Q&A Mechanics & Techniques Discussion

[Pixel_]

After some testing, I think I know what it is now. The animation when you turn around probably makes you move a little bit forward. This property along with the fact that momentum carries over after landing, causes you to continue moving during your turning-around animation. This normally doesn't happen because when you're turning around on the ground, there's none of that momentum from the air, so there's no reason to move.
This means that you can do this out of an empty shorthop, which makes this tech a lot more applicable.

 

[Vipermoon]

Buffered after Ftilt, Marth gets a boost from walking backwards (turning around) compared to forward. This is probably related.

 

[Fox Is Openly Deceptive]

Congratulations. You found Pivot Landing and Crawl Dashing.

 

[Pixel_]

Congratulations. You found Pivot Landing and Crawl Dashing.

aw maaaan is it already a thing or did you just make up awesome names for it? I hope it's the latter.

Even if it's already a thing, searching it up has almost no results. There's this video which actually looks really interesting despite the bad quality and this reddit thread but I haven't found anything on Pivot Landing.

(also if I were left to name it, it would've had a terrible name. I was actually considering Landing Lag Sliding or Landsliding as a name because I couldn't come up with anything)

 

[Fox Is Openly Deceptive]

aw maaaan is it already a thing or did you just make up awesome names for it? I hope it's the latter.

Even if it's already a thing, searching it up has almost no results. There's this video which actually looks really interesting despite the bad quality and this reddit thread but I haven't found anything on Pivot Landing.

(also if I were left to name it, it would've had a terrible name. I was actually considering Landing Lag Sliding or Landsliding as a name because I couldn't come up with anything)

Yeah they're known things (use the smash dictionary for a brief reference, otherwise the search results on smashboards should come up with some stuff around early brawl).

 

[Pixel_]

Yeah they're known things (use the smash dictionary for a brief reference, otherwise the search results on smashboards should come up with some stuff around early brawl).

welp. Time to oversell it and try to make it sound really important on my youtube channel.

How many techs like these are buried though? I'd like to make videos on them too.

EDIT: Made the video. Is it worth making a thread about it to make it more public? I checked it out on the Dictionary and it's in the same section as running, which is kinda weird. I might make a video on Pivot Walking, too.

Description:
A bit of a shorter video, but this description should make up for it lol

I used Sheik for this because she has a pretty good pivot landing.
Using subtitles instead of weird Movie Maker text is actually pretty great: you don't have to republish a video to make changes, and it works on mobile unlike annotations. I'm planning on using it more often.

So, explanation time. I rediscovered this technique but it existed since Brawl times (maybe even Melee?):

"Pivot Landing"/"Craq Walking"- 'Drifting' backwards then continuing to hold backwards upon landing so that you turn around to get a slight boost in the direction you were going. Alternatively, drifting forwards then upon landing lightly turning around and then holding back in the direction you originally jumped to get a slight boost.
- http://smashboards.com/threads/the-smash-dictionary.374538/

It might be helpful for catching the opponent off with fades, and having a sliding down smash is pretty helpful. It can be used after autocancelled aerials or empty shorthops (not shown in the video, but this should be very helpful since you can empty shorthop towards people into a sliding down smash), so even though it might not be super useful, it's not unrealistic to use it during a match.

 

[teluoborg]

How many techs like these are buried though? I'd like to make videos on them too.

A ton.
There are a lot of quirky things you can do thanks to the way the game handles its vectors, from making someone slide by footstooling his roll to this one tech where Roy/MK (and probably a lot of other characters) cancel the beginning of their walk with a crouch to get a momentum boost.
Hell, most people don't know that you can cancel the lag of an airdodge by sliding off an edge if you're facing towards said edge.

There isn't a place to find them all afaik, so if you want to do a video about it you'll have to find them first.

 

[EnhaloTricks]

Check out a video going over "Sliding Pivots". That's exactly what it looks like to me but with a crouch.

 

[Pixel_]

Check out a video going over "Sliding Pivots". That's exactly what it looks like to me but with a crouch.

Yeah, that's it. It's a really popular video except with the wrong name again.

 

[FLYING 7UR7LE]

I just did what looks like a waveland. Can anyone tell me what happened of if they have had this happen?

Here is a link:
http://youtu.be/_-9fTUnp4ZY

 

[Pixel_]

I just did what looks like a waveland. Can anyone tell me what happened of if they have had this happen?

Here is a link:
http://youtu.be/_-9fTUnp4ZY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oBLDQlPkQk
If the video showed just a little more, it could be easier to confirm.

EDIT: Rewatched the video, I have no idea how I came to that conclusion.

 

[ぱみゅ]

I just did what looks like a waveland. Can anyone tell me what happened of if they have had this happen?

Here is a link:
http://youtu.be/_-9fTUnp4ZY

Assuming it was not the Omega version, the clock has a slight slant on its border.
Doc probably just fell on the slant and slide on it.

 

[FLYING 7UR7LE]

Now that I look at it, I think it was the slant of the clock.

I just tested it out.
I'm disappointed that it a glitch.

 

[Vipermoon]

Can Marth B-reverse Counter? If so, can it be done (realistically) without special controls? I couldn't get it to work when I tried it. It would really help for edgeguarding.

 

[A_Kae]

Can Marth B-reverse Counter? If so, can it be done (realistically) without special controls? I couldn't get it to work when I tried it. It would really help for edgeguarding.

Counter can't be b-reversed, with or without special controls.

 

[Vipermoon]

Counter can't be b-reversed, with or without special controls.

Thanks. I'm kind of surprised because it was one of the Dspecials that were reversible in Brawl.

 

[EnhaloTricks]

I just did what looks like a waveland. Can anyone tell me what happened of if they have had this happen?

Here is a link:
http://youtu.be/_-9fTUnp4ZY

You can do this on Lylat as well for some interesting things. Have gotten some interesting kills this way lol

 

[ぱみゅ]

Why would you need to B-Reverse a Counter with Marth? It will be facing to the hitbox that activated it anyway.

 

[Pazx]

Why would you need to B-Reverse a Counter with Marth? It will be facing to the hitbox that activated it anyway.

Movement options, as well as the benefit of being able to control your orientation if you don't successfully counter an attack (I guess). A Brawl Marth player I know liked to sometimes use ledge hop b-reverse counter as a way to get back on stage.

 

[Vipermoon]

Why would you need to B-Reverse a Counter with Marth? It will be facing to the hitbox that activated it anyway.

Oh it is extremely important. Say Marth, with the lowest aerial friction in the game runs off stage real quick to get the Counter edgeguard. What's this? You didn't want to drift away from the ledge? Too bad. So anyway, Ryu wisely decided to recover directly below or even further inside the ledge so now you lost stage control.

Here's an example of Mr. R B-reversing it in Brawl (nvm can't find it right now but it was in a combo video)

 

[Masonomace]

The only exception to being able to B-reverse a counter that I can think of is Shulk, but not exactly. Shulk can use the art activation from a Monado art & B-reverse that followed by inputting Vision counter as soon as the endlag of the art activation finishes. It looks pretty neat & can help when needed, but aerial Vision counter is pretty bad.

 

[DanGR]

According the Kuroganehammer, Bayonetta's ledge jump is intangible f1-12 with her FAF on f13. Bat within activates on f1 of her airdodge. What this means is she can ledge jump-> airdodge/bat within with no vulnerability frames until after the airdodge/bat within.

When testing it out, it works as theorized. I can get the bat within to activate on f1 to avoid (and counterattack because why not) any aerial attack used to intercept the ledge jump. Yes it's as disgusting as it sounds. However, when I tested ledge jump->bat within against Luma rapid jabs held at the ledge, I couldn't get the bat within to activate consistently. I quickly tapped the airdodge button to make sure I'd buffer the airdodge, but bat within didn't activate every time- only part of the time. Does anyone know why I can activate bat within against aerial attacks consistently, but not against held Luma rapid jab?

 

[Lavani]

According the Kuroganehammer, Bayonetta's ledge jump is intangible f1-12 with her FAF on f13. Bat within activates on f1 of her airdodge. What this means is she can ledge jump-> airdodge/bat within with no vulnerability frames until after the airdodge/bat within.

When testing it out, it works as theorized. I can get the bat within to activate on f1 to avoid (and counterattack because why not) any aerial attack used to intercept the ledge jump. Yes it's as disgusting as it sounds. However, when I tested ledge jump->bat within against Luma rapid jabs held at the ledge, I couldn't get the bat within to activate consistently. I quickly tapped the airdodge button to make sure I'd buffer the airdodge, but bat within didn't activate every time- only part of the time. Does anyone know why I can activate bat within against aerial attacks consistently, but not against held Luma rapid jab?

For whatever reason, item drops are the only action that can be done f1 after ledge jumps. 1f dodges/invuln moves like Bat Within, Dolphin Slash, Rising Uppercut, etc. still have a vulnerable frame because they can't actually be done instantly in spite of the FAF.

nvm, what Yikarur said

 

[Yikarur]

You cannot buffer out of a ledge jump (except Z-drop) so you have to input airdodge frame perfectly.

 

[Megamang]

That is some interesting foresight, since ledge jump and ledge getup have incredible frame data and if you could buffer an airdodge or nair out of it, you'd pretty much see that all the time.

Looking over this frame data, I'd say unless you have a great ledge attack (m2's has some distance but even then...) you wanna mix up the regular getup and ledge jump mostly.

And I feel bad for ever missing a bayonetta ledge roll :#

 

[Vipermoon]

So we know that the higher a character's gravity, the more knockback they take in a vertical launch. This is to avoid the Melee effect where the two best characters have some of the best vertical survivability in the game despite being lightweights.

Why do I feel like this doesn't apply to Limit Cloud? He gets a gravity boost with Limit and I feel like his knockback gets unadjusted in that transition. It seems as though I am surviving things I shouldn't with Limit, and even watching the knockback happen makes me think the knockback doesn't match the gravity.

 

[Lavani]

So we know that the higher a character's gravity, the more knockback they take in a vertical launch. This is to avoid the Melee effect where the two best characters have some of the best vertical survival in the game despite being lightweights.

Why do I feel like this doesn't apply to Limit Cloud? He gets a gravity boost with Limit and I feel like his knockback gets unadjusted in that transition. It seems as though I am surviving things I shouldn't with Limit, and even watching the knockback happen makes me think the knockback doesn't match the gravity.

He also gets increased fall speed which ends up resulting in a slight net gain for vertical survival when in limit.

 

[Vipermoon]

He also gets increased fall speed which ends up resulting in a slight net gain for vertical survival when in limit.

What does terminal velocity have to do with knockback results? I'm actually wondering, because it doesn't sound like it should be involved.

Are you confirming that there isn't a knockback adjustment for Limit gravity?

 

[Lavani]

What does terminal velocity have to do with knockback results? I'm actually wondering, because it doesn't sound like it should be involved.

Are you confirming that there isn't a knockback adjustment for Limit gravity?

It's weird, I don't know how to explain it beyond "knockback velocity != standard velocity", it seems like characters still "fall" during knockback so fall speed does matter. Editing a character to have melee Falco fall speed makes them pretty much stall in place for the latter half of vertical knockback.

Calculating those speeds separately would also explain why knockback speed can't be utilized for B-reversing.

And no, there's a knockback adjustment for Limit gravity, it's just lesser than the reduced knockback height caused by the increased fall speed.

 

[Vipermoon]

It's weird, I don't know how to explain it beyond "knockback velocity != standard velocity", it seems like characters still "fall" during knockback so fall speed does matter. Editing a character to have melee Falco fall speed makes them pretty much stall in place for the latter half of vertical knockback.

Calculating those speeds separately would also explain why knockback speed can't be utilized for B-reversing.

And no, there's a knockback adjustment for Limit gravity, it's just lesser than the reduced knockback height caused by the increased fall speed.

Wow, super weird. Even if they fall during knockback, it won't be at max speed, so it's really interesting to see that the game uses it anyway. Anyway, thanks for the info.

 

[DanGR]

Questions at the end.

---

Luma upair has hitlag of 8 frames.

Hitlag Formula:
INT(((d/2.6+5)*e)*h)*c)-1
INT(((4/2.6+5)*1)*1.5)*1)-1 = 8

FAF for upair is f42.

I want to see how quickly a second Luma upair can happen after landing the first one.

Hit with Luma upair #1.
FAF of 42. & 8 frames of hitlag.
Hitlag during f42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49
Begin upair #2 on f50.
Hitbox active f3-10. f50, 51, 52.

Hitbox begins on f52?

---

If an attack incurs 50 frames of hitstun, is the soonest the opponent can begin their airdodge animation on f51? Does hitstun canceling exist in smash4 in any form? I've heard yes, no, maybe so, and I don't trust the smash-wiki. I imagine if it does exist (which it "feels" like it does in some form), it'd be related to the tumble state.

 

[Megamang]

You can airdodge early out of hitstun. Its the foundation of aerial 50/50s. If you couldn't, then they would either not combo, or would always combo, since jumping away would always be the best escape option.

 

[Funen1]

If an attack incurs 50 frames of hitstun, is the soonest the opponent can begin their airdodge animation on f51? Does hitstun canceling exist in smash4 in any form? I've heard yes, no, maybe so, and I don't trust the smash-wiki. I imagine if it does exist (which it "feels" like it does in some form), it'd be related to the tumble state.

You can act out of hitstun either on frame 41/46 (air-dodge/attack and jump) or whenever the hitstun normally wears off, whichever is smaller. The frame 41/46 values are more like caps than anything else, though they still require input from the player - if you don't do anything, your character will still be shown as flying/reeling through the air (before they start tumbling) for however long the hitstun calculation says they would.

 

[Clamhat]

I was doing some work with the Spacejam calculator and gravity and I ran into a conundrum:
- Hitstun is calculated after gravity knockback is added to total
- Gravity knockback is applied only to the vertical knockback component
- vertical KB component is based on the launch angle
- launch angle can be changed with DI

which leads to the following question: can DI affect your launch angle in such a way that you received decreased gravity KB and thus less hitstun? The answer is no, DI cannot affect how much hitstun you receive.

Here's how I tested it:

1. Training mode, playing Captain Falcon against Fox. (to remove Rage and Staling from KB formula. Fox is my test subject as he has the biggest gravity KB modifier - 11.32)
2. Establish constant parameters for moves to test vertical DI as well as horizontal DI
   • For horizontal DI, I use the foot hitbox of Falcon's strong hit up air (10% damage, 10 BKB, 100 KBG, 70-degree launch angle.)
   • For vertical DI, I use any hitbox of Falcon's down tilt (10% damage, 38 BKB, 80 KBG, 25-degree launch angle.)
3. Use the Spacejam calculator to calculate raw KB values at various %s with no DI, then incorporate gravity KB to determine without-DI knockback at those %s, use that to calculate gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Up air at 0% on Fox deals 48.1786 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 18 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Down tilt at 0% on Fox deals 67.6155 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 27 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
4. Choose a critical threshold of knockback/hitstun that can be confirmed visually
   • When a target receives >32 (that is, 33 or more) frames of hitstun they will enter DAMAGEFLY/tumble state
5. Calculate which %s produce the closest amounts of KB/hitstun to that threshold
   • Up air at 39% on Fox deals 84.7146 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 32 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Up air at 40% on Fox deals 85.6523 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 33 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Down tilt at 26% on Fox deals 84.8369 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 32 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Down tilt at 27% on Fox deals 90.9001 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 33 frames of gravity adjusted hitstun
6. Using only DI (held direction while taunting) in every direction, attempt to cross the threshold from the opposite side (i.e., trigger DAMAGEFLY before Fox's % crosses the threshold and trigger DAMAGE3 after Fox's % crosses the threshold)

I was unable to cross the threshold or otherwise affect the hitstun received with any DI angle. This means we can conclude that DI does not affect how much Gravity-Adjusted Knockback/Hitstun you receive from an attack.

 

[samosa]

I was doing some work with the Spacejam calculator and gravity and I ran into a conundrum:
- Hitstun is calculated after gravity knockback is added to total
- Gravity knockback is applied only to the vertical knockback component
- vertical KB component is based on the launch angle
- launch angle can be changed with DI

which leads to the following question: can DI affect your launch angle in such a way that you received decreased gravity KB and thus less hitstun? The answer is no, DI cannot affect how much hitstun you receive.

Here's how I tested it:

1. Training mode, playing Captain Falcon against Fox. (to remove Rage and Staling from KB formula. Fox is my test subject as he has the biggest gravity KB modifier - 11.32)
2. Establish constant parameters for moves to test vertical DI as well as horizontal DI
   • For horizontal DI, I use the foot hitbox of Falcon's strong hit up air (10% damage, 10 BKB, 100 KBG, 70-degree launch angle.)
   • For vertical DI, I use any hitbox of Falcon's down tilt (10% damage, 38 BKB, 80 KBG, 25-degree launch angle.)
3. Use the Spacejam calculator to calculate raw KB values at various %s with no DI, then incorporate gravity KB to determine without-DI knockback at those %s, use that to calculate gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Up air at 0% on Fox deals 48.1786 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 18 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Down tilt at 0% on Fox deals 67.6155 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 27 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
4. Choose a critical threshold of knockback/hitstun that can be confirmed visually
   • When a target receives >32 (that is, 33 or more) frames of hitstun they will enter DAMAGEFLY/tumble state
5. Calculate which %s produce the closest amounts of KB/hitstun to that threshold
   • Up air at 39% on Fox deals 84.7146 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 32 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Up air at 40% on Fox deals 85.6523 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 33 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Down tilt at 26% on Fox deals 84.8369 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 32 frames of gravity-adjusted hitstun
   • Down tilt at 27% on Fox deals 90.9001 units of gravity-adjusted KB and 33 frames of gravity adjusted hitstun
6. Using only DI (held direction while taunting) in every direction, attempt to cross the threshold from the opposite side (i.e., trigger DAMAGEFLY before Fox's % crosses the threshold and trigger DAMAGE3 after Fox's % crosses the threshold)

I was unable to cross the threshold or otherwise affect the hitstun received with any DI angle. This means we can conclude that DI does not affect how much Gravity-Adjusted Knockback/Hitstun you receive from an attack.

Could you specify how you calculate the gravity knockback?
So the vertical component is taken from the launch angle of the move, in this case 70 degrees for falcon upair?

Does anyone know if rage contributes to hitstun? Like do u calculate hitstun, using knockback+rage knockback or is hitstun calculated before the knockback from rage is added

 

[Lavani]

Does anyone know if rage contributes to hitstun?

It does.

 

[Clamhat]

Could you specify how you calculate the gravity knockback?

Gravity Knockback is calculated with the equation ((G*21.6) - 1.84) * 5, where G is the character's gravity attribute (ranges from 0.19 for Fox to 0.05309 to Jigglypuff - gravity values lower than and including Donkey Kong's 0.08505 will actually result in vertical KB reduction)

Plugging fox's gravity into the equation gives us the value 11.32, which is added to the vertical component of KB calculated by either the standard or training mode KB formula (both found here, but the pre-gravity KB is what you use the SpaceJam calculator for). Horizontal/vertical KB components are found with trigonometry:

horizontal KB component = (standard/training KB) * cos(launch angle of the move)
vertical KB component = (standard/training KB) * sin(launch angle of the move)

add the gravity component to the vertical KB component to get the gravity-adjusted vertical KB component, then plug the old horizontal KB component and the new vertical KB component into the pythagorean theorem:

Gravity-Adjusted KB = sqrt( (old horizontal KB component)^2 + (new vertical KB component)^2 )
Gravity-Adjusted Hitstun = floor(Gravity-Adjusted KB * 0.4) - 1

Does anyone know if rage contributes to hitstun? Like do u calculate hitstun, using knockback+rage knockback or is hitstun calculated before the knockback from rage is added

Rage is only part of the standard VS. mode KB formula (it does not factor in at all to training mode KB, which can be useful). It's a number between 1.0 and 1.15 that the standard KB formula uses as a multiplier in the very last operation, but before gravity is added. To the best of our knowledge, the general order of standard KB/hitstun calculation goes like this:

1. Raw KB is calculated from attack damage/staling, target damage, target weight, attack KB growth, and attack base KB (not necessarily in that order)
2. Raw KB from step 1 is multiplied by factors for rage, crouch cancel, grounded meteor, and target charging smash (last 3 are constants). This is the Pre-Gravity KB.
3. Pre-Gravity KB has the target's Gravity KB component added to its vertical KB component using the process described above. This is the Gravity-Adjusted KB.
4. Hitstun is calculated using Gravity-Adjusted KB (the result of steps 1-3). The number of hitstun frames calculated here is not modified by any subsequent step.

Any changes to launch angle/trajectory/KB received by the target that are the result of the target's DI take place after step 4.

 

[sRocky]

I do not know if this has been discovered yet or not so I might look like an uninformed idiot. Okay so I was messing around in training trying to get better at the Yoshi Jab, Dtilt, Fair. I noticed that If I timed it perfectly (right as I left the edge (I think Frame 1)) rather than using the Fair, a Nair occurred. I told one of my friends and he said it could just be a buffered aerial but I was holding Right (or left) the entire time. Is this a new tech? If this is a new tech then I wonder how this could be used for edgegaurd situations. Again, this might be well know but I have not been able to find anything about this on Smashboards from what I saw.

 

[Vipermoon]

I do not know if this has been discovered yet or not so I might look like an uninformed idiot. Okay so I was messing around in training trying to get better at the Yoshi Jab, Dtilt, Fair. I noticed that If I timed it perfectly (right as I left the edge (I think Frame 1)) rather than using the Fair, a Nair occurred. I told one of my friends and he said it could just be a buffered aerial but I was holding Right (or left) the entire time. Is this a new tech? If this is a new tech then I wonder how this could be used for edgegaurd situations. Again, this might be well know but I have not been able to find anything about this on Smashboards from what I saw.

Did you use the C-stick and do you have the C-stick set to Attack?

 

[Lavani]

I do not know if this has been discovered yet or not so I might look like an uninformed idiot. Okay so I was messing around in training trying to get better at the Yoshi Jab, Dtilt, Fair. I noticed that If I timed it perfectly (right as I left the edge (I think Frame 1)) rather than using the Fair, a Nair occurred. I told one of my friends and he said it could just be a buffered aerial but I was holding Right (or left) the entire time. Is this a new tech? If this is a new tech then I wonder how this could be used for edgegaurd situations. Again, this might be well know but I have not been able to find anything about this on Smashboards from what I saw.

It's been known for a long time, but it probably isn't the sort of thing most people are going to encounter. I first noticed it near release when I was trying to combo Wizard Foot ledge cancel > uair on Ganondorf and it'd always buffer nair instead. I'd consider it more of a nuisance than a tech in that regard, since it actually removes options for your first frame off the ledge.