How Many Hits When Grabbing?

[SAUS]

Hello.

For all of my smash career I have never looked into this. When you grab someone, you can hit them by pressing 'A'. I think almost everyone knows this. However, how many times CAN you hit them? Is it different depending on character? What damages allow which amount of hits?

If it's character specific, then the numbers for link would be great and this thread could probably be moved to the link thread, but I figured I'd post here.

Currently, I usually hit too many times because I am waiting for my boomerang to hit them on its way back to me lol. I'd like to know when I should just throw them and when I should go for more hits.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Mahie]

<20% : 0 hits
[20;50] : 1 hit
From 50% to like... 100, you can get away with 2 or 3.

It's more important at lower %s where people will mash to escape but they rarely do at 100+.

Maybe someone can respond more accurately, just remember never to pummel before 20% and you'll be fine.

 

[Bones0]

Read Mew2King's "SSBM Statistics List". He gives a breakdown of how many times you can pummel and how many frames the opponent can take off of their default grab time if they mash.

 

[nooga]

bones your posts are now over 9000 btw

 

[Alexo30]

When playing as Captain Falcon, 0 hits.

 

[Habefiet]

Context is important here. Often even if you CAN jab, jabbing isn't a great idea.

I know nothing about the properties of Link's throws and his follow-ups out of said throws, so that's a question for the Link boards (if there's anyone alive over there), but jabbing gives them all the time in the world to react to the grab and DI the throw they're expecting accordingly to make it harder to follow up, whereas if you do a throw immediately out of a grab they'll miss the DI pretty often (ex. space animals popping straight up for Puff's uthrow -> Rest). I suppose given the nature of Link's grab it's a bit harder to catch them missing their DI, but still, it's something to consider if you have one specific "best throw" in a given context or if all your best throw options require the same DI from the opponent to optimally escape from.

 

[SAUS]

Context is important here. Often even if you CAN jab, jabbing isn't a great idea.

I know nothing about the properties of Link's throws and his follow-ups out of said throws, so that's a question for the Link boards (if there's anyone alive over there), but jabbing gives them all the time in the world to react to the grab and DI the throw they're expecting accordingly to make it harder to follow up, whereas if you do a throw immediately out of a grab they'll miss the DI pretty often (ex. space animals popping straight up for Puff's uthrow -> Rest). I suppose given the nature of Link's grab it's a bit harder to catch them missing their DI, but still, it's something to consider if you have one specific "best throw" in a given context or if all your best throw options require the same DI from the opponent to optimally escape from.

OMG your avatar makes me laugh every time I see it.

I think DI on link's throws doesn't really matter. There are a few exceptions, but overall, if he can combo you out of a grab, it doesn't matter how you DI. He always does down-throw or up-throw. I've only used back-throw once because it was into my falling bomb and then I down-aired them :D That's besides the point though.

I know what you mean by making people miss their DI, but Link's grab and throw animations are WAY too long to be sneaky about it. I was just wondering how many hits you can get before the throw. I do see why it can be bad, though.

Also, ya the link forum is pretty dead. It's pretty much just me posting with the occasional reply. There are threads on the first page that are >6 months old

Thanks for the help

 

[Xyzz]

Link's common down and up throws both take 30 frames to release the opponent. Even without the tether grab, that means: No you're not surprising anybody who isn't on a heavy dose of Valium.

Pummels are independent of the character you face, but instead on the human opponent before you. Every character takes just as long to break free from grabs, but this time can be reduced by mashing buttons. The theoretical optimum indicated by M2ks (or others) frame data sources isn't that commonly reached, and quite a few people don't mash at all.
The percents indicated by Mahie are super safe in my experience and pretty much what I go with as well. To be specific, I allow myself one pummel for every 40 or 50 percents the opponent has beyond 20something... unless I think throwing him faster would be beneficial for whatever reason (missed DI inputs, higher chance of them being kind of disoriented by follow ups).
If in doubt you can hear (or sneak a look at his hands, if playing that dirty is fine by you ) how mush mashing he is doing and decide by that on how many pummels are fine.

 

[DRGN]

Yeah, as Xyzz said, I usually listen for whether or not they're mashing buttons. If they're not pressing anything I'll pummel for a little while. But the moment they realize it and start pressing things I'll throw them. That can also mess with their DI, because suddenly they're wiggling their joystick rather than preparing for the throw trajectory.

I allow myself one pummel for every 40 or 50 percents the opponent has beyond 20something... unless I think throwing him faster would be beneficial for whatever reason (missed DI inputs, higher chance of them being kind of disoriented by follow ups).

You could probably do about double of this if they're hardly pressing buttons. According to M2K's formula, every 37.5% the opponent has increases their grab time by 1 second, and all pummels take 26 frames. So every +40% = an additional ~2.5 pummels (on top of the number of pummels from the initial/minimum grab time). Drop it to 2 pummels for every 40% (or 1 for every 20%, to gauge it during matches easier) and you'd still have leeway for them pressing about 2 buttons a second, without even considering the initial minimum grab time.

I wonder how long it takes to press a button, or move the joystick strait from one side to the other, and therefore how many button inputs an opponent can do in 26 frames.

 

[SAUS]

I read M2K's list and I didn't entirely understand the grab timing stuff - mostly the mashing to get out of it. He said that it reduces the grab time by 6 frames (I think it was 6, read it a couple days ago) when you press a button or input a direction (only up, down, left, or right count). How often can this be done? Couldn't you just mash a, b, x, y, r, l, and z while rotating the joy stick maniacally and get out of grabs almost instantaneously?

 

[Habefiet]

I read M2K's list and I didn't entirely understand the grab timing stuff - mostly the mashing to get out of it. He said that it reduces the grab time by 6 frames (I think it was 6, read it a couple days ago) when you press a button or input a direction (only up, down, left, or right count). How often can this be done? Couldn't you just mash a, b, x, y, r, l, and z while rotating the joy stick maniacally and get out of grabs almost instantaneously?

Glad you like the avatar. A beautiful accident.

Anyhow

The important things to remember here are 1, the higher your percent is the more preset frames you have to wait/mash through until you can get out, and 2, while you're in your pummel animation from getting pummeled you won't break out even if you're past the frame threshold until your pummel animation ceases.

The former is why you'll see Marth/Peach CG spacies on FD by doing just straight uthrows with no pummels up until ~20%, then adding a single pummel, and if it's Peach having multiple pummels at ~100%, etc. The latter is why Wobbling and various 2v1 infinites (such as use of Pikachu's jab) work.

 

[TerryJ]

I almost always opt for at least one pummel when I grab even at 0%. If they however try to break out at early percents I'll hold off on doing more pummels until like 20% or so. Always at least one.

 

[Xyzz]

you'd still have leeway for them pressing about 2 buttons a second, without even considering the initial minimum grab time.[...] I wonder how long it takes to press a button, or move the joystick strait from one side to the other, and therefore how many button inputs an opponent can do in 26 frames.

I can probably do two button presses per second with my big toe, and I'm rather average incredibly bad at hitting buttons at a high frequency... well, and even I can do multishines that aren't that far off from frame perfection and hitting "A" along the way isn't that hard to do as well (it's actually tougher to avoid lol). Which would result in about 5 or 6 button presses every 26 frames (too lazy to do math right now, but that should be fairly close ).

If you're serious about mashing you can adjust the thumb position to allow for better sliding than what people do for multishining and go crazy like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yw8s5jc4U4
Well, maybe you don't want to be so rough with your GCC, and more than likely you need to be a bit crazy to get 35 presses per second. Supposedly most people who seriously try to mash out as fast as possible get somewhere between the 10-15 I'd get doing multishines with additional A presses, and the 35 of our Japanese friend here.

Regarding why I go with the super secure way almost all of the time: I'd like to say that it's entirely on me thinking that "controller peeking" is about as bad as looking at the other screen in some split screen game and I'd much rather entirely win my matches "inside the game"... but I'll also have to admit that I tend to be rather absorbed in Melee matches; to the point where even during friendlies I sometimes stop talking mid-sentence or reply to things somebody said two minutes ago. Compare that to some irritating clicking noise I'd probably try to ignore in the first place

 

[DRGN]

Yeah, I was just thinking about those occasional cases where the person just sits there waiting for you to throw them and doesn't press anything (at least for a while until they realize they should). (Maybe they're just used to people who throw instantly?) I just played against somebody last weekend who didn't for whatever reason (and it was in-tournament where I'm pretty sure he was trying to win). And I agree with being conservative about it, since getting that extra 2-3% certainly isn't worth risking getting the throw damage + resulting combo damage + putting them in a bad position. In any case (and pretty much a general rule) one should definitely be taking into account how their opponent behaves and play off of that.

That's interesting; I don't consider hearing my opponent's button inputs cheating at all. Though I hate screen-peeking, lol. I also get pretty engrossed in matches and don't like talking, whether they're talking to me or my opponent. It affects people's choices, which messes with my predictions. I know that I could compensate by going less "yomi" levels, but ultimately it just makes it harder for me to concentrate.

Hm. So perhaps 20 inputs a second is a good average estimate for those actually trying to get out? That's -120 frames!

 

[choknater]

as an ice climbers player i pummel them for 25%-ish with blizzard into cg, or i pummel them until they die

real talk though it's pretty situational. uthrow cg's against spacies that work regardless of DI, pummeling is okay, but you do risk them mashing out of it and losing your 'rhythm.' i've seen lots of marth players who opt to not pummel at all when doing uthrow cg's because of these two risks.

for sheik, there is almost no reason to not pummel. she should always pummel at least once or twice before a dthrow, IMO. especially if you want to guarantee a KO

guaranteeing KO's is another reason to pummel

 

[DerfMidWest]

Infinite

 

[Upke]

If they are 50%+, I pretty much pummel until I hear them start mashing then buffer the throw. I don't really bother at low percents unless I'm just bored or something.