New To Robin. Can I Get Some Help?

[Aleccio987]

I've only just, after countless months of playing smash 4, discovered Robin to fit my playstyle perfectly. I really would like to make them my main. But first, I thought I'd come here to ask the experts. What are some bread and butter Robin fundamentals? Combos? Things to avoid? Things to look out for? Any help would be much appreciated.

 

[LochTessMonster]

Keep your Arcthunder charged and your Levin sword at the ready
I wrote a massive wall of text a while back in the matchup thread that i'm going to include here, go ahead and read it if you'd like lol.

http://smashboards.com/threads/wort...ch-up-q-a-thread.372415/page-11#post-20938206

Other advice I didn't include, practice catching your tomes. Unless you can get a combo off a move, you should always catch your tomes. I advise practicing the airdodge method of catching tomes as you don't have to suffer through the lag of an aerial if you catch the book. On that note, try not to waste the books, but don't be too afraid to use them. You'll get another soon enough, and if you try to hard to hit with a book it will probably end up with your own death.

You generally don't want to use Thoron. As absolutely Kick-arse as it looks, it's relatively weak in terms of knockback, and almost all of the other variants of Thunder have more utility.

You're also going to want to learn and practice Robin's "Checkmate", his down throw into up air combo. It's guaranteed at kill percents against almost all of the cast, but it takes time and effort to learn when you can use it.

Try to limit your use of "Tomahawks" or empty full hops, while useful for some characters who are fast on the ground and have good grabs, Robin has neither of those attributes, combined with Robin's lack of landing options can put you into more danger than you would ever want. Related to this note, short hops are okay if combined with an aerial attack, like his Fair. If you practice the autocancel windows on Robin's fair it's almost completely safe on shield.

If you're in a match with a fast character, try to limit your use of Arcfire to situations where you can A) guarantee or nearly guarantee that Arcfire will hit them, B) You are using it in a situation to force a move on their part, but still avoid situations where it won't achieve the objective, it's endlag can lead you to eating smash attacks or long strings. Arcthunder is your best friend in this, and really most matchups. It has short ending lag (comparatively) and it's multi-hit properties are similar to Arcfire except it inescapably traps opponents. Arcfire has it's uses, but it's a much higher-risk higher-reward kind of move.

I'm going to end this post here, but I linked a guide by @Zareidriel at the end which is EXTREMELY well put together and through, if you get anything out of what i've written here, i'd like to make sure it's that you check out that guide.

http://smashboards.com/guides/superior-tactics-deity-level-robin-guide.128/

These videos are also extremely helpful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUqPF4QssYc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6eRa77z214


Oh also it's nice to see another fellow Robin main here c:

 

[Zeep]

Don't Get Hit

 

[Toodenbelch]

The first at most important thing if you want to use robin more is keeping track of your tome uses and levin sword uses. You can tell by the flashing obviously but it is important to build that instinct so when you are approaching you can ask yourself "Is only 3 levin sword uses enough to pull off a nice combo or is it too risky?" but at the same time you can ask if like if having only 2 uses in your arcfire, would it be a smart idea to throw one out to trap the enemy to get like a fair string at low percent with levin sword. One thing I learned recently about Robin is that you are going to get stuck in combos like it is know tomorrow, so it is important to know how to di and how to effectively.

Using Robin puts us in a really bad position from the beginning because we lack speed mostly. I've found you can use that to your advantage. Sometimes I run away knowing that the player knows that Robin is the slowest character and that they could easily catchup to Robin. When you start running you can instantly throw an arcfire behind you and trap them and come in with a follow up. Also NEVER EVER EVER!!!! USE YOUR SMASHES UNLESS YOU CLEARLY KNOW 100% YOU ARE GOING TO HIT. Missing a smash could easily be a 30% you rack up just because you got careless. I would also mention that jumping in one someone with a fair is a great way to approach, you know why? Well, people will pick up on that very easily and what you can do is jump again out of the fast fall, and then fast fall again into a nosferatsu. Nosferatsu is a move you have to master overtime and it takes a very long time to get good at it. I myself feel very confident in using nosferatsu. You can b- reverse nosferatsu to throw people off very easily.

https://youtu.be/Vw1elkJwtDo
video to show b reversing in case you don't know how to b reverse.

I cannot stress enough that evaluating a situation is the most important thing to do as a Robin. Take a few moments in the match, don't attack and observe how your opponent plays. Eventually, I started watching my opponent almost 100% of the time since I was confident on how well I can move Robin around the stage. Like this quote goes "Keep your friends close but your enemies closer." I'm sorry if I'm rambling on a lot but I cannot stress enough that if you don't know your enemy well enough you aren't going to win.

Playing Robin you'll have mixed wins and losses. Some days I won't lose at all, other day I'll lose repeatedly to the same guy, and that is 100% completely ok. You've probably have heard this a million times but save the replays you lose so you can see your mistakes, if you have any replays you want me to take a look at post it on youtube or if is too long add me on wii u, 3ds whatever you play on. I'll gladly take a look and give some advice. I have replays on my own channel if you need to take a look at them and see how I play, but remember Robin can be played a variety of ways and that's why a find Robin such an amazing character, there are a lot of ways you can utilize Robin's move. I genuinely think Robin is underrated and in reality Robin is easily one of the best characters (Don't let tier lists get to you. They only show who is more viable. You can win any matchup with knowledge of the matchup!)

If you want me to help you get the ropes of Robin we can talk, and do some dittos and such.
My Nintendo Newtwork id: Hornet172

If you are interested just direct message me and I'll be on the lookout for a message.

https://youtu.be/K4jDxbKxR3U
https://youtu.be/WscAY1eqr24
https://youtu.be/Lfb7SM8y5cc
https://youtu.be/N6XNNgUgP7Y
https://youtu.be/e2aX7tuHexg

Some replays I uploaded of me playing Robin (Will be posting more soon)


Robin is one of the hardest characters to learn in smash without a doubt, I've poured thousands of battles with her and I'm still not the best you can be with Robin. Robin has easily one of the biggest learning curves in the game and you will be practicing for hours trying to get better with Robin. It is a really rough road when you are learning to play Robin, you will lose a lot, more than you'd like. But the most important thing that you need to remember is to learn the matchups if you know how a certain character is played, form a strategy to counteract what they do. Robin is truly one of those characters where you have to think before the fight even begins. You have to learn how your opponent moves, approaches recovers. You have to be extremely observant on how a player behaves. Heck you can tell right away how they are going to play generally from their first move they make.

Once again, I'm sorry I rambled on but I'd love to see more people get into Robin more and more so I'll help as much as I can. If you need help or want to talk about robin or just do some robin dittos or if you are uncomfortable with a certain matchup I'll gladly help. Thankyou if you took the time to read this!