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I need help figuring out neutral

JackSSBU

Smash Rookie
Joined
Feb 15, 2019
Messages
9
Location
pl_Badwater
Switch FC
SW 2724-7390-2521
haven't been taking smash seriously for my life, but as a now sophomore in high school and a member of my schools smash club I want to take the game seriously. I've been tinkering and fiddling with characters and I found my favorites to be joker and mario, I like the combo game and movement they provide. I play somewhat well and am Decent at the game. I have tournament results as I placed in winners semifinals at my schools 30 player tournament with joker and mario.


Enough backstory, I feel I have all these characters main punish and movement options down, but I'm struggling in neutral. When I am in neutral I don't do much other than short hop around and look for openings. I don't know if this is the right thing as I am getting punished for my playstyle in neutral and I want to find out how to patch those holes.

Jokers punish is my favorite in the game, it allows me to get 40+ percent off of a single down tilt or grab, sometimes even a simple back air.

I need tips to help deal with neutral to take my play to the next level, Is this something that will come naturally to me with practice or am I just an Idiot? Please help and leave feedback here.
 

ShadowTheHedgehogZ

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Jul 24, 2018
Messages
340
Location
King Kai's Planet
3DS FC
4227-4459-2606
Switch FC
2267-2995-1302
haven't been taking smash seriously for my life, but as a now sophomore in high school and a member of my schools smash club I want to take the game seriously. I've been tinkering and fiddling with characters and I found my favorites to be joker and mario, I like the combo game and movement they provide. I play somewhat well and am Decent at the game. I have tournament results as I placed in winners semifinals at my schools 30 player tournament with joker and mario.


Enough backstory, I feel I have all these characters main punish and movement options down, but I'm struggling in neutral. When I am in neutral I don't do much other than short hop around and look for openings. I don't know if this is the right thing as I am getting punished for my playstyle in neutral and I want to find out how to patch those holes.

Jokers punish is my favorite in the game, it allows me to get 40+ percent off of a single down tilt or grab, sometimes even a simple back air.

I need tips to help deal with neutral to take my play to the next level, Is this something that will come naturally to me with practice or am I just an Idiot? Please help and leave feedback here.
To help I would have to play you in a match and then give you tips afterwards
 

KatKit

Smash Lord
Joined
May 7, 2014
Messages
1,628
Location
The Sass Realm
Joker's neutral game is... interesting, to say the least. He's extremely versatile, so you can play him how you need to in any given situation, but if we had to categorize his general gameplan, it's a mixture between rushdown and bait/punish zoner (and you often have to switch between the two styles). What he lacks in range and brute force (without Arsene), he makes up for with agility. As you approach, you can weave in, out, and around your opponent with gun, n-air and b-air (two safe approaches on shield), d-air (if you jump over an opponent that's shielding), and an aerial side B (if you short hop it and drift back a bit; it has weird momentum, but it seems safer to do it that way in neutral than on the ground). Your opponents are going to fish for grabs because of your rebellion counter, so keep them guessing or shielding and fish for your own grabs so that you can confirm them into combos. Punish unsafe options with dash attack or d-tilt; I personally use the latter attack to escape and approach. Don't be afraid to fill your rebellion gauge if your opponent is being predictable with their attacks. Poke around with his tilt and jab attack; it isn't a true combo but I like using jab and gun interchangeably. For example, I'll jab once or twice then switch to gun or vice versa.

I'm always down for Joker ditto matches; we can learn from one another. I'm no pro or anything, but my Joker is somewhat unorthodox (or at the very least, not flow-charty), and whatever I'm doing has given me good results.
 
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