Swoops here, self-proclaimed master of Ganondry.
First off I want to say that the content in this thread could easily go in one of the many tech threads on these boards, but I just feel that in these hectic messy Brawl Boards (not just Ganon Boards) the only way to really get an ounce of attention is to create your own thread, and I wanted to go in depth. Maybe later in time people can actually post new information in the same thread, but we'll see.
Realize that in no way do I expect this thread to last. It is specifically to gain attention for certain things about Ganon's game.
There are a few things I want to talk about. I mentioned some things in other threads but I might go into a little more detail with them here.
Lol, actually a pretty short list.
Reverse Buffering with Ganon
Everyone should know what buffering is and how it got added into Brawl, if you input a command during the ending frames of a previous action, the input will be executed on the first frame possible. Chances are you already use buffering and reverse buffering. You d-air then press A before you hit the ground, you get a jab immediately after. You do a RAR u-air and f-tilt the other direction (not exactly reverse buffering, but close enough.) You can buffer any command in this game though, including turning the other direction. Push the d-stick the opposite direction during an ACed aerial before you hit the ground, and you turn around asap. This is way more useful than it sounds.
Ganon has a pretty **** good retreating aerial game. His b-air has really nice priority and snuffs a lot of incoming aerials, and his tipman u-air covers a good area, has decent priority, and leads to other things as many people know. People still tend to rush in or let their guard down after these autocanceled aerials because they can usually punish. F-tilt after these is pretty punishable too.
This is where reverse buffering is really f*cking nice to use (it's nice for advancing with these aerials too.) Tipman u-airs and b-airs into d-tilts and jabs are really nice, catch people by surprise when they let their guard down and help you create a more solid retreat and approach. It's obvious you can get Gerudo and DA the other direction, but you can also reverse buffer wizards foot!
(1) The Jab
Reverse jab is really nice to cover your *** on ACed aerials and keeps people away as well as annoys the opponent. The input is simple, (I will let you figure out the right timing for yourself) before you land during the ending of your aerial, slightly hold the opposite direction, let go, then press A. To be honest it's something you get the feel of yourself but that's basically the input.
(2) D-Tilt
When you hit c-stick down at a certain point in aerials (timing isn't too strict) you get a d-tilt instead of a d-smash. So, hit the opposite direction, c-stick down during the end of the aerial. Be wary that too early=fastfall (very bad), too late=d-smash (not as bad, but still pretty bad.) I use this the most. Has the most reach, can poke under shields, actually fairly safe if you know what you're doing, and pops up for u-airs. I back my aerials up with this all the f*cking time.
(3) Wizard's Kick
Wizard's Kick is a pretty hard one actually, I don't have it down all the way just yet. But you catch airdodgers coming down to the ground after an aerial, can immediately fly across the stage in the opposite direction for kick cancel, spam reverse aerials far away then all of the sudden hit them with a kick from half the stage, and other goodies. Harder because you have to hit two directional inputs within a very short time frame, opposite and vB. I'm pretty sure you can't quarter circle it.
Dash Attack
This one doesn't seem difficult at first, but that's because it happens on accident a lot. Turns out it's slightly hard to recreate intentionally. I've found their are two methods that seem to work decently for this, but not consistently yet. The problem is that you have to buffer the turnaround, the dash forward, and the c-stick down all before you land. The two methods I've found is double tapping the d-stick in a direction and hitting c-stick down before landing, and holding d-stick in a direction then c-stick down. Actually, both these methods are consistent as long as you get the timing down, so practice. If you mess up the timing you get d-smash...not good. This might prove to be one of the more useful reverse buffers...seeing as it's as fast as d-tilt (though I'm not sure if a turnaround animation has any frames on it) and has really good horizontal movement.
Whew...longer than I thought. Basically get the timing down yourselves, just takes a bit of practice. Remember there is a difference in timing when you hit them and don't hit them. Honestly it's a very simple technique that probably a lot of people know, but it's very useful to Ganon. It pretty much just backs up his awkward aerial hitboxes that dont hit people on the ground without lagging, and gives him a way of advancing with his tilts. It catches anybody that lets their guard down and makes his defense and even his approach a little bit better. Also leads to my next section...
True Combos
*IMPORTANT: D-Air>U-Smash is never guaranteed or a true combo from what I can tell*
It counts as two hits in training mode, but that's bullsh*t. Everyone can airdodge out of this or even attack, I'm pretty sure.
^^THE HITS METER IS A LIE!
Alright, I honestly don't like to search for true combos. This is Brawl, and it seems more useful to me to find strings of attacks that keep the opponent at a disadvantage and limit his options (lol I know all true combos do that.) But if I happen to come upon a true combo that does exactly that and is practical, I'm not going to ignore it.
Tipman U-Air, or RAR U-Air where you hit with his toes, actually gives enough stun sometimes, to give you guaranteed hits. Now, with the little bit of testing I did, it seems that these percents vary a bit and there might be small windows as to what move is guaranteed at what percent. I'm a fan of practicality and these fluctuating %'s annoy me (like the fact that d-air>u-smash actually has like less than a 20% window and varies from character to character). But this is useful to know. Did my testing with Lucario, plan to do some more chars. Yes, character (ie weight) dependant, but not much.
Tipman>D-Tilt: Started being guaranteed at 60%, and continued to be guaranteed to at least 100%. Earliest move to be guaranteed. Note: It actually interests me that this is the earliest move to be guaranteed. I would of thought it would be Jab. I want some frame data.
^This is the only one I'm sure of. I'll list the others in somewhat order of what % they become guaranteed.
Tipman>Jab: Think this becomes guaranteed at around 67% and has a small window of being guaranteed.
Tipman>F-Tilt: Oof, not sure. Around 85% I believe, but goes up to around 110% I believe.
Tipman>DA: Not sure at all what percent, but it has a pretty short window I think.
Tipman>WizKick: NOT GUARANTEED
Tipman>Gerudo: NOT GUARANTEED
EDIT: From what I can tell, tipman into Gerudo/Wizard's Foot is not guaranteed. I'm pretty sure I got a trip or two, because I cannot recreate these reliably. Tipman into Gerudo is still **** good though, so don't let this discourage you.
Alright, I've decided I'm not going to go and test percents for guarantees on each character. In every case with these attacks, you're most likely going to hit them, and most likely not to get punished for trying. I will give you a general percentage for those interested however.
Hits after tipman start becoming guaranteed from 50% (lightest, I used Fox) to 65% (Bowser.) Tipman starts sliding to far after 90-100% but you might still be able to get a successful DA.
FJ N-Air
I mentioned this stuff in a couple other threads but I thought I'd write it up here as well. To all who say that N-Air is useless or has very limited options, don't mess around with Ganon's moveset enough. FJ N-Air is not an autocancel, the animation finishes right before you hit the ground, allowing for a double jump, or ground level aerial gerudo.
This simple fact opens up a lot of options for Ganondorf, and gives him somewhat of a spammable wall (kinda.) FJ N-Air covers a good distance in front of him, stopping quite a few aerial advances. When you double jump a N-Air out of the FJ N-Air, if you don't fastfall, the second one autocancels. You can kind of spam this far away and it's pretty hard to get through aerially. However, people can get under it and attack from below. Mind games ensue...
DJ F-Air, DJ D-Air, Gerudo, DJ U-Air, DJ B-Air, and DJ WizKick are all excellent options out of FJ N-Air.
(I didn't need to write all the aerials out, but I felt like it)
DJ F-Air, DJ D-Air, Gerudo, and DJ WizKick are the best options if they try to get in from below or for fake-outs. They will eat these a lot. I have a preference of F-Air over the others due to spacing and the hitbox, but that's me.
DJ D-air, Gerudo, DJ U-Air, DJ B-Air, and DJ N-Air are the ones I use for an actual follow up after I hit FJ N-Air. How in the world do I land FJ N-Air on somebody, you might ask? Few ways actually. U-Throw at earlier percents and D-Throw at later percents both set your opponent up in the air perfectly. Of course they can airdodge, but with Ganon's only multi-hit attack, it's hard to get just right. Also, at close range, and starting at 50% I believe, the first hit of FJ N-Air knocks up into the second hit for a true combo. Not sure if DI will change that, but I'm pretty sure it wont.
D-Air follow ups and Gerudo follow ups are really fun after FJ N-Air
This adds some more great mind game potential to Ganondorf's arsenal, and also some very nice strings of attacks after U-Throw or D-Throw.
Ganondorf Frame Data!
This is for anyone who's interested in some in depth analysis of the speed and frames of Ganon's moveset. If anyone wants any data on a move they do not see here, let me know and I'll get on it.
Basically, my method of testing involved my recording device (capture card) and my recording software (Pinnacle Studio.) It calculates the video in 30 fps, and since Brawl runs at 60 fps, I had to do some converting. Multiply by 2 pretty much, and I recorded a couple of trials so I could average in case of odd numbers. Not too complicated and if anybody is suspicious about some of the numbers, I'll go into a little more depth if you want.
So the regular frames that I'm measuring are neutral to hit. I did the lag frames of some moves as well, which is hit to shield (doesn't need to completely cover Ganon.) The only lag frames I did on aerials though were the landing lag frames. I did shield stun as well, even though it's usually non existent and usually useless in Brawl. I was pretty sure I should not include the freeze frames in the shield stun, not completely sure though. I tested a few misc. things too. Here we go...I actually had some trouble figuring out how to organize this.
( )-Regular (neu to hitbox)
( )-Lag (hitbox to shield)
(L-)-Landing Lag
( )-Frame Advantage (neu. to opponent shield/control)
Standards
Aerials
Smashes
Shield Stuns Woo Hoo
Attack Stuns
* I measured when the last tipman hitbox came out
** Used "Thunderstorm" because i measured the entire time for a lagless SH D-Air, from jump to land. Seemed more useful to know I guess.
*** This was just the number of frames from hit to shield. Meaning its cooldown is actually quicker than jab lol.
Notes
Attack Stun Notes
Since I was kind of general with the attack stun frames, I thought I'd go a little more in depth here.
Thunderstorm stun is actually close to crap. I only tested both stun frame data with Lucario (I know, I know, more character testing.) I only tested frame data from my neutral landed position, to airdodge or shield by the opponent. But on Lucario at least, stun at 0% was only 12 frames, and at every other percent there was no stun! Lucario could airdodge before I could even do anything. So remember...hits meter is a big fat liar enclosed in a box.
Tipman slide stun varied a little bit and it might more so with different characters. But basically, I started at 45% and recorded the frame stun at every tipman damage (meaning I didn't set the damage every time, I just used damage after every hit.) Since tipman does 6%, it went 45%, 51%, 57, 63 etc... It gradually increases stun time by 2 frames every so often. At 111% it became 20 frames of stun time.
Lol I realize this^ might get too in depth with the frame analysis and might not matter, but I think it's important to know Ganon's moveset in and out.
Videos
Mmkay, I have one video that's really old and it's an online video, but it demonstrates a little bit of FJ N-Air use. Lol don't actually judge me on the match just look at a little bit of what I'm talking about. I'll try to get more vids up.
FJ N-Air Stuff in Action! -Kinda bad video but it has some FJ N-Air use
Reverse Buffering and FJ N-Air - A little longer than I probably needed to make it for such a couple quick concepts but hey it's footage
-I'm going to actually get some game footage when I go to a tournament next weekend.
--------------------------
I'm hoping to get more involved lately, and maybe if I have enough time I can get a Ganon Guide together to collect basic moveset stuff and other good sh*t from other threads.
-Swoops
First off I want to say that the content in this thread could easily go in one of the many tech threads on these boards, but I just feel that in these hectic messy Brawl Boards (not just Ganon Boards) the only way to really get an ounce of attention is to create your own thread, and I wanted to go in depth. Maybe later in time people can actually post new information in the same thread, but we'll see.
Realize that in no way do I expect this thread to last. It is specifically to gain attention for certain things about Ganon's game.
There are a few things I want to talk about. I mentioned some things in other threads but I might go into a little more detail with them here.
[*]Reverse Buffering with Ganon (I'll explain if you don't know, it's not complicated)
[*]True Combos
[*]FJ N-air (Maybe, I already mentioned it a few times lol)
[*]Ganondorf Frame Data!
[*]Videos
Lol, actually a pretty short list.
Reverse Buffering with Ganon
Everyone should know what buffering is and how it got added into Brawl, if you input a command during the ending frames of a previous action, the input will be executed on the first frame possible. Chances are you already use buffering and reverse buffering. You d-air then press A before you hit the ground, you get a jab immediately after. You do a RAR u-air and f-tilt the other direction (not exactly reverse buffering, but close enough.) You can buffer any command in this game though, including turning the other direction. Push the d-stick the opposite direction during an ACed aerial before you hit the ground, and you turn around asap. This is way more useful than it sounds.
Ganon has a pretty **** good retreating aerial game. His b-air has really nice priority and snuffs a lot of incoming aerials, and his tipman u-air covers a good area, has decent priority, and leads to other things as many people know. People still tend to rush in or let their guard down after these autocanceled aerials because they can usually punish. F-tilt after these is pretty punishable too.
This is where reverse buffering is really f*cking nice to use (it's nice for advancing with these aerials too.) Tipman u-airs and b-airs into d-tilts and jabs are really nice, catch people by surprise when they let their guard down and help you create a more solid retreat and approach. It's obvious you can get Gerudo and DA the other direction, but you can also reverse buffer wizards foot!
(1) The Jab
Reverse jab is really nice to cover your *** on ACed aerials and keeps people away as well as annoys the opponent. The input is simple, (I will let you figure out the right timing for yourself) before you land during the ending of your aerial, slightly hold the opposite direction, let go, then press A. To be honest it's something you get the feel of yourself but that's basically the input.
(2) D-Tilt
When you hit c-stick down at a certain point in aerials (timing isn't too strict) you get a d-tilt instead of a d-smash. So, hit the opposite direction, c-stick down during the end of the aerial. Be wary that too early=fastfall (very bad), too late=d-smash (not as bad, but still pretty bad.) I use this the most. Has the most reach, can poke under shields, actually fairly safe if you know what you're doing, and pops up for u-airs. I back my aerials up with this all the f*cking time.
(3) Wizard's Kick
Wizard's Kick is a pretty hard one actually, I don't have it down all the way just yet. But you catch airdodgers coming down to the ground after an aerial, can immediately fly across the stage in the opposite direction for kick cancel, spam reverse aerials far away then all of the sudden hit them with a kick from half the stage, and other goodies. Harder because you have to hit two directional inputs within a very short time frame, opposite and vB. I'm pretty sure you can't quarter circle it.
Dash Attack
This one doesn't seem difficult at first, but that's because it happens on accident a lot. Turns out it's slightly hard to recreate intentionally. I've found their are two methods that seem to work decently for this, but not consistently yet. The problem is that you have to buffer the turnaround, the dash forward, and the c-stick down all before you land. The two methods I've found is double tapping the d-stick in a direction and hitting c-stick down before landing, and holding d-stick in a direction then c-stick down. Actually, both these methods are consistent as long as you get the timing down, so practice. If you mess up the timing you get d-smash...not good. This might prove to be one of the more useful reverse buffers...seeing as it's as fast as d-tilt (though I'm not sure if a turnaround animation has any frames on it) and has really good horizontal movement.
Whew...longer than I thought. Basically get the timing down yourselves, just takes a bit of practice. Remember there is a difference in timing when you hit them and don't hit them. Honestly it's a very simple technique that probably a lot of people know, but it's very useful to Ganon. It pretty much just backs up his awkward aerial hitboxes that dont hit people on the ground without lagging, and gives him a way of advancing with his tilts. It catches anybody that lets their guard down and makes his defense and even his approach a little bit better. Also leads to my next section...
True Combos
*IMPORTANT: D-Air>U-Smash is never guaranteed or a true combo from what I can tell*
It counts as two hits in training mode, but that's bullsh*t. Everyone can airdodge out of this or even attack, I'm pretty sure.
^^THE HITS METER IS A LIE!
Alright, I honestly don't like to search for true combos. This is Brawl, and it seems more useful to me to find strings of attacks that keep the opponent at a disadvantage and limit his options (lol I know all true combos do that.) But if I happen to come upon a true combo that does exactly that and is practical, I'm not going to ignore it.
Tipman U-Air, or RAR U-Air where you hit with his toes, actually gives enough stun sometimes, to give you guaranteed hits. Now, with the little bit of testing I did, it seems that these percents vary a bit and there might be small windows as to what move is guaranteed at what percent. I'm a fan of practicality and these fluctuating %'s annoy me (like the fact that d-air>u-smash actually has like less than a 20% window and varies from character to character). But this is useful to know. Did my testing with Lucario, plan to do some more chars. Yes, character (ie weight) dependant, but not much.
Tipman>D-Tilt: Started being guaranteed at 60%, and continued to be guaranteed to at least 100%. Earliest move to be guaranteed. Note: It actually interests me that this is the earliest move to be guaranteed. I would of thought it would be Jab. I want some frame data.
^This is the only one I'm sure of. I'll list the others in somewhat order of what % they become guaranteed.
Tipman>Jab: Think this becomes guaranteed at around 67% and has a small window of being guaranteed.
Tipman>F-Tilt: Oof, not sure. Around 85% I believe, but goes up to around 110% I believe.
Tipman>DA: Not sure at all what percent, but it has a pretty short window I think.
Tipman>WizKick: NOT GUARANTEED
Tipman>Gerudo: NOT GUARANTEED
EDIT: From what I can tell, tipman into Gerudo/Wizard's Foot is not guaranteed. I'm pretty sure I got a trip or two, because I cannot recreate these reliably. Tipman into Gerudo is still **** good though, so don't let this discourage you.
Alright, I've decided I'm not going to go and test percents for guarantees on each character. In every case with these attacks, you're most likely going to hit them, and most likely not to get punished for trying. I will give you a general percentage for those interested however.
Hits after tipman start becoming guaranteed from 50% (lightest, I used Fox) to 65% (Bowser.) Tipman starts sliding to far after 90-100% but you might still be able to get a successful DA.
FJ N-Air
I mentioned this stuff in a couple other threads but I thought I'd write it up here as well. To all who say that N-Air is useless or has very limited options, don't mess around with Ganon's moveset enough. FJ N-Air is not an autocancel, the animation finishes right before you hit the ground, allowing for a double jump, or ground level aerial gerudo.
This simple fact opens up a lot of options for Ganondorf, and gives him somewhat of a spammable wall (kinda.) FJ N-Air covers a good distance in front of him, stopping quite a few aerial advances. When you double jump a N-Air out of the FJ N-Air, if you don't fastfall, the second one autocancels. You can kind of spam this far away and it's pretty hard to get through aerially. However, people can get under it and attack from below. Mind games ensue...
DJ F-Air, DJ D-Air, Gerudo, DJ U-Air, DJ B-Air, and DJ WizKick are all excellent options out of FJ N-Air.
(I didn't need to write all the aerials out, but I felt like it)
DJ F-Air, DJ D-Air, Gerudo, and DJ WizKick are the best options if they try to get in from below or for fake-outs. They will eat these a lot. I have a preference of F-Air over the others due to spacing and the hitbox, but that's me.
DJ D-air, Gerudo, DJ U-Air, DJ B-Air, and DJ N-Air are the ones I use for an actual follow up after I hit FJ N-Air. How in the world do I land FJ N-Air on somebody, you might ask? Few ways actually. U-Throw at earlier percents and D-Throw at later percents both set your opponent up in the air perfectly. Of course they can airdodge, but with Ganon's only multi-hit attack, it's hard to get just right. Also, at close range, and starting at 50% I believe, the first hit of FJ N-Air knocks up into the second hit for a true combo. Not sure if DI will change that, but I'm pretty sure it wont.
D-Air follow ups and Gerudo follow ups are really fun after FJ N-Air
This adds some more great mind game potential to Ganondorf's arsenal, and also some very nice strings of attacks after U-Throw or D-Throw.
Ganondorf Frame Data!
This is for anyone who's interested in some in depth analysis of the speed and frames of Ganon's moveset. If anyone wants any data on a move they do not see here, let me know and I'll get on it.
Basically, my method of testing involved my recording device (capture card) and my recording software (Pinnacle Studio.) It calculates the video in 30 fps, and since Brawl runs at 60 fps, I had to do some converting. Multiply by 2 pretty much, and I recorded a couple of trials so I could average in case of odd numbers. Not too complicated and if anybody is suspicious about some of the numbers, I'll go into a little more depth if you want.
So the regular frames that I'm measuring are neutral to hit. I did the lag frames of some moves as well, which is hit to shield (doesn't need to completely cover Ganon.) The only lag frames I did on aerials though were the landing lag frames. I did shield stun as well, even though it's usually non existent and usually useless in Brawl. I was pretty sure I should not include the freeze frames in the shield stun, not completely sure though. I tested a few misc. things too. Here we go...I actually had some trouble figuring out how to organize this.
( )-Regular (neu to hitbox)
( )-Lag (hitbox to shield)
(L-)-Landing Lag
( )-Frame Advantage (neu. to opponent shield/control)
Standards
- Jab (8-9) (28)
- D-Tilt (15-16) (26)
- -(Standing) D-Tilt (10.5-11.5)
- F-Tilt (9.5-10.5) (40)
- iDA (11-12)
Aerials
- N-Air (7-8) (L-24)
- B-Air (9-10) (L-24)
- U-Air (6.5-7.5) (L-24)
- -Tipman* (15-16)
- F-Air (15.5-16.5) (L-34)
- Thunderstorm** (23-24) (L-36)
Smashes
- D-Smash (15-16)
- U-Smash (21-22)
- -IASA*** (19.5-20.5)
- F-Smash (21-22)
Shield Stuns Woo Hoo
- F-Smash (10)
- Thunderstorm (10)
- F-Air (8)
Attack Stuns
- Thunderstorm (11-12 when 0%, any other %=0)
- Tipman Slide (0-20 depending on percent and character)
- Recovery Carryover Lag (15-16)
- Gerudo (17-18)
- Wizard's Foot (17-18)
- Empty Lag on Jumps (2-3)
- SH Air Dodge Vulnerability (ending 5-6)
- Grab (7-8)
- Quake (~12) (at least 52)
* I measured when the last tipman hitbox came out
** Used "Thunderstorm" because i measured the entire time for a lagless SH D-Air, from jump to land. Seemed more useful to know I guess.
*** This was just the number of frames from hit to shield. Meaning its cooldown is actually quicker than jab lol.
Notes
- I noticed how shield stun really doesn't matter that much given freeze frames and Ganon's lag, but with pushback it's alright. They can still be punished, but with the pushback+stun, you have a good chance of not getting punished.
- When getting rid of recovery carryover lag (from now on I'm just calling it RCO lag,) just empty jump/airdodge. It has less lag than all your aerials.
- The last three aren't really Ganon specific but I thought it was important to test them. Actually, it's important to know this against other characters. I started counting from the jump, and Ganon was vulnerable from frame 38 to shield, which happened to be 6 frames. Probably a little vulnerable on start up too, but I didn't check.
Know how to punish landing opponents. This is how I now get a lot of my Gerudos, and how you can trap with Wizard's Foot. Basically, if you have good timing, once they get to a certain height above the ground, they can't do a lot when you bust out Gerudo or Wizard's Foot/DA/Grab. - Never, ever, use Quake...ever.
Attack Stun Notes
Since I was kind of general with the attack stun frames, I thought I'd go a little more in depth here.
Thunderstorm stun is actually close to crap. I only tested both stun frame data with Lucario (I know, I know, more character testing.) I only tested frame data from my neutral landed position, to airdodge or shield by the opponent. But on Lucario at least, stun at 0% was only 12 frames, and at every other percent there was no stun! Lucario could airdodge before I could even do anything. So remember...hits meter is a big fat liar enclosed in a box.
Tipman slide stun varied a little bit and it might more so with different characters. But basically, I started at 45% and recorded the frame stun at every tipman damage (meaning I didn't set the damage every time, I just used damage after every hit.) Since tipman does 6%, it went 45%, 51%, 57, 63 etc... It gradually increases stun time by 2 frames every so often. At 111% it became 20 frames of stun time.
Lol I realize this^ might get too in depth with the frame analysis and might not matter, but I think it's important to know Ganon's moveset in and out.
Videos
Mmkay, I have one video that's really old and it's an online video, but it demonstrates a little bit of FJ N-Air use. Lol don't actually judge me on the match just look at a little bit of what I'm talking about. I'll try to get more vids up.
FJ N-Air Stuff in Action! -Kinda bad video but it has some FJ N-Air use
Reverse Buffering and FJ N-Air - A little longer than I probably needed to make it for such a couple quick concepts but hey it's footage
-I'm going to actually get some game footage when I go to a tournament next weekend.
--------------------------
I'm hoping to get more involved lately, and maybe if I have enough time I can get a Ganon Guide together to collect basic moveset stuff and other good sh*t from other threads.
-Swoops
.
.
