New Player trying to learn Fox

[RyanFoolz]

I've been a big fan of smash for a wile and like everyone else played melee a lot when I was younger. I am pretty determined to main Fox in this game because his movement feels most comfortable to me so far and I've just always liked the character. I'm having some issues getting KO's with him and finishing kills and also am not sure what kind of combos or moves work best or even exist because it's such an early stage in the game. This is my first time trying to get into a competitive fighter (I come from competitive console shooters) and would love any tips or suggestions you guys have as to where to start learning the character and getting better!

TL;DR - New player wants to learn fox, watches alot of smash, knows most terminology, help

Thanks!

 

[Linksmasher]

Fox in my opinion is a very tricky character now in ssb4, he lack of a finish move like Bowser and other characters, but, you can make a lot of combos and chains of moves with him, maybe the people now are saying about he is bad or something, but let me tell you about what i learn, first of all, you need to know and use every move with this guy, and secondly, need to know about, how hard is to kill or finish someone
Also, Fox is a light weight character, they can punish you if you make any error in 85% or more, so you need to be very carefull, and you need like 120 or more to finish someone, this is not a bad thing, i mean, Fox can do a lot of damage in just seconds.
Sorry if my english is bad, im not a english speaker but ill try to help in anything, im curious about how i can make my Fox better and better

 

[Rhus]

Most of the information we can give you about Fox in Sm4sh is very preliminary and will drastically change context in the next few months, so keep that in mind.

Fox McCloud is an incredibly hard character to play in all smash games and thus takes time to learn, tech skill or not, due to his innate reliance on flexible gameplay, varied pressure game and fast movements/gravity that can be hard to accurately position. Uzi has a guide on the Brawl Fox board that speaks miles for playing Fox in my opinion, stating that when you move and play the game, you must move as Fox. You must act and think quickly, but also make decisions pre-emptively.

Basically, trying to pressure the opponent from all positions is a good start, and Fox has incredible disengage and re-engage with his incredible dash speed and fox trot and also has a powerful defence at a distance in his shine. Learn the timing on his aerials, where they autocancel and their respective safety when used in different situations, and the consequences of missing an attack. These may be universal skills but they are immensely important for a character that gets punished as hard as Fox.

Blaster is only good for a far distance now due to the lack of cancelling ability, but he still performs well at a distance because of his shine, which can still be cancelled in the reflection animation into a jump, roll or spotdodge.

Up close, using a retreating Nair is still an alright approach. His jabs are really, really great now and using them up close to box is pretty solid, and his jab combo is also pretty great. Full Dair can lead to Utilt at low percents and Dthrow to Fair. Fair has a spike hitbox on the first and second kick and, if fast falled, can net some surprise kills.

Killing is usually done with Bair or Usmash, but his buffed Fsmash can be good for punishes and reads. His Usmash is still a great killing option and can still be performed as a hyphen smash and OoS. Learning to time Usmash OoS is a major portion of maintaining a "fear" in people to attack your shields as it's an obnoxiously fast and powerful kill move.

Nair is your safest aerial with good priority, a lasting hitbox and very low landing lag. I believe weak Nairs can combo into dash attack, then Utilt or another followup.

That's basically all I have for now, I'll post more later and I hope this was somewhat helpful.

 

[RyanFoolz]

Most of the information we can give you about Fox in Sm4sh is very preliminary and will drastically change context in the next few months, so keep that in mind.

Fox McCloud is an incredibly hard character to play in all smash games and thus takes time to learn, tech skill or not, due to his innate reliance on flexible gameplay, varied pressure game and fast movements/gravity that can be hard to accurately position. Uzi has a guide on the Brawl Fox board that speaks miles for playing Fox in my opinion, stating that when you move and play the game, you must move as Fox. You must act and think quickly, but also make decisions pre-emptively.

Basically, trying to pressure the opponent from all positions is a good start, and Fox has incredible disengage and re-engage with his incredible dash speed and fox trot and also has a powerful defence at a distance in his shine. Learn the timing on his aerials, where they autocancel and their respective safety when used in different situations, and the consequences of missing an attack. These may be universal skills but they are immensely important for a character that gets punished as hard as Fox.

Blaster is only good for a far distance now due to the lack of cancelling ability, but he still performs well at a distance because of his shine, which can still be cancelled in the reflection animation into a jump, roll or spotdodge.

Up close, using a retreating Nair is still an alright approach. His jabs are really, really great now and using them up close to box is pretty solid, and his jab combo is also pretty great. Full Dair can lead to Utilt at low percents and Dthrow to Fair. Fair has a spike hitbox on the first and second kick and, if fast falled, can net some surprise kills.

Killing is usually done with Bair or Usmash, but his buffed Fsmash can be good for punishes and reads. His Usmash is still a great killing option and can still be performed as a hyphen smash and OoS. Learning to time Usmash OoS is a major portion of maintaining a "fear" in people to attack your shields as it's an obnoxiously fast and powerful kill move.

Nair is your safest aerial with good priority, a lasting hitbox and very low landing lag. I believe weak Nairs can combo into dash attack, then Utilt or another followup.

That's basically all I have for now, I'll post more later and I hope this was somewhat helpful.

This is great, thanks so much for the insight. I'm really trying to just absorb any information I can from experienced players and trying to learn what moves I should be trying to learn and potential combos are out there. Played more Glory matches last night and did better for sure than my first day (could have been because I played a bunch of kids with no hands or I'm getting better, not sure yet). One thing I'm having big issues with right now is my timing/spacing. I'm finding myself thinking I can land the Fsmash or grab or something and whiffing right in front of them (usually get punished). Another thing in this game I'm trying to figure out is the priority(I believe it would be called this). Seems like so many times we both go in for a hit and I'm very rarely the one who comes out actually getting the hit off, is there something I don't know about this as well? Again, really appreciate you taking the time to help, this is why I've always loved the smash community so much despite playing console shooters (with a much worse community for sure).

 

[Reetrider]

Most of the information we can give you about Fox in Sm4sh is very preliminary and will drastically change context in the next few months, so keep that in mind.

Fox McCloud is an incredibly hard character to play in all smash games and thus takes time to learn, tech skill or not, due to his innate reliance on flexible gameplay, varied pressure game and fast movements/gravity that can be hard to accurately position. Uzi has a guide on the Brawl Fox board that speaks miles for playing Fox in my opinion, stating that when you move and play the game, you must move as Fox. You must act and think quickly, but also make decisions pre-emptively.

Basically, trying to pressure the opponent from all positions is a good start, and Fox has incredible disengage and re-engage with his incredible dash speed and fox trot and also has a powerful defence at a distance in his shine. Learn the timing on his aerials, where they autocancel and their respective safety when used in different situations, and the consequences of missing an attack. These may be universal skills but they are immensely important for a character that gets punished as hard as Fox.

Blaster is only good for a far distance now due to the lack of cancelling ability, but he still performs well at a distance because of his shine, which can still be cancelled in the reflection animation into a jump, roll or spotdodge.

Up close, using a retreating Nair is still an alright approach. His jabs are really, really great now and using them up close to box is pretty solid, and his jab combo is also pretty great. Full Dair can lead to Utilt at low percents and Dthrow to Fair. Fair has a spike hitbox on the first and second kick and, if fast falled, can net some surprise kills.

Killing is usually done with Bair or Usmash, but his buffed Fsmash can be good for punishes and reads. His Usmash is still a great killing option and can still be performed as a hyphen smash and OoS. Learning to time Usmash OoS is a major portion of maintaining a "fear" in people to attack your shields as it's an obnoxiously fast and powerful kill move.

Nair is your safest aerial with good priority, a lasting hitbox and very low landing lag. I believe weak Nairs can combo into dash attack, then Utilt or another followup.

That's basically all I have for now, I'll post more later and I hope this was somewhat helpful.

Awesome write up on fox Rhus! Thank you for this. I've been playing casually with my friends since ssb64 as fox and this was incredibly helpful now that I want to learn what i'm actually doing.

 

[Rhus]

This is great, thanks so much for the insight. I'm really trying to just absorb any information I can from experienced players and trying to learn what moves I should be trying to learn and potential combos are out there. Played more Glory matches last night and did better for sure than my first day (could have been because I played a bunch of kids with no hands or I'm getting better, not sure yet). One thing I'm having big issues with right now is my timing/spacing. I'm finding myself thinking I can land the Fsmash or grab or something and whiffing right in front of them (usually get punished). Another thing in this game I'm trying to figure out is the priority(I believe it would be called this). Seems like so many times we both go in for a hit and I'm very rarely the one who comes out actually getting the hit off, is there something I don't know about this as well? Again, really appreciate you taking the time to help, this is why I've always loved the smash community so much despite playing console shooters (with a much worse community for sure).

No problem! Fox has been my main for years, so I've spent a lot of time figuring him out, and what I love about him is how he relies on flexibility, and is only as good as not only your motor skill, but also your mental processing, and Fox has always been like this.

Timing and spacing is a skill you just learn with practice. Best way to learn would be to go to training, select an average size/speed character and keep them on stand still and practising perfect spacing on your moves, as in hitting with the tip of the active hitbox. The most important moves to learn the ranges on are Usmash, Ftilt, Dtilt, Nair, Fair, Bair, dash attack, Jab/Jab2 and Fsmash, but of course knowing all of them is necessary to playing him exceedingly well. Once you get the hang of it, set the CPU to walk and start trying the spacing and timing on them. Start with an average speed CPU like Mario (not slow) and then move to the fast walkers like Marth and Fox himself.

To really get the hang of it, pivoting Ftilts, SHFF Nair, RAR Bair and dashing Usmash are good techniques to practice (if you are confused on these ask me), as it involves you moving as well as them moving, making perfect spacing more picky. Once you start to learn the ranges and where the hitboxes are, it becomes second nature to perfect space these things.

Priority is a little strange in smash. Main reason I say that is because when we say a move has "high priority" it doesn't mean it wins against all "low priority" moves, it just means it wins the majority of the clashes. A good example is Fox's Dair in Brawl being able to go through Meta-Knight's high priority glide attack despite having a small hitbox with low priority.

In Fox's case, the majority of his moves have low priority because his attack speed is pretty much the fastest there is. Knowing this, you shouldn't be focused on winning trades by clashing, but winning trades because your hitbox came out first. Fox's Nair, however, is known for having high priority and his Dsmash is pretty solid too. His tilts don't often win many clashes but they come out incredibly fast and are good for safe poking on most character's shield when spaced well.

The Smash community is great! ^^

@ Reetrider Thanks for the compliments! Welcome to the boards! If you have any questions about Fox in terms of his general gameplay feel free to ask here. If you have something more specific you'd like discussed, you can bring the topic up in his Meta Game thread or make a new topic if necessary. Hope you enjoy your time here.

 

[Linksmasher]

You know Rhus, im new too, and im looking about what is RAR Bair, and how you can Pivot the Ftilts, i mean, i know how to do the pivot grab, and with that i can do a tilt too, but maybe im wrong and is not the right form to use the move
i see a great potential on Fox in SSB4, maybe i just need to practice more the thing about finish someone, for the moment im just trying a lot to have a chance and try to not be so predictable, but the cpu is just dont smart than a player...

 

[Reetrider]

Oh man Rhus, I have a lot to learn about this game! Your first post helped me immensely last night, i'm the type to just straight out rush people the entire game but playing smarter worked out way better using the engage/disengage style haha. I won with Fox a total of 2 times since release and went 8 for 11 last night with him. I had no idea that his up smash was that deadly too! After catching a few people with it right out of a dash they were avoiding me like the plague. If I dashed towards them after they lost a stock to it they would roll or jump allowing me to throw or use one of my aerials. If I can get some time tonight I think I might just go into training mode as mentioned in your second post and get the spacing and timing down for everything (after i google most of the terminology lol). I was missing a ton of attacks by overshooting out of a run or just completely whiffing. Thank you again for all your help! Also have you ever though about putting together your own Fox guide for SSB4?

 

[Gentatsu-]

You know Rhus, im new too, and im looking about what is RAR Bair, and how you can Pivot the Ftilts, i mean, i know how to do the pivot grab, and with that i can do a tilt too, but maybe im wrong and is not the right form to use the move
i see a great potential on Fox in SSB4, maybe i just need to practice more the thing about finish someone, for the moment im just trying a lot to have a chance and try to not be so predictable, but the cpu is just dont smart than a player...

Hopefully I can explain this well enough. I am no pro by any means, but have played smash for a long long time.

A RAR Bair is a Reverse Aerial Rush Back Air. This involves dashing, quickly mashing the opposite direction and immediately short hopping (or jumping) into a back air. If you do this correctly you should maintain your forward momentum from the dash while being able to Bair your opponent. If you just do a normal short hop, you would only be able to hit your opponent with fair, nair, or dair (if they stay on the ground). If you RAR Bair, you can use your strongest aerial to KO without needing to go through getting your opponent in the air.

Pivot ftilt. is doing an ftilt in the opposite direction of your facing. Most importantly you do this out of a dash when you expect your opponent to roll to your opposite side to avoid a dash attack. The nice thing about fox is his ftilt comes out stupidly quick. In SSB4, you can do ftilt, fsmash, neutralb and sideb out of a dash pivot. In melee you were able to do a lot more out of a dash pivot.

Some more fun things with Fox:
At higher percentages, I find that dash attacks set up a lot of your kills especially with uair and bair. Another useful fox tidbit is to shine as you are falling as people will not expect your momentum to stop for a moment which causes them to mistime their attack. Depending on the character you may be able to punish while they are still in ending lag.

 

[Rhus]

Oh man Rhus, I have a lot to learn about this game! Your first post helped me immensely last night, i'm the type to just straight out rush people the entire game but playing smarter worked out way better using the engage/disengage style haha. I won with Fox a total of 2 times since release and went 8 for 11 last night with him. I had no idea that his up smash was that deadly too! After catching a few people with it right out of a dash they were avoiding me like the plague. If I dashed towards them after they lost a stock to it they would roll or jump allowing me to throw or use one of my aerials. If I can get some time tonight I think I might just go into training mode as mentioned in your second post and get the spacing and timing down for everything (after i google most of the terminology lol). I was missing a ton of attacks by overshooting out of a run or just completely whiffing. Thank you again for all your help! Also have you ever though about putting together your own Fox guide for SSB4?

That's very nice of you, I appreciate your compliments.

Fox has to play both patiently and quickly, your punishes are still fairly unforgiving because the hitboxes are small and his combos tend to be a little frame picky like always. You must always be on the move, but waiting for something to happen is not inherently a bad idea at all. Going in without thinking it through, however, is. Try and avoid all out rushdown and going auto pilot, as it can lead to unsafe moves and get you killed really early. Applying up close pressure is one of his strengths though, so just try to remain safe while being intimidating and pressuring them. Sometimes you learn more about your opponent by just dashing towards them and putting up a shield and waiting to punish. xD

If you need help on any execution of the stuff I mentioned or the terminology let me know and I'll do what I can for explaining. @ Gentatsu- did a great job of explaining pivots and RAR Bair.

I have considered a guide but as of right now I'm not highly proficient at Fox and need to learn his optimal playstyle because he's still very flexible and I wouldn't want to write a guide without capturing that and/or writing it too early with poor advice as the game ages. This is unavoidable but I'd like to put the effort in a little later so I have a better idea of how to play him. In addition, there are likely people here miles better than myself and I can't say I would be the best for the job. If the community sees me as capable down the road I wouldn't mind putting one together.

 

[LordMasterFox]

Fox was and is always good. Fox in reality is well-balance. Can trick his challengers and than go for the kill. Fox is a master of both offence and defence. The main for Fox is to analyz your oppent while on defence to find an opening and than go for the kill and moves when its time to go into offence mode. Think Fast, Fight strong. That's how you use Fox. Btw..... Here's a guarentee combo for Fox, dair-uptilt x2-grab-down throw-fair x2. that should lead up to a 50-85% damge to any fighter than fallow by an uptilt-jab than finish with a upsmash. guarentee kill.

 

[Reetrider]

That's very nice of you, I appreciate your compliments.

Fox has to play both patiently and quickly, your punishes are still fairly unforgiving because the hitboxes are small and his combos tend to be a little frame picky like always. You must always be on the move, but waiting for something to happen is not inherently a bad idea at all. Going in without thinking it through, however, is. Try and avoid all out rushdown and going auto pilot, as it can lead to unsafe moves and get you killed really early. Applying up close pressure is one of his strengths though, so just try to remain safe while being intimidating and pressuring them. Sometimes you learn more about your opponent by just dashing towards them and putting up a shield and waiting to punish. xD

If you need help on any execution of the stuff I mentioned or the terminology let me know and I'll do what I can for explaining. @ Gentatsu- did a great job of explaining pivots and RAR Bair.

I have considered a guide but as of right now I'm not highly proficient at Fox and need to learn his optimal playstyle because he's still very flexible and I wouldn't want to write a guide without capturing that and/or writing it too early with poor advice as the game ages. This is unavoidable but I'd like to put the effort in a little later so I have a better idea of how to play him. In addition, there are likely people here miles better than myself and I can't say I would be the best for the job. If the community sees me as capable down the road I wouldn't mind putting one together.

After this weekend I can definately see an improvement in my playing. I'm starting to get the hang of the timing, hitboxes ect after practicing in the training mode and against bots. Slowly creeping up to a 50% win percentage too Thank you for all of the help again!

 

[DavemanCozy]

Weak N-air also combos into jab -> jab -> grab -> d-throw -> f-air

His F-air is very, very sexy in this game. Like others have said, you can meteor the opponent if you hit them with the second hit. You can do this with a short-hop -> F-air > fast-fall

You have to fast fall immediately after reaching the apex of your jump, which means you have to do the F-air right before reaching the highest point of your jump, and fast-fall as soon as you reach that high point to only hit them with the second hit. This is incredibly hard to do in the 3DS, the timing for connecting this move is also strict, but it's worth mastering since it sets up your opponent for an Up-smash and reduces their options to teching the meteor when they land.

Take your time with Fox. He's by far one of the toughest characters to use in any smash game, but his moveset is so good that the learning curve makes up for it.

 

[RPK]

You're new so I'll give you an incredible tip that will be hard to find. In addition to learning Fox, learn how to buffer and always think ahead. I cannot stress this enough. LEARN HOW TO BUFFER EVERYTHING AND EVERY FOLLOW UP. No matter what character you are playing, learning how to buffer will make you one of the best players in your region because everything you do will be frame perfect. The only way to lose is if your opponent out thinks you, out plays your, or you just made bad decisions during the match. It also helps promote a longer life for whatever controller youre using because you won't be mashing buttons. In all my years of playing, even when I was using Fox in Brawl where I would do RAR SHTL, or even things like buffered boost pivot grabs, I have never broken a controller or had to replace any of the parts. Again guys..Shhhh Japanese Secrets...