Getting the Lucarionite: MU discussion

[HK_Spadez]

Been looking into picking up a secondary to counter lucario's bad matchups.

My two worse matchups right now are diddy kong and link. I been thinking about picking up either samus or mewtwo.

any thoughts? I dont know who else could be good for a lucario secondary. I also play marth, falco, pit but they're kind of sub par at the moment.

 

[Risky]

Mario does well against both of those characters, and is strong in general. I think Link might give Mewtwo some trouble, I imagine he would give Samus trouble too. I don't play either of them so take it with a grain of salt.

 

[KullaN_xo]

Anyone have notes for Luigi matchup?

 

[Zoa]

There aren't many good Luigi players where I'm at, so my MU knowledge on Weegee is a bit lacking. What I do know is that you should play this somewhat safe. An experienced Weegee will use wavedash as their primary source of movement and offense. Weegee has a slew of powerful offensive and combo options, and he can even waveland away a fair he lands on Luc's tiny shield. You're really going to want to bait him out, though this can be quite hard given Luc's lack of options to force any form of commitment out of the opponent.

 

[Hazm@]

Yeah, Luigi...how should i put it... He's kinda like a xenomorph. He escapes all of your attempts to kill him and just turns it around on you (and he's green). The best method i've found to deal with him is to spam aura sphere, then approach him with dash attack or down b while he's in hitstun. But then he just DI's out everything. I find this guy very tough to deal with, maybe just because I'm pretty new to smash. I think he's better on stages with platforms, judging from my limited experience. I can beat a lvl 9 cpu weegee on final destination but I've only done it on Smashville once.
Any tips from anyone about stage picks/tactics for this MU? It's one of the hardest for lucario IMO, along with Mewtwo.

 

[Zoa]

Jiminy Cricket! I just got my **** wrecked hard today. A really good Fox player is now a part of my practice crew. I now understand how horrible Luc's neutral game is. Just wow. I can't force the opponent to do anything, and all I can do is DD for stage control and mind games. Any help?

 

[Captain Chunk]

One thing I had trouble with in the fox matchup is that I usually don't combo side to side. You almost have to VS spacies. DA to fsmash to DT will put you into a very good place, set up for tech chases or more smashes. Edgeguarding him is pretty simple, take ledge and wait for him to commit to something. Other than that, its just a waiting game. Stay on platforms to avoid the pew pews, down b is your ticket in there most of the time. Sorry I couldn't be a little more help

 

[Schwamus]

I personally like playing against Fox as Luc. The way I tend to play it is to just take it to him. Personally, everytime i try to hang back and bait I get crushed by Fox's speed and combo ability. These matches turn into pretty fast paced ones that are generally fun to watch because of the crazy combos on both sides. Bring the pressure to him and just brawl til one of you is dead. Don't be reckless in approaches and still bait out moves but once you get a hand on him, pop him up (i usually use down tilt out of DT), hit him forward and chase something fierce. The spacies are easy for Luc to combo due to their weight and grabs are your best friend to start them off if they shield, Dash attack/ DT cancel + down tilt if they CC.

This also is one of the few matchups where I would say REALLY focus on the little disjoint Lucario has, in this case to deal with shines. Practice spacing with downtilt/ fair to make sure you can hit him with that sweetspot while still being out of range if they try to shine OoS to break your combo.

 

[Treesper]

Not sure if this has already been mentioned, but I had troubled with a ZSS matchup yesterday. If I approach her on the ground with down-b, she can just guess which side i'm gonna be on and will have a 50/50 shot at hitting me with her dsmash even if she doesnt attempt to read it. Approaching her in the air was also rough cause her up-b and up-smash outrange anything. My only options were to hit her with an aura sphere, which is annoying to aim since she has her ANNOYING *** GUN (yes im still a little salty) or approach from the air with down-b, but because of her range it's super easy to get caught. Once she's in the air it's not that hard, so I guess my question is how should I approach her?

 

[Kerfuffle]

You shouldn't approach her too often. Lucario has a great dash dance and ZSS has some very laggy moves. Just bait her into using her gun or dsmash and come in with a fair or dash attack.

 

[Stryker]

Not sure if this has already been mentioned, but I had troubled with a ZSS matchup yesterday. If I approach her on the ground with down-b, she can just guess which side i'm gonna be on and will have a 50/50 shot at hitting me with her dsmash even if she doesnt attempt to read it. Approaching her in the air was also rough cause her up-b and up-smash outrange anything. My only options were to hit her with an aura sphere, which is annoying to aim since she has her ANNOYING *** GUN (yes im still a little salty) or approach from the air with down-b, but because of her range it's super easy to get caught. Once she's in the air it's not that hard, so I guess my question is how should I approach her?

I feel like you are getting caught up in the matchup and not focusing on playing your character. I've actually been working on dual maining these two characters specifically, because I feel the cover each other well and are both incredibly fun.
From ZSS's side of things, she lacks amazing approach options, so understand that shes probably going to be trying to outmaneuver you with speed, and catch you out for committing. Keep in mind that she gets very little off of grabs if you DI correctly so shielding is a good option that can be tough for her to deal with. Zss projectiles are slower than average, so powershielding is surprisingly viable, and can be clanked with. Try not to Double Team through the projectiles very often. Its a great option, but the problem is it's too good of an option and opponents will punish it very quickly if you do it too much.

As for approaches, as I mentioned, she doesn't have great ones so she will likely be looking to bait and outspace your approaches and punish them.
I mentioned I feel like you are getting caught up in the matchup, because it seems like you are relying on lucarios speed based tools to assist in keeping up with zss and getting punished. Try playing a bit more defensively. Uncharged aura sphere, pressure space with fair, and when you do go in, go in with guaranteed safe things. You said once she's in the air its not so bad, so I'll speak to grounded game more.
Dash Attack is a great combo starter, and with proper followup, you can make it safe on shield. Shffled Fair > Force palm also works great on grounded opponents.
If you are going to go in with DT, make sure you have a charge. You should be able to cancel it into a tilt while you still have intangibility frames from DT, leading to no more eating dsmashes.

Hope that helped!

 

[Kerfuffle]

Okay, I played against the absolute most campy Lucas I've ever come across today. Holy hell, these are two of the most punish and combo based characters in the game and every game went 6 minutes. PK freeze was am absolute nightmare for me, if I got hit it was an easy ~50% or more. also, if I tried to bait it and punish the endlag, out would come magnet to cover his front and then a big long wavedash back to retreat. This was seriously one of the mose annoying and boring matches of my life. I ended up winning, but I had to play incredibly slow and couldn't use aura spheres due to the magnet. I could sometimes punish the lag when he absorbed my aura sphere, but somwtimes the magnet would still be out and I'd just knick it and get sent flying backwards into a combo. How do I deal with a campy Lucas? Also, it should be mentioned if he hit my shield, I would have to buffer roll out due to the crazy amounts of shield pressure Lucas can do. Help me.