Link Match-up Thread

[BigHairyFart]

Ness is pretty good for Link, Lucas is a pain in the ass.

 

[Fortress]

Haven't been in the thread for a few days, so I'll just sporadically comment on what's popped up in that time:

I'll go as far to say that Link has a strong advantage versus Roy, with plenty of options to beat out his close-range attacks and keep him at a distance. His melee-esque recovery leaves him vulnerable to simple things like a volley of arrows or a ledgehog. An aggressive Roy can be a problem for Link, since Link struggles once distance has been closed. Link suffers under pressure, and Roy excels when putting it on.

Like others have said, focus on your basic tech before you worry about matchups. Matchup knowledge will only get you so far without the tech to back up the actual advantage that you should have in said matchup. Focus on what benefits Link strongly; L-cancelling, AGT, the bomb recovery, out-of-shield tech, wavelanding, bow-cancelling, and things like that. You'll do much better across the board with tech knowledge than you will with matchup knowledge.

Ness kicks my ass. Maybe that's just me, but his recovery can get stamped out easily (laughably so) by Link.

 

[Hylian]

I think Roy does really well against Link...though the only roy I've really played against is Sethlon and that was before he was announced yet lol so >_>. It's probably changed.

 

[Heero Yuy]

I played against my friend's Roy and while I did win a couple games against him, he played aggressive as fak... You don't want him pressuring you, EVER. Best resort to a camping game against Roy to keep him away from you. The Rang really hurts Roy and stuns his approach. Also you can edgeguard him rather easily. However, Roy comboes Link hard and it's hard for Link to do anything OoS. A 50:50 MU in my book, but 10:90 in Roy's favor up close.

 

[Omnipresent]

So I was playing my friend's Dr. Mario again and didn't do so well against him with Link. I think my problem is dealing with him wavebouncing pills towards me and then coming in while I'm stunned. I'm not sure how to deal with it. I know nair, bair, and zair go through the pills while still protecting me, but I don't think they help too much when he's weaving in and out constantly. How do I deal with a pill/fireball spammer? I do better with Marth because fair for days, but I want to use Link more.

 

[Hylian]

I either just try to PS and then act out of shield or stuff them with nair depending on his spacing in relation to the fireballs. Mario is pretty hard for link so don't get too discouraged.

 

[Problem2]

Updated the Ness Section. Learned a bunch more about that match-up.

 

[Heero Yuy]

A few pro tips on the Mewtwo matchup:

- Shadow Balls CAN be camped with. Projectiles, especially the bombs, can handle this. PS'ing won't do so much since they disappear once you shoot them back at him.
- His aerial mobility tends to be unpredictable with the teleports and stuff so try to keep stage control.
- Mewtwo has GREAT throws. Avoid getting grabbed.
- Mewtwo beats him on the ground. Link beats him in the air.

I played only two matches with this Mewtwo and barely won with some well-spaced aerials, so this matchup is open for plenty of discussion.

 

[Problem2]

I've received quite a bit of experience against Mewtwo. I don't have the words to write an entire guide yet, but the main thing to pay attention to is when you decide to pull out a bomb. Mewtwo can teleport and punish you for trying to pull out a bomb, but the boomerang will hit him usually if he tries to teleport in as you're using it. Even though Mewtwo has a teleport, which allows him to get around projectiles with good timing, he's a big character, and so he has to be aware of both the space near him and the availability of the space he wants to teleport to. Teleport is set distance, so always be spacing for it. Camp Mewtwo a lot, he still has some difficulty getting past your projectile wall, even with his fancy new toys.

Edit: You know what? I'll just go ahead and stick my little bit about Mewtwo in the main thread anyways, so that there is at least something there. Also going to add Squirtle and alphabetize the match-ups by name.

 

[Heero Yuy]

Beat a mediocre Falco and got wrecked by a freakishly good Falco today. Here's some of my pro tips:

- PS'ing is your best defense against this annoying bird and his lasers.
- You don't want him pressuring you, otherwise that results in deadly pillars which Link is very vulnerable to. Keep him away with your boomerang. If he does get in, my option of choice is usually Nair OoS or WD OoS.
- Link's jab CAN halt some of his approaches. Time and space it carefully.

 

[Player -0]

Against squirtle can't dropping bombs on the ground limit his Side B approach?

 

[Fortress]

It can, yeah, but I'm pretty sure Squirtle has some kind of armor on one of his attacks. Not sure which one.

As for Falco, I dunno, I usually let the Hylian Shield take the hits. Then again, no people in our group play Falco.

 

[Problem2]

Some updates

Vs Falco NEW

Spoiler

Falco's goal versus Link, as against most characters, is to pin you down and start exerting shield pressure. Falco pretty much owns the horizontal space around him for free, so try taking him to stages with a bunch of platforms of varying heights (like Battlefield and Skyworld). Your goal is to always been on a different horizontal plane as him and pester him with your angled projectiles. Link also can also stuff Falco somewhat well by n-airing over his head to control space.

Be trying to hold onto a bomb most of the time, dropping it so that you can attack or combo. If he starts lasering your shield, you can throw the bomb OoS before he can shoot the next laser. Once he starts pillaring your shield, there isn't a whole lot of options you have left. Your options basically boil down to waiting for an opening or mistake in his shield pressure (then grab or up-b oos), or seeing where he'll commit too hard to pressuring and roll away. Pretty much anything won't work in this situation. Link's jump is too slow to wavedash or jump away. You'll just get hit.

Bad Falcos will camp the stage when you are recovering, but good Falcos will ledge grab, drop, b-air. If you face a Falco that does that, the best option is to hookshot the ledge, cancel it really fast, and then aim your up-b into hitting him. Being able to get back on stage is a pivotal point in the match-up. Your success will increase greatly if you can survive most of his edge guards.

Link has a pretty good combo game on Falco. At percents below 80%, you can try stuff out of up-throw. If you grab Falco near the ledge, you can also try tossing him off and then edge guarding him. If he tries to recover late, it's almost a free n-air gimp, but knowledgeable Falcos will Illusion almost immediately, in which case, you just hit him from on stage. (In Melee, Falco could illusion before LInk recovered from b-throw, but I don't believe this is true in PM)
80% is the magical percent for throwing against space animals. At 80%, Link can d-throw into up-b guaranteed for a kill.

Falco is one of the easiest characters for Link to edge guard. In a lot of situations, if you can cause Falco to dip below the stage, you can drop out there with your n-air to gimp him. Smart Falcos know this and will move very fast to recover and mix-up illusioning on stage or towards the ledge. You'll have to become aware through practice what moments Falco will have time to escape from beneath and when he will not. If you respect when he can escape and recover high, you can cover ledge, then hit him if he recovers high. Usually this is done by throwing your boomerang downwards to cover the ledge and awaiting his high recovery. If he up-bs, you can n-air him out of it.

Vs Mewtwo Update!

Spoiler

Update: (1/3/14) A quick update on this match-up. His b-air is deadly. Mewtwo perhaps has the strongest edgeguard in the game because he can follow you anywhere with floating b-airs which will carry any character to the blast zone, especially Link. Another lesson I learned recently is that fully charged Shadow Balls will actually beat your boomerang. Yes, it goes right through the boomerang and can hit you if you are not careful. Careful Mewtwo players will camp outside your zoning range to prepare his Shadow Ball for exactly this purpose. You can try to up the pressure to get some free damage while he is charging, but once he has it charged, you should respect the Shadow Ball a little better. You can keep a bomb on hand to stop it. Bombs still collide with Shadow Ball, even when fully charged, and there are ways to throw the range without leaving yourself vulnerable.

Vs Squirtle Update!

Spoiler

Update: (1/3/14) Another idea that AeroLink and I have been trying is placing bombs on the ground to stop him from being able to withdraw as much (this was even suggested by someone on here). I don't think it's amazing, but it does slow him down. Every little bit helps. The more I play this match-up, the more aggressive I become. I've been gradually using less and less projectiles and been approaching more and more with spaced f-airs. Squirtle's weakness in general is his short moves and mediocre options against pressure. Squirtle is weird, unlike most characters who have armor at the start of their moves, I think Squirtle's armor usually comes later in the move, where it's not as useful, but packs a larger surprise factor. This is why he loses to constant pressure though. His armor doesn't help him to get out of it.

 

[HarryTheChin]

Lol. I got bodied so hard by KirkQ's R.O.B. what are some things that should be done against a ROB? I've never played a good one until Kirks...

 

[FlashingFire]

I'm pretty sure there's a twitch archive of JCaesar's New Year's Smashfest. He goes R.O.B. against Hylian's Link a fair amount, so if you can find it I recommend watching the matches for tips.

 

[Player -0]

Does Link's Shield block shadow ball? If so then we can just tank it while Mewtwo is in endlag. Don't forget when you're walking your shield is still blocking.

If someone checks that then also see if Link blocks non charged, partly charged, and fully charged balls. Also if he blocks while crouching.


I think Bombs make Squirtle come out withdraw when they explode? It'll limit his approach options to jumping over the bomb w/ withdraw, running up and wavedash grabbing the bomb (wavedashing back and throwing at you or forward and trying to get behind you and throwing the bomb at you?), running through the bomb, SHFFLing in with an aerial, waiting the bomb out, or something else?

Squirtle might be able to Shellshift Up-Smash you if you're not careful.

Might make a list.

 

[Vale]

Does Link's Shield block shadow ball? If so then we can just tank it while Mewtwo is in endlag. Don't forget when you're walking your shield is still blocking.

If someone checks that then also see if Link blocks non charged, partly charged, and fully charged balls. Also if he blocks while crouching.

Link's shield blocks Shadow Ball both in and out of crouch. A short-hopped non-charged Shadow Ball will go above his shield to his head, but you can get around those pretty easily.

 

[Kaeldiar]

Some notes on the Fox MU:

If you can get him off the stage, you're golden. You can jump out and nair him, or if he comes back, f-smash and up-b will send him too far away to recover. That being said...how do you win the neutral game? Spacing is of course very important, and you want to try to get some big hits on him, since overall, Fox is going to combo you better than you combo him. I find that he has difficulty with short hop nair approaches. He doesn't have a lot of tools to stop it. Falco has the laser, but Fox's won't stun you. At very low percentage, both hits of f-smash will hit, and possibly combo into an up-b. That sequence together gets you about 45% on him, which means that further hits will give you space. Mixing wavedashing and rolling can mess up his approaches and help create the opening for that combo.

Spacing: Boomerangs and bombs work wonders, especially since most Foxes forget that the Reflector actually reflects projectiles! If he starts to get in too close, up-tilt, up-smash, f-smash (due to large horizontal coverage), and nair all help to keep him from comboing you.

Once Fox is in and starts comboing you, it's hard to get out without taking severe damage, but if you can tech roll away, you can minimize the damage.

Recovering is pretty standard. I like to space my up-b so that I hit them as I come up, since I seem to get baired when I try to sweet spot the ledge

 

[Player -0]

If the Spacies remember about their shine then try to throw your bomb at their feet as it will explode and they'll still take damage (of course they're running everywhere).

Against spacies if you get an early grab near the edge when they're at low percents does Up Throw -> Spin attack semispike work? Of course you would need to techchase over and then spin if they DI'ed to the stage.

 

[PATH O__o]

I think Bombs make Squirtle come out withdraw when they explode? It'll limit his approach options to jumping over the bomb w/ withdraw, running up and wavedash grabbing the bomb (wavedashing back and throwing at you or forward and trying to get behind you and throwing the bomb at you?), running through the bomb, SHFFLing in with an aerial, waiting the bomb out, or something else?

I've done this against a squirtle before, and it was highly effective.

Anyone have any advice for the Ike match up? I had trouble approaching one last night. Any advice is highly welcomed.

 

[Player -0]

Fair outranges most of what we have, I think you might be able to use a bomb if he's spacing with fair. Ike can get in fairly quickly if you're not careful due to his Quick Draw. I think Link's Zair might be able to outspace his fair. I don't have much firsthand experience though.

 

[Kaeldiar]

Not sure how well it would work in P:M, but in Brawl, I would "fake approach" to get Ike to use a move, then go in for a real approach in the heavy end lag

 

[Heero Yuy]

I played with this really good Roy today and I have some ideas on how to handle him:

Roy will generally try to get in and pressure you. If you're in your shield, clearly he'll try to grab you with his broken grab range. Grabbing leads to combos = sad Link. The moment you read the grab with an airdodge, SH Nair is a good option to get him out of the way. The Nair in general is probably your best bet on dealing with aggressive Roys. Also, good Roys WILL crouch cancel, but you can CC him back. Most moves, excluding Roy's Fsmash, can be CC'd and be followed up into. The Fsmash is the one move you DO NOT want to get hit by. Try to keep away from being in front of or behind him by using the projectiles. You also have a great advantage on him when you're far away.

Note that Roy beats Link on the ground but Link beats Roy in the air. Link has a good grab game on Roy, too! Dthrow --> Utilt leads to a lot of combos on Roy. Knock him off stage, the place you want Roys to be, and you can edgehog his bad recovery.

Neutral game-wise... The rang and bombs are good at slowing him down, but expect a lot of PS'ing. You generally just want to stay away from his grab range, because that's where Roy will start pounding you hard.

 

[Player -0]

Not sure how well it would work in P:M, but in Brawl, I would "fake approach" to get Ike to use a move, then go in for a real approach in the heavy end lag

Ike has L-canceling in this though, combined with Fair's range and Link's mediocre run speed I don't think you can punish his Fair spacing.
I could be wrong.

I played with this really good Roy today and I have some ideas on how to handle him:

Roy will generally try to get in and pressure you. If you're in your shield, clearly he'll try to grab you with his broken grab range. Grabbing leads to combos = sad Link. The moment you read the grab with an airdodge, SH Nair is a good option to get him out of the way. The Nair in general is probably your best bet on dealing with aggressive Roys. Also, good Roys WILL crouch cancel, but you can CC him back. Most moves, excluding Roy's Fsmash, can be CC'd and be followed up into. The Fsmash is the one move you DO NOT want to get hit by. Try to keep away from being in front of or behind him by using the projectiles. You also have a great advantage on him when you're far away.

Note that Roy beats Link on the ground but Link beats Roy in the air. Link has a good grab game on Roy, too! Dthrow --> Utilt leads to a lot of combos on Roy. Knock him off stage, the place you want Roys to be, and you can edgehog his bad recovery.

Neutral game-wise... The rang and bombs are good at slowing him down, but expect a lot of PS'ing. You generally just want to stay away from his grab range, because that's where Roy will start pounding you hard.

Roy's grab range is a BIT smaller than Marth's. Also if you're at a decent percent his Down Tilt will make you go into the knockdown state, so be careful of at (I'm pretty sure anyway... Can you tech roll when you CC stuff?)

 

[AeroLink_the_SoulMaster]

I'm pretty sure there's a twitch archive of JCaesar's New Year's Smashfest. He goes R.O.B. against Hylian's Link a fair amount, so if you can find it I recommend watching the matches for tips.

I saw Hylian doing some Link dittos. They were going in! Lol, with Problemo our Link dittos are just a patience testing campfest. Very interesting to see the exact opposite spectrum in the ditto MU.

 

[Problem2]

mmmaybe if we just started power shielding everything, it would be different. lol

 

[Heero Yuy]

Link dittos IMO are like Marth dittos but with projectiles. You have to be patient and know when to go in at the right time.

P.S. Link dittos are jank. :/

 

[Heero Yuy]

(Double post, sorry.)

The Sonic MU can be either 70-20 or 45-55 at worst. It depends on the Sonic's playstyle - aggressive or defensive.

This MU is merely a spacing and patience game. Smart Sonics will not simply charge into you, and in fact they WILL camp you in order to find an opening. The goal here is to keep pressure, as Sonic also struggles with severe pressure. Like Problem said, keeping him near the ledge is the best place you want a Sonic to be. Apply your pressure with the projectiles and read as best as you can what they will do next - roll, jump OoS, UpB OoS, etc. Link has a really good grab game on Sonic, too. However, it's immensely hard to grab a smart Sonic and he punishes Link hard on whiffs. Again, keep the pressure to make your chances easier.

You can't really outzone a Sonic because he's so fast and can run around the whole stage. While the annoying rodent is buzzing around you with SideB or DownB, it's a good idea to keep a bomb in your hands to halt his approach if Zair-dropped space-accordingly. Try to have a bomb ready as much as you can. Nair and Zair are also good spacing tools in this MU. Play it safe at all times, keep the space, and pressure with patience.

Sonic has a lot of qualities over Link, however. Sonic WANTS to knock you off stage in almost every scenario. His Fair is a certified Link killer for it can either send him flying away or spike him. Sonic also combos Link really hard and can juggle him in the air with Uairs and NeutralB's up to high percentages.

In a nutshell, don't allow him to punish you and maintain stage control and pressure at all times.

 

[Hylian]

These are from 2.5 but here are a ton of me vs Sethlons Sonic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSUWlXSo6Ww

You will have to account for link being worse in 2.5 and sonic being better in 2.5 but maybe you can take somethings from it.

 

[Kaeldiar]

Currently my strategy for facing Lucas consists of switching to Mario, my secondary. That being said, it's tough to pressure Lucas as Link partially because he's so damn small. It's tough to get a hit on him. You'll want to consider angling your boomerangs up or down, because if you throw it straight, he'll just jump over and combo you to Hyrule Come (sorry, had to). I like to toss my bombs up as well, as it forces him to approach me head on. That makes it easier to use up-smash, up-tilt, and f-smash to break his approaches. I find that Lucas works sort of like a spacie with better aerial combos and worse edgeguarding. You will want to keep him on the ground as much as you can.

Spacing is crucial. You want to keep him at the tip of your reach or just a little bit further. It's a really tough MU, and might be one of Link's hardest. Only Ivysaur has given me as much trouble.

 

[Hylian]

My strategy for lucas: Use nair and grab him. Link is probably lucas's worst match-up, grab combos are brutal and nair beats his entire moveset, not to mention free edgeguarding with nair. I've played almost all of the best lucas players and my opinion has never changed.

 

[Skeith]

Seeing a lot of empty spots in OP. I can help with this, I'll post some matchups later, feeling lazy to type it out at the moment and a lot of info >_>. In the meantime people can analyze this ARC(Mewtwo/Marth) vs Skeith (Link). Marth may feel even to some on average to most, but people have no idea how ridiculous the Marth matchup actually is for Link at a high level. From my experience it's actually worse than it is compared to Melee -_-. If I had to rate it, the matchup would unfortunately be 70/30 in Marths favor if you know what you're doing (well the worst at least); probably 50/50? for average Marths. It should be noted that I'm quite known to be a Marth slayer, and can usually handle most Marths. I'm not saying Marth is that OP but there are some things in the matchup that feels like it shouldn't work regardless of skill. And as much as I don't like to admit, it's not exactly Marths fault but rather how Link is damaged, but that's for another time for me to explain.
Matchups I'll probably type out later: [?'s are info I have little experience on but might be sufficent]
Bowser?
C. Falcon
Diddy Kong
Donkey Kong?
Falco
Fox
Ganondorf
Ike
Ivysaur
King Dedede
Link???
Lucario?
Luigi?
Mario?
Marth
Metaknight?
Mewtwo
Mr. G&W
Peach
Samus
Sheik
Snake
Wolf?
Zelda
and maybe a few others I may have missed.
If anyone wants me to explain a matchup from the above list I'll post it. I'll post most of these eventually. As for the ones with question marks I know some of it but don't quite completely know it so avoid asking me those for now >_>.

 

[Player -0]

Wait.... How is the match up WORSE than melee...?

 

[Heero Yuy]

Some matchups that I think favor Link but are commonly favored in the other direction include Peach, Sonic, and Ganon. However, some overrated matchups that people commonly think favor Link include Marth, Roy, and Bowser.

Now here's some of my notes on Captain Falcon:

Captain Falcon has always been tough for Link, and even with Link's new toys in P:M it can still be tricky. Falcon's Nair clanks the boomerang and his mobility is great enough to dodge simply bomb throws. Mixups in maintaining space are the key. You must NOT be jabbed or grabbed by Falcon at all costs. Those lead to combos and Falcon is notorious for all his punishes on Link. The knee can also trade with the Nair, except one of these is obviously far more powerful.

Nair, however, is a great combo starter! Falcon has quite a lot of trouble in the air against Link, as Link can do some heavy damage with Uairs and Bairs. Link also has plenty of options to edgeguard Falcon, too. Nairing him off stage out-prioritizes the Falcon Dive (this only worked ONCE in a match I played with him and it's the only time it ever happened in all of our matches. Someone can prove this wrong), edgehogging also hurts, but most importantly UpB is almost a guaranteed kill from higher angles he tries to recover in.

Current Verdict: 40-60 Falcon's favor.

I haven't looked into Link's grab game on Falcon yet, but just note that he's heavy and falls fast like the spacies.

 

[Player -0]

If CF is Dash Dancing right out of Link's normal Fair range you can try to quick airdodge forward and throw a zair to try to pop CF up. You might have to airdodge towards CF and up a bit. You don't have too much lag from it although you'll have to quickly move back and regain your spacing if you miss.

 

[Problem2]

Sorry that I've been falling behind with the match-up thread. I need to compile all the advice that has been discussed lately. Maybe I'll update it between watching matches on the Apex stream this weekend.

 

[Frost | Odds]

Link/Marth favors Link.

Does Link have any counters or even bad matchups? I'm pretty salty about how hard he wrecks both Kirby and Bowser, but don't really know what to do about it.

edit: How does Diddy do?

 

[Player -0]

Link/Marth favors Link.

Does Link have any counters or even bad matchups? I'm pretty salty about how hard he wrecks both Kirby and Bowser, but don't really know what to do about it.

edit: How does Diddy do?

Link has trouble against straight aggression/rushdown.

If you're going to say it favors Link then you have to give reasons.

 

[Frost | Odds]

If you're going to say it favors Link then you have to give reasons.

I disagree. The matchup was known to be pretty even in Melee, and Link has been dramatically buffed for PM.

Marth can't approach Link. His usual spacing tricks are ineffective, and he basically chomps on projectiles all day. His recovery is incredibly easy to hose with a weak Link nair. There's not really much else to say.

 

[Hylian]

If you think Link vs Marth is even in melee then >_>.

I think it's pretty even in PM. Weak nair does not stop marth up-b, he can just up-b again right away. Marth can approach fine with wavedash OoS and by swatting projectiles with his sword and combos the ever living **** out of Link.