Help Me Understand Quick Attack

[Freezie KO]

Hi Pika Mains,

I really do not understand up-B. It just confuses me. Please help me understand.

1. Can you up-B and then travel in a straight line as both of your inputs are "left" or "right"? Or do you have to vary the two different inputs?

2. When is Pikachu vulnerable? Can he be hit during the move?

3. What are the frames of start up and end lag? Is there landing lag? What is quick attack cancel (QAC)?

4. What are the properties on hit? Minor hitstun, but is it enough to combo? Does the player getting hit get turned around?

5. What are the best offensive uses for the move? What are the ways to punish it?

Thanks for helping me understand this option.

 

[SafCar]

Your two inputs must be different in some way. You can't go straight right twice. QA is all about knowing how to geometry.

He can be hit during the move, but he moves quickly, which makes it hard to land hits. It's easiest after each movement.

QAC is a trick that exploits QA's ability to snap Pika to the ledge to trigger invincibility among other feats. Try reading other threads first.

It has slight stun, but it's not worth the back and forth that Lv9 CPUs love to spam. Meteor QA on the other hand...

Pikachu can't recover from a great distance like how Greninja does with his Up B, but Pikachu has speed over Greninja in terms of Up B. It's a big reason why most custom sets keep normal QA over other QA alts; It's hard to punish as a recovery.

 

[Freezie KO]

Thanks for the answers! Does it have landing lag when Pika quick attacks into the stage?

 

[Emuchu]

Hi Pika Mains,
I really do not understand up-B. It just confuses me. Please help me understand.
1. Can you up-B and then travel in a straight line as both of your inputs are "left" or "right"? Or do you have to vary the two different inputs?
2. When is Pikachu vulnerable? Can he be hit during the move?
3. What are the frames of start up and end lag? Is there landing lag? What is quick attack cancel (QAC)?
4. What are the properties on hit? Minor hitstun, but is it enough to combo? Does the player getting hit get turned around?
5. What are the best offensive uses for the move? What are the ways to punish it?
Thanks for helping me understand this option.

1. Pikachu used to be able to QA twice in the same direction, but that was all the way back in Smash 64. As of Melee, there has to be about 38 degrees of difference between your inputs--that's a bit less than 1/8 of a rotation.
2. Pikachu is vulnerable for the entirety of the move, although it's fast and has a generous hit box, making it pretty good at interrupting things. You can get hit out of it with well-place attacks, though, so you'll often see players stick out meaty attacks hoping to trick Pika into running into them.
3. There is a distinct startup and cooldown associated with QA. Just QA into the floor and observe how long it takes before you can shield after. A QAC is when you deliberately aim a QA so that you "land" at the corner of a platform during the final frames of the move and slide right off, skipping the cooldown frames. This also works by QA-ing into slopes, which is why Pika loves Lylat so much. Other than that, though, there is always a little bit of landing lag, so don't miss!
4. QA is not a reliable move to combo off of. The attack part of the move is mostly used to approach, as you do end up at a frame advantage and can continue to apply pressure, but the strings aren't guaranteed. It doesn't turn players around.
5. QA is one of the premier zone-breaking attacks, meaning it's exceptional at unexpectedly pushing through projectiles and boxing-out strategies. You just QA around ROB's tops and lasers and smack him with it, then Pika is right next to him and ROB is forced to make defensive moves. It's extremely punishable if you get predictable with it. If you QA and whiff, there's definitely enough time there to eat a Mario Usmash, and you can definitely run into a pre-emptive Smash hitbox if you're not careful.

Thanks for the answers! Does it have landing lag when Pika quick attacks into the stage?

A bit. I've been Mario Usmash'd and thrown out of careless landings.

 

[Freezie KO]

1. Pikachu used to be able to QA twice in the same direction, but that was all the way back in Smash 64. As of Melee, there has to be about 38 degrees of difference between your inputs--that's a bit less than 1/8 of a rotation.
2. Pikachu is vulnerable for the entirety of the move, although it's fast and has a generous hit box, making it pretty good at interrupting things. You can get hit out of it with well-place attacks, though, so you'll often see players stick out meaty attacks hoping to trick Pika into running into them.
3. There is a distinct startup and cooldown associated with QA. Just QA into the floor and observe how long it takes before you can shield after. A QAC is when you deliberately aim a QA so that you "land" at the corner of a platform during the final frames of the move and slide right off, skipping the cooldown frames. This also works by QA-ing into slopes, which is why Pika loves Lylat so much. Other than that, though, there is always a little bit of landing lag, so don't miss!
4. QA is not a reliable move to combo off of. The attack part of the move is mostly used to approach, as you do end up at a frame advantage and can continue to apply pressure, but the strings aren't guaranteed. It doesn't turn players around.
5. QA is one of the premier zone-breaking attacks, meaning it's exceptional at unexpectedly pushing through projectiles and boxing-out strategies. You just QA around ROB's tops and lasers and smack him with it, then Pika is right next to him and ROB is forced to make defensive moves. It's extremely punishable if you get predictable with it. If you QA and whiff, there's definitely enough time there to eat a Mario Usmash, and you can definitely run into a pre-emptive Smash hitbox if you're not careful.

A bit. I've been Mario Usmash'd and thrown out of careless landings.

Got it. I understand a lot better now. I watched a Pikachu combo vid yesterday and have seen Kenny at Xanadu, and I don't always get what I'm watching. Sometimes it looks like Pika can just QA back and forth through the opponent. But I see what you mean with ROB and what Pika is trying to accomplish.

 

[Emuchu]

Got it. I understand a lot better now. I watched a Pikachu combo vid yesterday and have seen Kenny at Xanadu, and I don't always get what I'm watching. Sometimes it looks like Pika can just QA back and forth through the opponent. But I see what you mean with ROB and what Pika is trying to accomplish.

He can totally QA back and forth through his opponent, as he can always input a second direction after QA as long as he doesn't aim the first QA into the floor or off the corner of a platform (which gets you a QAC). QA drags your opponent with you a little bit if you go through your opponent, so it's often used to set up for a followup Utilt or tipped Fsmash--but again, not usually guaranteed.

 

[Kaladin]

Something that I'm surprised no one has mentioned... QA is an excellent excape tool. Pikachu is pretty literally untrapable if he gets a few frames to himself, you can go basically anywhere on the stage with ease.

QA is also a great mixup from a ledgehop... QA to center stage, QALC back off the ledge, do basically whatever you want. It's great.

 

[Dark 3nergy]

To add what everyone has said, keep one thing in mind at all times. You can QA at any time pikachu is in a neutral animation. By neutral animation, i mean, he is doing nothing. No attacks or specials just him in his default state.

Example:

Jump

Wait

QA into the ground

Wait for opponents reaction.

You can do things like that or you can do whatever you want with QA to get you closer to your opponent. Not necessarily inside of him.

Something else no one has mentioned and I encourage you to go into training mode for this. Using the default move settings go into training mode with your choice character as pikachu. Get a heavy character like DK to test this. Load up training mode. Set yourself and DK to 100%.

• Do QA1 the first input into DK and watch the hitstun on DK. DK didn't move much did he? Here comes the juicey part.
• Reset yourself and DK to 100%, Set yourself at the end of the platform, then QA1 towards DK, then QA2 into DK. See how high he pops? This is what you want to get out of QA.

At low % QA2 can pop the opponent up for aerial strings and combo set ups. Use it, abuse it. And at high % it'll scare the pants off them.

 

[Thor]

QA turns you around if you are not facing him when he goes through you. This is true of all attacks [Falco lasers, Marth's sword, etc.]. It doesn't have the cape effect [which will turn you even if you're facing them], but it isn't a special move that never turns people around.

 

[Emuchu]

QA turns you around if you are not facing him when he goes through you. This is true of all attacks [Falco lasers, Marth's sword, etc.]. It doesn't have the cape effect [which will turn you even if you're facing them], but it isn't a special move that never turns people around.

Did not know this. Clearly I'm not paying enough attention, haha. Does this mean you can always QA through an opponent and, assuming you hit, always expect their back to face you?

 

[Dark 3nergy]

Thor is right. When any hit makes contact with the opponents body, it turns that character to face the one who hit him. This turn around on hit mechanic does not work if; they shield, spot dodge or roll.

 

[Thor]

Did not know this. Clearly I'm not paying enough attention, haha. Does this mean you can always QA through an opponent and, assuming you hit, always expect their back to face you?

As far as I know, yes. You may wish to test to verify to put your own mind at rest. Conveniently, this means jabbing you out of QA landings might now be harder if you are able to position to go through them as you land.

As a point of clarification: I might need to double-check back slash [Shulk side+b], since I seem to recall that attack not turning people around [flavor reasons perhaps?]. It is however true for every other attack I know of that flinches (some grabs function weird, like Sonic bthrow releases you facing backward, but it might be a nuance of the animation). Note that Fox lasers do not turn people around either [they don't flinch], which is good because they'd be broken in teams because you could turn them around over and over when they try to edgeguard your teammate.

 

[LunarWingCloud]

Thanks for the answers! Does it have landing lag when Pika quick attacks into the stage?

Not a lot but enough that landing too close to a prepared opponent can hurt. However it doesn't have too much in that it makes a great landing tool to get back to the ground quickly if you're trying to reset yourself.