo can kill on the top platform of Halberd at around 75% on Mario so I guess Halberd might be a good stage choice although the lower ceiling also means we die earlier to any U-Smashes or Uairs, and we all know which top tier is notorious for a good Uair.

 

[SeanS]

Mr. Game & Watch has a true combo in the form of D-Throw to U-Air at around 60%-80% according to training mode. This combo can kill on the top platform of Halberd at around 75% on Mario so I guess Halberd might be a good stage choice although the lower ceiling also means we die earlier to any U-Smashes or Uairs, and we all know which top tier is notorious for a good Uair.

Generally, dthrow-uair is quite useful if you are sure that you can pull it off:

- As you suspect, you can get kills on elevated platforms (esp. with rage).

- Sometimes, you can transition into Fire directly, or at least chase to nair / pressure with your aerial vortex.

- On DeDeDe specifically (he reacts to dthrow very peculiarly, this will be covered in my future guide), you can literally chain uairs together at certain percents and follow up with a DI read into Fire. The inputs are quite tight, but the damage is extreme. The ideal damage range for execution is 32-35%, with expected damage of 42%. On him and other characters, uair combos can (sometimes) also work at higher percents with a missed first hit on the second uair (expected damage: 35%), you can uair > nair more reliably (lower 30% expected), or try for uair > Fire (backangled) > fair (26% if you miss the fair, 37% if you land it).


This character rewards creativity and aggression, and has a lot of untapped potential. Even I didn't know until very recently that you can even go from low percentage usmash > uair > fire (backangled) > fair for 49% expected (38% if fair misses). I mean, the chance you pull off the last parts of that combo, let alone the setup itself is kind of rare because playing against computers and humans is very different, but you can't really say that other characters can do this kind of stuff reliably.

 

[BBC7]

How potent is Mr. Game & Watch Jab Fake? I'm trying it against various characters and it seems you can get Mega Man from 50% to 85% with one properly placed Jab if you can Jab Fake, and then D-Throw to Uair becomes guaranteed at that point. Of course, this needs testing with a human since AI has garbage DI, or at least I'm assuming they do.

 

[X3I]

Didn't know about Dthrow to Uair, looks nice!

 

[Tibbyflapps]

Uair in general feels like an extremely solid move in numerous ways. Not only can its windbox push falling/recovering enemies further out (messing with their aerial game in general and making getting safely back on stage a lot more difficult), it can also kill fairly easily in the air and feels extremely reliable.

Then you've got fair, which works wonders for spacing and following up certain moves (like a low-percent dash attack or Fire) thanks to how easy it is to boomerang with it movement-wise.
Bair is harder to use than nair, but it also possesses some of fair's boomerang potential, which is certainly nice. At the very least, it sets up combos a lot better against a grounded enemy than nair can, though nair is clearly superior in the air.

Dair is situational, but the situations in which it can be used are nice. Using the move from high enough a point will cancel the ending animation that most other players will try to punish you for, meaning that you can move around immediately and punish them for their ignorance. It also has spiking abilities, but... well, there are much better moves in his arsenal for edgeguarding IMO.

Speaking of edgeguarding, I can't believe how potent dash attack is on that front. Like holy ****, even if your opponent can ledgesnap fairly easily with their recovery, dash attack can hit them before that and knock them outward again, allowing for further edgeguarding. And given how easily G&W builds up damage, it's not hard to get the characters with great recoveries to dash-attack kill percentage

 

[ZTD | TECHnology]

I'm teaming with @ JustKindaBoredUKno this weekend and I have never teamed with a GW before in this game. Pretty familiar with his tools but if any of you have experience teaming with a // and have any specific tips or setups that have worked for you, let me know. Trying to do some last minute homework before the event. We trying to win.

 

[JustKindaBoredUKno]

These boards don't help anyone for anything

 

[GMan1255]

I'm kinda shocked no one has mentioned this already. His D-tilt hitbox messes with projectiles too. With proper timing it will send the projectiles over his head behind him, or in the case of Rob's gyro, it sends it to the moon. All of Pacman's Neutral-B are also affected. Only Link's bombs are affected by this, but you can actually bucket those now for some reason. Basically any physical projectile is thrown above him excluding Link's arrows and boomerang. I think that is interesting to note at least, especially for Rob's gyro when people like to constantly spam it.

 

[meleebrawler]

I'm kinda shocked no one has mentioned this already. His D-tilt hitbox messes with projectiles too. With proper timing it will send the projectiles over his head behind him, or in the case of Rob's gyro, it sends it to the moon. All of Pacman's Neutral-B are also affected. Only Link's bombs are affected by this, but you can actually bucket those now for some reason. Basically any physical projectile is thrown above him excluding Link's arrows and boomerang. I think that is interesting to note at least, especially for Rob's gyro when people like to constantly spam it.

Or more specifically, item projectiles.

 

[yoyowoodchuckguy]

So, on the latest tier list based on data from Anther's Ladder, Gdubs is placed at the bottom of A-tier, in 19th place.

What do you think about this placement? Personally I think it's slightly high, but not too far off the mark.

 

[pepi1197]

So, on the latest tier list based on data from Anther's Ladder, Gdubs is placed at the bottom of A-tier, in 19th place.

What do you think about this placement? Personally I think it's slightly high, but not too far off the mark.

I was legitimately surprised when a friend told me about it. His meh smashes and the stupid high ending lag on some aerials makes that seem several spots too high.

 

[X3I]

I think 19th may be right, personally.

 

[pepi1197]

I definitely think he's low 20s but I'm not quite sold on it. I still need time to work everything about Gdubs out.

 

[Funkermonster]

Can someone give me/direct me to a short overview of how G & W plays, what character archetype you'd label him in, and his general pros and cons? I do not play as this character at all, rarely come across anyone who does (let alone a good one), and I don't even hear much talk about him. And from the few times I do hear about him, people have said around me that they think he's "eh" in this game

G & W hasn't actually been any trouble for me yet, but I think its good to know who my rival is and what he does before I have to go to war, know what I'm sayin'?

 

[X3I]

To me, he is pretty unique... If I had to define him with one word, I would use "Hype" =p
Basically, he has everything to make someone salty...

- An invincible move (the Usmash) that beats everything... It makes people say : "Oh... Seriously?! o_o"
- A lot of windboxes, the Uair can kill without even touching you! Dtilt against projectiles is funny too.
- Judge 9, which is now combo-able easily even after a simple throw. This is a Stock-Thief, ahah.
- The best edeguarding game in Smash 4, along with the best recovery. That ******* is mobile.
- Bucket, that adds a lot of pressure on a good read, which can also kill at 0%...
- Huge priority on every move, disjointed hitboxes, good zonning tools...
- A godlike grab game... Check the Frame Data Thread for videos.

His main flaws are that it's hard to approach with him, and that he's light.
Some will say he struggles to kill... it's not my case, but let's say it's another one.

But yeah... he is random, he is very dangerous if he does a good read, he has unusual moves and ways to kill...

IS HYPE!

 

[GMan1255]

Honestly, hype is a decent way to describe him XD

 

[BBC7]

Is Jabbing after a blocked Fair a good option? I was getting really frustrated fighting a Villager today until I decided to Jab after blocked Fair's to catch grabbing attempts and to apply shield pressure in general. It seemed so obvious yet I never really did it for some reason. DISCLAIMER: I'm bad

 

[meleebrawler]

Is Jabbing after a blocked Fair a good option? I was getting really frustrated fighting a Villager today until I decided to Jab after blocked Fair's to catch grabbing attempts and to apply shield pressure in general. It seemed so obvious yet I never really did it for some reason. DISCLAIMER: I'm bad

Villager's grab is pretty darn slow, try this against someone with a normal grab.

 

[BBC7]

Villager's grab is pretty darn slow, try this against someone with a normal grab.

If we're looking at plain numbers, it shouldn't work because Fair has 15 frames of ending lag and most people have a grab of 6-9 frames.

 

[meleebrawler]

Basically the same principle as Little Macs jabbing right after a dash attack.
Only truly works if the opponent is too slow to punish. Still not bad to try though.
Just don't rely on it.

 

[JohnnyB]

Villager shouldn't shield grab. Oos nair(frame 3) is the usual response to shield pressure. Against villager you have to space your approaches or you will get oos naired until the cows come home. Hitting the ground while in a fair will set up villager perfectly for this exact scenario because of how much g&w slides.

I'm basically saying approach villager with something else.

 

[Tibbyflapps]

Guys, I was messing around with the bucket today, spamming it a bunch in the air for shiggles, and something odd seemed to be happening. It seemed as if the ending lag for it was extremely diminished if released after certain amounts of time, if not outright canceled. I then tested landing buckets using the same trick, and it appeared that a full hop > horizontally moving bucket, though not instant, was still extremely quick to cancel (since it didn't have to go through the on-ground bucket's ending frames where he picks the bucket up), which meant he could move around a lot earlier than had he just held the bucket down on ground. Couple that with the fact that his bucket can change direction of absorbtion mid-flight, and it looks like he might be able to pull out his bucket fairly safely after all :D

Also noticed that holding the bucket down for an extended period of time resulted in more ending frames. Maybe to encourage not camping with the bucket or so?

Either way, though, can someone else also confirm this? It feels like this could have a huge effect on some of our matchups, but I don't want to get anyone's hopes up before it's actually been properly tested.

 

[BBC7]

I've been starting to like Nair recently, here is what I can make of how to use G&W Nair.

1. Obvious use would be for D-Throw to Nair, which is 21% and shouldn't really be stale because of Uair refreshing stale moves.
2. I've also been finding it useful to test the waters with in order to see how often my opponent airdodges. If they don't airdodge at all, they likely eat raw 17% and will continue doing so until they airdodge more often. If they airdodge often, that tells me to bait them once I need to go for a vital edgeguard.
3. FH Nair is also pretty useful. If you have the fish to cover your landing, I find it a relatively safe approach since you can get behind the opponent and poke their shield with the fish. Your FH should be enough to jump over most U-Smashes. If not, opt for Double Jump Nair.
4. It's difficult to punish. You'll have 12 frames of landing lag so any punish that will be made likely isn't severe. Shield drop takes 7 frames already, so the other guy really only has 5 frames where he can punish and probably won't be able to take it. If he doesn't shield, he gets hit by a fish. If he perfect shields, then clearly you're getting predictable and probably have to change something up.
5. Nair can be good for chasing opponents. If they stand in place or roll away, Nair will probably either hit or harass their shield. If they start rolling towards or attempt to counter the Nair with their own attack, you can SHFF Fair which gives you a little mindgame tool. I also use Nair to tech chase until I'm confident with the option that my opponent will usually take, then I go for hard reads to get early kills.
6. The fish puts us as a relatively comfortable position when it lands. Despite pitiful damage at 4%, I still like the fish for launching the opponent upwards with ease which leads into our great disjointed aerial game.

 

[JohnnyB]

When you say the fish are you taking about dair(edit: whoops ment to say bair, my bad)? Because it's actually a turtle...

Also as far as out of shield options go 12 frames of landing lag is actually a lot. If you land in front of your opponent they will be able to shield grab you. Some characters have amazing out of shield upb follow ups( like bowser), or great frame data on aerials (like villagers frame 3 nair). These options also don't have to wait for a shield drop, they come out instantly. I'm not saying that nair approaches are bad, but they aren't quite as safe on shield as you're making them out to be. Landing behind them is a good way to avoid getting shield grabbed but you have to be really careful with your spacing to avoid out of shield punishments, and even that won't be enough with some opponents.

 

[pepi1197]

When you say the fish are you taking about dair? Because it's actually a turtle...

Also as far as out of shield options go 12 frames of landing lag is actually a lot. If you land in front of your opponent they will be able to shield grab you. Some characters have amazing out of shield upb follow ups( like bowser), or great frame data on aerials (like villagers frame 3 nair). These options also don't have to wait for a shield drop, they come out instantly. I'm not saying that nair approaches are bad, but they aren't quite as safe on shield as you're making them out to be. Landing behind them is a good way to avoid getting shield grabbed but you have to be really careful with your spacing to avoid out of shield punishments, and even that won't be enough with some opponents.

Dair is the key and Bair is the turtle. Nair is a fish bowl with two fish leaping out on either side of the bowl.

 

[BBC7]

12 frames of landing lag on Game & Watch from Nair
1 frame of shield-stun on Opponent from the Nair
5 frames for an OoS jump for Opponent
A 3-6 frame move in order to punish for Opponent

Or, -12 + 1 + 5 = -6

Maybe a slower aerial could work if Game & Watch doesn't land early enough, but that still requires borderline frame perfect timing on the opponent's part. If you land from the back, OoS Grab shouldn't be as problematic. Nair is still pretty safe, I fail to see how 12 frames of landing lag is very bad because Bowser Up B can punish it. Bowser Up B is well-known for punishing power, so it would be unsafe against Bowser. I just don't see Nair approaches as being bad for the rest of the cast. Donkey Kong Up B is 19 frames so there's really nothing like Bowser Up B even if you think it's similar enough.

 

[JohnnyB]

12 frames of landing lag on Game & Watch from Nair
1 frame of shield-stun on Opponent from the Nair
5 frames for an OoS jump for Opponent
A 3-6 frame move in order to punish for Opponent

Or, -12 + 1 + 5 = -6

Maybe a slower aerial could work if Game & Watch doesn't land early enough, but that still requires borderline frame perfect timing on the opponent's part. If you land from the back, OoS Grab shouldn't be as problematic. Nair is still pretty safe, I fail to see how 12 frames of landing lag is very bad because Bowser Up B can punish it. Bowser Up B is well-known for punishing power, so it would be unsafe against Bowser. I just don't see Nair approaches as being bad for the rest of the cast. Donkey Kong Up B is 19 frames so there's really nothing like Bowser Up B even if you think it's similar enough.

Ok so first off I'm getting the impression that I came off a little standoffish in my first post. I'm only here to discuss, learn, and share ideas. If it seemed like I was trying to "one up" you, that was not my intention and I apologize.

Now about your post...

You have it at -6 for an aerial punish. I have a few issues with that. First off I don't think it's actually possible for you to hit anyone's shield on the same frame that you land so you can't take the one frame of shieldstun off of the punishing time. I actually don't know how many frames it takes to jump In this game. Is it actually just 5 for everyone? I only ask because in other smash games they weren't the same for every character.

There also is more time than just the landing lag to punish. As soon as your attack hits a shield they can let go of the button and buffer an input before you hit the ground and even start to go into landing lag. Game and Watch's nair is a multi hit attack so there is a chance that if they drop their shield before you hit the ground that they can get still get clipped by another hitbox, but I've never had it happen for me at least when I've used nair.

So now you land, go through landing lag and your opponent hasn't landed anything yet (although they are probably almost there). You still have to act yourself. Now what? The fastest option gdubs has in this situation is shield. Even if you get it up in time, you are in shield and facing the wrong way. It isn't exactly an advantaged position. This is all assuming you don't space it wrong and end up In front of your opponent...

I'm not just talking theorycraft either, I have used nair approaches many times and good opponents can punish me for it. I had a match with a really good player who punished me easily when I tried the nair crossup. The only time I could shield in time (and it was a perfect shield too) was once when the attack whiffed entirely and they got stuck with shield drop lag (they were punishing with ftilt). The game was kinda laggy too though so maybe that helped their timing? I really doubt this stuff is frame perfect though...

I'm not trying to be a ****, and I don't really think it's a bad approach, but It certainly isn't a good one either (not that game and watch has many better ones in this game). Even though 12 frames of landing lag is far from an eternity it isn't very safe on shield, which is usually a pretty automatic response to an aerial approach. This is why having auto canceling aerials is so good. It's a pity that nair isn't one of them.

Am I wrong? Please correct me if I am.

 

[Kofu]

One important thing to remember when considering safety on shield is that you're usually not landing the same frame as the hitbox connects with a shield. There will, in most cases, be more than 12 frames for the opponent to punish NAir on shield. This obviously varies depending on how far above the ground Game & Watch is and whether or not he fastfalls, but I'd guess that 15 frames is more reasonable (possibly more). I just wish we had our low jump autocancel NAir back.

By the way, nice mains, JohnnyB.

 

[JohnnyB]

One important thing to remember when considering safety on shield is that you're usually not landing the same frame as the hitbox connects with a shield. There will, in most cases, be more than 12 frames for the opponent to punish NAir on shield. This obviously varies depending on how far above the ground Game & Watch is and whether or not he fastfalls, but I'd guess that 15 frames is more reasonable (possibly more). I just wish we had our low jump autocancel NAir back.

By the way, nice mains, JohnnyB.

Ty =)

It's a pretty difficult to pin down a hard number of frames for this. If they have a big shield they get more time, if you fastfall they get less. 15 sounds like a pretty good average though.

G&W is my favorite char in all of smash bros, but you have to put sooooo much more work in with him this time around. Sometimes I feel like gannondorf is better than him now.

 

[BBC7]

Frame-data wise, it still beats other options. Fair has more range though and Bair has shield-poking(I think Dair also might), so other aerials beat Nair in other ways.

 

[GMan1255]

Ty =)

It's a pretty difficult to pin down a hard number of frames for this. If they have a big shield they get more time, if you fastfall they get less. 15 sounds like a pretty good average though.

G&W is my favorite char in all of smash bros, but you have to put sooooo much more work in with him this time around. Sometimes I feel like gannondorf is better than him now.

I have to agree with you on that last part... I love G&W, but I seem to just be unable to use him in any effective way against anyone who has half a clue... I'm starting to think I am going to focus on someone else, not sure who though.