Official Wolf Metagame Discussion

[castorpollux]

Oh and also, you can get shieldgrabbed while u are hitting the opponent with the N-air. It's a stupid move

 

[teekay]

Nair does not have good priority. It's actually pretty bad.

I'm not saying it's a useless move, but that's just flat out not true.

 

[JCav]

ok, heres my thought of how my meta game will go. i believe in a concept of constantly moving. so do this i will keep SHing just for movement purposes.

things like empty SHs, land, f smash. or SH until hit with a fiar or bair and them just unleash from there.

keeping down smash fresh to use to ko at low percents and if its stale, go with a fair, bair, or up tilt (yes up tilt) throw in some smash boosting for an occasional approach.

grab release at high percents followed up by an AAA (can rack up 20 damage sometime)


thats all so if you wanna tell me how this wont work, go ahead

 

[gehaga]

I love to use Wolf's DashAtk/Usmash cancel. and I find myself whoring his Fsmash. I'm always surprising my brothers with my shine Fsmash/blaster and fireWolf. FireWolf can be used to intercept the enemy when your edgehoging and they're above you. just -> ^B, it works a lot.

Also whats the agreed upon name for dash attack Usmash canceling? I like to call it "Dash Smashing" or writen as "DUsmash" for Dash Up Smash.

And does anyone have any idea what Wolf is saying during his Usmash,
"I rule", "You n00b", "Hirue", "Achu", "Hyrule"? Or is wolf a Samurai Jack Fan, "AKU!!!!"

 

[MuBa]

Wow...wolf has a bunch of good moves but why isn't he top tier anymore?

 

[castorpollux]

Wow...wolf has a bunch of good moves but why isn't he top tier anymore?

He isn't popular i guess. Germ is the only pro i know that mains him

 

[teekay]

Nobody really knows what the tiers are like yet.

Wolf's potential has just barely begun to be tapped. He could move up a lot or he could stay where he is or move down. Just have fun playing him and see how things develop.

 

[Brahma]

I think Wolf is a solid all around character that has a lot of potential. He has good priority and spacing, decent priority, deals damage okay. Blaster is a great pressure projectile, Shine is a great utility move. he has good combo ability with F/Uair, Bair is a great all-around move, good jab combo, Fsmash is great for spacing. He fits into a lot of playstyles well.

His only glaring weaknesses are he doesn't kill reliably until higher % and his recovery is fairly bad. The recovery issue isn't horrible Melee Falco had a poor recovery as well, but his onstage presence made up for it. I think the issue is the same for Wolf. Over time I think more ways will be found to push Wolf's recovery a little further with things like >B cancel and such that may improve his recovery a bit.

The kill issue is something that can be dealt with too. It may just be that I main DK, but Wolf doesn't seem to be able to kill reliably until 130%+. I see a lot of Wolfs using Dsmash as a damage dealer. I throw this out myself a few times on low % enemies, but after 50% or so I start saving it for the kill, as it is single-handedly his best kill move. Anywhere you can fit a Dsmash in, you can use jab combo. It won't kill, but jab combo does good damage and you can cancel after the first two hits to lead into a lot of things, including Dsmash at higher %. Utilt KO's decently, but is pretty punishable. I use Fair a lot, so it's not that reliable for kills.

One thing of note though is his grab. Since he can grab jab so fast, you can use this to refresh your kill moves. His grab release gives you decent options, some sometimes it's worth it to not throw and just mash out as many grab jabs as possible.

Also, Dair spikes. I don't see a lot of Wolf players go for Dair spike. It's a decent kill at mid%. Personally, I try to stay on the stage and blaster as they go for the ledge, then deal with how they get up from the ledge. Going off the stage with Wolf for a Bair or Dair is always a liability. But once you get them used to making it to the ledge safely, I think it's a good idea to go for the Dair spike occasionally.


Nair is a good move. It's not a great distance approach, that's where blaster, Fsmash, and Bair come in. It's great up close though, after a shine hit or first two hits of jab combo. After one of those, SH Nair at the opponent. If they shield, you can Nair over them into shine. If they spot dodge, the Nair's multi-hit properties will cause them to get hit for a shine followup. If they roll, you land with no lag and can try for Fsmash or blaster.

His closeup game is really good. Any combination of jabs, shine, SH Nair, Ftilt, grab works well. With any of those options you can beat shield or spot dodge, and if they try to roll out, Fsmash and blaster are great.

What do you guys think of his grab game. As I said I use grab jabs to release a lot just to refresh my damage on kill moves. Other than that I just use Dthrow, then follow it up at low % with shine/jab/Nair and aat higher % blaster or Fsmash. You guys do anything different?

 

[Turbo Ether]

Wolf's grab game is nothing special to be honest.

 

[Turbo Ether]

Wow...wolf has a bunch of good moves but why isn't he top tier anymore?

He can't do anything broken. No chain grabs, no good tech chase options and no crazy disjointed hitboxes.

Average grab game.

His UP B is stiff with average priority making him one of the easier characters to gimp when recovering from beneath the stage and limits his edge guarding.

He gets chain grabbed by Falco, D3 and Pikachu and Ftilt locked by Sheik to around 70%.

He loses to MK, Falco, D3, and GW, common tournament characters. Snake can handle any matchup that Wolf can handle, plus more.

Imo, the best thing about Wolf is his punish game. He's a very hard character to outpoke and be safe against because his moves have so much range and/or speed.

Btw, Nair does have good priority. It won't go through disjointeds but it will beat a lot of other attacks in the air. The problem is the lack of histun, not priority.

 

[Juggalo]

The recovery issue isn't horrible Melee Falco had a poor recovery as well, but his onstage presence made up for it. I think the issue is the same for Wolf.

But in melee, you could almost make up your own combos as you went along onstage thanks to L-cancelling and faster gameplay. Poor recovery in this game is a bigger issue.

What do you guys think of his grab game.

I like Wolf's grab game alot, actually. All of his throws have their uses except b-throw imo.
Dthrow - use at low % because you may be able to follow it up, it does most % damage of his throws, and it forces the enemy to cover a decent amount of ground if they don't tech
Fthrow - more reliable than dthrow to follow up with attacking unless you've got them grabbed right at the edge
Uthrow - now we play the juggle game, and if you're dumb enough to DI behind me after airdodging my uair, i get a free bair. Not to mention if you try to intercept me aerially, Wolf's shine rocks.

 

[chronoize]

I like Wolf's grab game alot, actually. All of his throws have their uses except b-throw imo.
Dthrow - use at low % because you may be able to follow it up, it does most % damage of his throws, and it forces the enemy to cover a decent amount of ground if they don't tech
Fthrow - more reliable than dthrow to follow up with attacking unless you've got them grabbed right at the edge
Uthrow - now we play the juggle game, and if you're dumb enough to DI behind me after airdodging my uair, i get a free bair. Not to mention if you try to intercept me aerially, Wolf's shine rocks.

hmm thanks for opening my eyes to wolfs throw game. usually mine would be one-dimensional. i would always use d-throw

 

[ArcPoint]

Grabs, the only useful one is Dthrow.

Bthrow - For obvious reasons, this sucks.

UThrow - Airdodge takes the functionality out of this.

Fthrow - Puts them too far and for too little damage, it basically resets everything.

Dthrow - Not too far, not too close, excellent damage, what more do you need? =D

Jab - This freakin' pwns, you can do 6 of these per second with perfect timing, without you can still do a lot, that's less than 2-3 seconds and you have ALL your moves refreshed. Dsmash anyone?

Anyways: With killing, Wolf does a slight problem there, I rarely ever kill someone before 100% it's kinda hard. However, if you don't use Dsmash as a damage dealer and refresh it with Wolf's jabs then you're good. Still, it's hard to KO someone before 130 ish.

In my opinion, Nair is absolute garbage, the hitlag (Time from first attack that actually does hitstun to the time where you can do something else) is horrible, it's basically a free hit unless you actually hit them. That to me isn't reliable at all. It can be shieldgrabbed to hell and back. It's a free it. It really sucks >_>

As for edgeguarding: I think since Wolf has a problem killing, that Wolf users are just going to learn to edgeguard in order to make those lower percent kills. Without interrupting it, Wolf's recovery is actually decent (Not anywhere near Rob's, Mk's or other's... but decent) and Wolf can get back on from relatively long distance.

Also: What would you guys say is the "Current strategy" With Wolf?

 

[teekay]

Bair a ton for keeping them spaced properly, punish all mistakes with fsmash, aggressively build up damage with bair, jab, 0 lag fair and blaster, and then dsmash the hell out of them when they're over 110 or so. Basically play very aggressively using Wolf's excellent spacing and aerial game, and try not to let them get a chance to counterattack because they are getting rushed down so fast.

Unless you're fighting Meta Knight, then the strategy is to lose and pick another character.

 

[pwmlord]

i like using U smash followed by using Uair to juggle them and Bair or until they just fly off the top screen

 

[ArcPoint]

That's your entire strategy? X_X

Well anyway, my general strategy is stage control, get to the center stage However possible, and maintain it. And then pressure my opponent towards the ledge, retreat if need be, and continue pressuring. If I lose the center of the stage I generally try and barrage the opponent with lasers and find a Fsmash opening or Bair opening to get him out. And then continue pressuring. Works very well for Wolf ^^

 

[Ishiey]

About the killing issue with wolf, as ArcPoint said, edgeguarding is a viable option. A fair or bair when your opponent is coming back to the stage works well enough, and they can kill at decent percents (bair only if you jump out a lot or don't use it like you should be using it). There's also the spike, which seriously needs to be used more often, killing at 60% with wolf is too good to pass up. The only onstage options are dsmash, utilt, and usmash. When usmash hits the opponent horizontally its pretty nice, works decently when they airdodge into you.

 

[ArcPoint]

Yeah. But come to think of it, I see a lot of people who say "Wolf can't kill DK under 130%" or "Wolf can't kill Snake under 170+%"

Well, no crap, DK is the second heaviest character in Brawl, and Snake is the third heaviest. On the LIGHTER characters, if Wolf can get a good solid Dsmash in from the middle of the stage then he has a good chance of killing at 130% ish, in the middle of FD. On things like Smashville and Battle Field... even less, (Lol @ Yoshi's Story Brawl, horizontal kills <333)

 

[Koskinator]

People read this nao. Short hop fast fall bair.

 

[snadmonkey]

I've been able to do a combo several times recently and not sure if its my opponents bad di or what. Usually only works at lower precents, 0lag forward air while diing backwards, to shop backair(as fast as possible) such that u hit them with the hit box furthest towards wolf that still sends them backwards, to double jump backair. Work in games several times and not sure if this is actual combo, i'm to lazy to test it out, so anyone wanna try it out for me?

 

[ArcPoint]

Thank you laziness, but it doesn't seem like a combo just from hearing it... the lag from the Fair to the time of actually getting close enough would seem like there wouldn't be enough hit stun to do that... as far as I'm concerned it's not really a combo, I've done a little testing, but probably not to the exact specifications of your combo. >_>

 

[Boo Yah]

B-Reversal laser. Why don't I see more of it against matchups where the opponent attempts to space well?

 

[Captain Sa10]

Just going to throw this out here:

A fun chain to do if you want to catch your opponent off guard-Running Grab>couple of grab attacks>D-throw>Boosted Up-smash. This works pretty well around like mid damage since you can atleast reach your boost full length witht that.

And if you just feel like being a plan ****/douche bag to a newbie you can do this-Running grab>couple of grab attacks>D-throw>Boosted Up-smash>Anticipate DI or if you think the distance is good, just go for the over B(you'll have to jump in the air to connect). DO NOT USE THIS CHAIN IN A SERIOUS MATCH OR SOMEONE THATS AROUND YOUR SKILL LEVEL OR ABOVE, OTHER WISE, THE OVER B PROBABLY WONT CONNECT.

the caps was on purpose for emphasize if anyone cares to ask.

 

[ArcPoint]

A lot of stuff works pretty well at mid percent with the Boost Smash =)

 

[snadmonkey]

At higher precents, when u do a down throw dash after them, if they roll back shop back air them. If they stand or attack shield to regrab. If they roll away u can boost smash him.

 

[JCav]

you know, i have some high hopes for wolf as far as what kind of a character he can be


however, i feel very discouraged today after playing several metaknights, falcos, sheiks and whoever else owns wolf.

and ive seen it somewhere around here but i dont feel like quoting it but wolf does have a lot of things that hurt him, A LOT. to me, these chain grabs and f tilt locks really hurt wolf as an all around character. and not to mention his recovery is relatively easy to gimp.

im sorry that this has all been said a million times.


... i need to watch a good wolf montage to make things better

 

[JCav]

People read this nao. Short hop fast fall bair.

this is the best thing with wolf, i tried this and WOW. you can even rar kirby, this is a huge

 

[ArcPoint]

Lol, yeah, fastfalling Bairs = Pwn.

But guys, I see a lot of potential with the boost smashing. It covers a great amount of distance, it's like Fsmash x 2. A lot of people simply don't expect it. Works great as a follow up, it's alright as an approach, I mean, Boost smashing is a great asset.

 

[Brightside]

It is indeed, however I find the usual tactics like Bairs more reliable for finishing. It may be quite predictable, but I just find it a whole lot easier.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

It's still useful, though. Wolf can basically cover any kind of range with all his attacks. For medium distances he has fsmash, for bigger distances he has neutral B and ICancel into fsmash and for very big distances he can do a sliding upsmash. Very nice, imo

 

[Radiation]

Said on the last page by Arc Point, but I just recently got in the habit of using the grabjab consistently and I think that Wolf's is the best for eliminating stale moves. If you're confident you can grab them after 80%-or-so, you can jab a bunch without grabbing until they let go and have ALL your moves reset, meaning you can pretty much spam dsmash and fsmash as much as you want without worrying about the obnoxious kill %s they get to when you use them that much (BEFORE you grab them, obviously). If you're not in the habit of using it, I suggest you start doing it.

 

[-Mars-]

Said on the last page by Arc Point, but I just recently got in the habit of using the grabjab consistently and I think that Wolf's is the best for eliminating stale moves. If you're confident you can grab them after 80%-or-so, you can jab a bunch without grabbing until they let go and have ALL your moves reset, meaning you can pretty much spam dsmash and fsmash as much as you want without worrying about the obnoxious kill %s they get to when you use them that much (BEFORE you grab them, obviously). If you're not in the habit of using it, I suggest you start doing it.

So your saying when I grab instead of throwing them, just hit them a few times and all my moves will be fresh again?

 

[Van Jones]

Wow. I didn't know that. I hope that wasn't common knowledge.

 

[xcchmpn11]

This is new to me. I guess I can use dsmash a little more often now.

 

[ArcPoint]

So your saying when I grab instead of throwing them, just hit them a few times and all my moves will be fresh again?

More or less. I'm sure you're aware of the "Queue" that records your moves up to 9 moves. If these moves appear more than once in the queue, it gets degraded et cetera. Now, the grab attack you can do when you grab your opponent counts as an attack. In-person you can do said grab attack pretty freakin' fast. With each one you are inputting one move into your queue, if you do the grab attack 9 times, all of your moves are refreshed.

Although, their not completely "Fresh" there's this thing where once you lose a stock, all your moves are COMPLETELY fresh, this is when they do the most knockback, however once you use that move (As in hit a person, if you miss or hit a shield, it does not count as an attack) it will degrade, and you will never be able to get that move to that same "freshness" again, at least until you lose your stock. For example, if you hit a person with your completely fresh Dsmash, and then hit the Dsmash again, hit with 9 other moves, your Dsmash will be at the freshness it was after you hit with your very first Dsmash.

I hope that made sense xD Lemme know if it didn't =S

Edit: Xcchmpn, I wouldn't recommend using your Dsmash a little more often, sure it's a great move, but it's pretty much Wolf's only reliable kill move, it's best not to show your opponent in what situations you use it in, and it still degenerates. And if an opponent is smart, they'll figure out "Once they grab and jab and let me go, I know a Dsmash is coming"

 

[snadmonkey]

OK I'm calling on the help of the Wolf core players from way back. Many of you have learned all the simple techs and strats that works so well for wolf. I'm now calling on you guys to attempt to revamp ur game using the wolf flash cancel as a tech approach. If you do the medium length or full length cancel u can actually cover ground twice as fast. This would be mostly a tech used above 50% or so, when we land a resonable knockback move, typically fsmash or bair etc. You then use wolf flash cancel to immediately pursue and tech cahse. I was working with it some in training mode and was able to preform some interesting combos such such bair to wolf medium cancel to grab. Granted it was avoidable but so is every other tact. I've only been doing it in training mode since my timing on wolf cancel still kinda sucks, I can do it most of the time if i mash b, but I don't know which I'll get. I could see good mindgame potential if u use the medium length one for tech approaches then mix up to a short one to land in front for a surpised downsmash etc.

I would like to start on revamping wolf in this way, but dam its making my thumb sore smashing b over and over. It might be easier on me if I set a second button to b like L, but not sure yet. The reason I won't be able to work on this alot is I got a tournie coming up in like 3 weeks and might be my last irl one for quite a while and I'd like to do well.

Wolf already has a reasonable low precent tech persuit game, and some good ko moves, the problem lies in getting from 40-100 since ur only possible combo's > 12% come from grab tech chases. This could give wolf a new aspect that will deffinently take him from a newb char to a complicated one. I'll try it out some more and such, it appears best on the long one if u follow up with a tilt, though the short one can grab or downsmash relitvely easily afterwards.

Feel free to give some feedback or ideas. I plan to investigate this route further. Its hard but meh, so was learning wavedash ur first time.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Snadmonkey, read this:

http://smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=185000

This is a thread, where I deal with illusion canceling (it wasn't very popular though )

 

[snadmonkey]

I'm more curious in using it as a tech chase than an approach. Approaching with it is very predictable, I'm curious if with a faster tech chase he can follow up at higher precents some moves.

Second note, feel free to try out the infinte on wario. This I got from ZSS boards, but seems to work for wolf to. The trick is that u cannot be attempting to pummel him when he breaks out, so he needs to be above like 15% and then its only 1 pummel at a time or so. If he struggles to get out he pops in air and if u time grab just right u'll regrab before he regains control, if he doesn't struggle he pops out right in front and u just regrab. Also if u let him just pop out from struggling u can utilt him if u time it right before he can defend himself. The timing on these are very precise, but it seems to work. This regrab has been proven to be infinte for zss and yoshi. If someone has someone to test this out with that can actually get the timing perfect on this, I'd love to see if wolf can do it as well.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

I didn't know, that it works with wolf...I'll try it

 

[§witch]

Regrabs are soooooo gay and boring to do. If it's that precise and difficult to do a grab release I'm not going to practice it. I hate them mostly because I'm a ness main though, **** you marth!