Palutena Match-up thread (Face me like a god)

[Berserker.]

vs

Since Palutena is the (imo) face of customs meta, you can talk about customs also if you want. Ratio for customs will be included but talk about default meta too please

Thanks

Spoiler: Obligatory

 

[Piford]

If we talk about defaults, I think Shulk wins this very nicely. Shulk's superior mobility will help him space out Palutena. Palutena's best aspect are her aerials, but they don't really have too good of a reach so it's not a huge issue. On the ground, the main move to be worried about is jab. Her tilts and smashes aren't that fast, and really only Up Smash is really good. You have to really be cautious of up smash when approaching from the air. For her throws, I believe she relies on down throw, so make sure to DI that properly. I'd say it's probably +2.

For Customs, Palutena gets exactly what she needed to help this match up. Lightweight make her mobility so good. It's going to be much harder to space her out when not in Jump or Speed. Her follow ups become much more prevalent, so know the percentage that down throw to up air kills in all the arts, and when it stops killing as well. If she's using Jump Glide, her mobility will be amazing, but her recovery is now a low easier to edge guard. She's probably going to opt for Jump Glide on stages like Final Destination and Smashville, but on stages with a lot of platforms like Battlefield she'll likely opt for warp. Super Speed is another tool that's great for getting in Shulk's face. Make sure to get a feel for how fast she goes and what she'll do (dash attack, back air, ect.) and shield properly. One huge problem for Shulk is explosive flame. Since Shulk doesn't autosnap to the ledge, Explosive flame can be used for an easy edgeguard or at least some free damage. Make sure to space perfectly. The key thing in this matchup is managing the monado arts perfectly. Speed and Jump's mobility can really help counteract the extra mobility from Palutena's customs. Using Smash to get a kill when Palutena's in Lightweight's cool down might be best. Unless you know you are confirmed getting a hit, I'd stray away from Buster. Shield might be good at either low percents when you can punish moves on hit, or when you are at that down throw to up air kill percent. If you are really good at managing, I'd say Hyper Monado Art's might work better, but most of the time default is probably the safer option. I still think this is one of Shulk's easier high tier match-ups and I'd give it advantage Shulk so +1, but I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out even with more analysis.

 

[Linkmario00]

Don't know a lot about this MU but...in deafults it's probably a +2. Her specials do next to nothing to Shulk (maybe warp makes her a little difficult to edgeguard), we outrange her tilts and have a lot more mobility in the air thanks to Jump/Speed. Also we outspace her aerials that are the only good things about deafult .

Customs are another things however. Lightweight gives her the mobility to fight HJ/HS, and added to her very good aerials makes her quite a beast in the air. On the ground Super Speed can compensate some of her weaknesses. Like @ Piford said, Explosive flame can be a major issue for recovering, so maaaaaaybe Back Slash Charge can help with the super armor on the startup? don't really know. For me the MU is a 0/+1, probably 0

 

[Sha-Shulk]

Honestly?

Palutena has only one good smash move (Up Smash), and her moves just have bad ending lag in general, worse than Shulk's.

Definitely a +1, Shulk's favor

 

[erico9001]

Here's what has annoyed me about this MU without customs:
-Down throw combos
-Autoreticle
-Faster aerials

Here's what I've found out:
D-throw -> Fair only does 12% damage.
D-throw -> full Nair does 16%.
D-throw -> full Uair does 14%.

D-throw -> Uair kills at 105% on FD with no DI. This changes to 109% if DI'ing away from Palutena during the d-throw and the Uair, but the execution of the combo is tight if DI'ing away from the D-throw. Palutena's Uair actually sends you at a vertical angle that is slightly behind her, so the best chance for survival if caught in a D-throw at high percents is to DI away from the throw, trying to jump+air dodge ASAP, and if she hits you with Uair, then start DI'ing behind her. Now, the jump is necessary, because if you were DI'ing away and air dodged without it, you would suffer air dodge landing lag. Good Palutenas like to predict this air dodge and wait for you on ground with a F-smash. With no DI, this will happen to you any % below 108% in training mode. If DI'ing Palutena's d-throw away from her, this landing lag will be suffered even into 140% damage (Again, training mode). If you happened to be in Monado Jump, I'm sure this would be even worse due to the higher fall speed. I'm not a huge fan of the jumping + air dodge thing though, because even this can be predicted. Instead, what you can do is a Monado Art Landing Lag Cancel to cancel your air dodge's landing lag! If you are at high percents, all you actually need to do is spam B and either Shield or Grab at the same time! You will continue changing arts until you air dodge (and you can't change arts during air dodge), and it happens that this will give you a nice MALLC upon landing. Lucky, right? MALLC's invincibility frames may even do the trick of having you dodge a smash attack, but if unsure, put the shield up. She can't grab you so soon, anyways. Be sure to still DI the throw, though, and try hard to continue drifting away during the rapid pressing B/Shield or Grab. MALLC the air dodge can still be done at low percents, even 0%, but you need to time the pressing of B instead of just doing it rapidly, or you will have the art activate too late. It might be futile to do at low percents, unless the Palutena user is purposefully baiting you to air dodge, because there's not really much you can do to escape the D-throw combos except maybe mixing up your DI to make her go for the wrong aerial.

Monado Shield might be able to save you from her D-throw combos at all percents. Although, I'm not sure, because it's hard to test alone. All I know is the combo counter is not counting the D-throw combos as true combos against Monado Shield, even at high percents. Testing is definitely needed here.

Autoreticle----
Paulutena's neutral B, Autoreticle was very annoying to me. What I did not understand is how easy it is to dodge. Just jump. If she uses it while you're in the air, just fall. If she uses it when you're in the air, close enough to the ground to be hit while standing, but far enough in the air that you will get hit when you try to jump, then shield (or maybe crouch). You aren't forced to approach her. Monado Shield can actually hold its own by shielding the attack, unshielding between the 3 hits of the attack, then shielding again, meanwhile staling the move.

Fast Aerials-----
This is bad if you let Paulutena in your range. So, don't do that. Without lightweight, she actually has a pretty slow air speed (rank 37) despite her fast run speed (rank 10). Her Bair has a little more range than our Nair (less than f-tilt), and her Fair has almost the same range as our Nair. So, air slash, Fair, Bair, F-tilt, and etc. all out-range it.

Maximum Horizontal Range​

Note: All of Shulk's moves are listed from farthest to shortest. I used a custom stage I created to help assist with this, & used the Crate item to better determine the results. Not even Wii Fit Trainer was the greatest example to use the first time for this.

Note: I only measured the range of Shulk's moves by the farthest they could reach aka the Beam aka the Sourspot in most cases (Exceptions like NAir are loved & appreciated, because NAir, you break the B & B "rule"<3. I also did not test move techniques like Jump Canceled Vision).

1. Back Slash Charge sliding hit-box as Shulk with any Art excluding all 3 Speed Arts
2. Back Slash Charge sliding hit-box as Speed Shulk / DSpeed Shulk / HSpeed Shulk
3. Dash Vision counterattack (This basically looks like a disjointed Tipper hit-box, but it's the sourspot)
4. Advancing Air Slash 2nd hit
5. Power Vision counterattack
6. Vision counterattack
7. Back Slash landing Tipper hit
8. Instant Dash Attack as Speed Shulk
9. Instant Dash attack as Vanilla Shulk / Jump Shulk / Buster Shulk / Smash Shulk
10. Instant Dash Attack as Shield Shulk
11. Back Slash Leap landing Tipper hit
12. Forwarded Dash Vision counterattack
13. Air Slash 2nd hit
14. FSmash 2nd hit without angling
15. Full Jab Combo (Rapidly tapping A)
16. FSmash 2nd hit angled downward & upward
17. BAir from behind
18. Forwarded Vision counterattack
19. Forwarded Power Vision counterattack
20. FThrow collateral 3% hit
21. Air Slash grounded 1st hit AND Advancing Air Slash grounded 1st hit
22. DSmash 3rd hit from the front (It's actually the 5th hit of DSmash)
23. DTilt
24. FSmash 1st hit angled upward
25. FAir
26. FSmash 1st hit without angling
27. FTilt
28. FSmash 1st hit angled downward
29. DSmash 2nd hit from the back (it's actually the 4th hit of DSmash)
30. DSmash 1st hit from the back (it's actually the 2nd hit of DSmash)
31. DSmash 1st hit from the front
32. DSmash 2nd hit from the front (it's actually the 3rd hit of DSmash)
33. Mighty Air Slash 2nd hit
34. Jab-1 > Jab-2
35. Ledge Attack from the ledge
36. NAir from the front
37. BThrow collateral 3% hit from behind
    
38. Mighty Air Slash grounded 1st hit
39. Jab-1
40. NAir from behind
41. UTilt
42. USmash Front Ground-Hitting knock-up
43. BAir front-facing hit
44. Standing Grab
45. USmash Back Ground-Hitting knock-up
46. DAir
47. UAir

Keep in mind her Fair and Bair both auto cancel from short hop, and her Fair can be fastfalled ASAP too. Nair autocancels from full hop with immediate fast fall. Dair autocancels from full hop with a slightly delayed fast fall. Don't be tricked into trying to punish these aerials when they are going to be autocancelled. You will probably be able to punish Uair, though, because it has a very bad autocancel and 24 frames of landing lag. However, if Uair is used shortly after a FH, she can use her second jump before reaching the ground and suffering landing lag.

On ground, she actually has worse frame data than Shulk (wow, that's bad).
http://kuroganehammer.com/Smash4/Palutena

We can get closer than we are used to.

I'm not sure about what to rate the MU.

Customs make it pretty different. I have not had enough experience against custom Paulutena to say much about that. I wonder how decisive Shield Shulk would do against her d-throw combos. I wonder if advancing air slash is susceptible to Explosive Flame neutral move 2. I think lightweight Paulutena would make D-throw -> Uair an easier guaranteed kill at high percents unless already in Monado Shield.

 

[kenniky]

Palutenas prefer the air . fair is a great spacing tool, bair has decent knockback and invincibility, nair is a great combo tool and uair is a good finisher. In contrast, her grounded options are really, really terrible besides jab. None of her tilts are worth using except for catching rolls/spotdodges and shieldpoking, and even then they're extremely subpar. Smashes are long ranged, but laggy; feel free to punish with something. If you're way high up in the air, Palutenas will generally throw out usmashes, as you're pretty far away and can't punish that well; remember that usmash hits above and slightly in front of her. Jab is good - has a nice range and jab1 leads pretty freely into grab.

Palutena has some pretty terrible OoS options (grab and usmash only hit in front of her, and Warp and Jump Glide don't do damage; no Palutena uses Rocket Jump). Feel free to pressure Palutena from behind, the best she can really do is run away.

Beware of dthrow combos. dthrow sends you up and in front of her, so I guess DI away from her to avoid too many nair / uair combos.

Lightweight makes Palutena stupid. dthrow --> nair --> uair is a true combo and can OHKO on stages with low ceilings like Halberd. Mobility is extremely important in this game so Lightweight Palutena benefits a ton. Make sure not to go to low-ceilinged stages (Halberd, Town and City, etc.)

Also the thread should be called "The God-Slaying Sword"

 

[S.F.L.R_9]

ALWAYS DI her dthrow away from her. Her most damaging combo off of dthrow is nair to fair/bair/uair, and you can avoid that if you DI away from her. You can also avoid dthrow to uair (without Lightweight activated) if you DI away.

I don't have much else to say that others haven't already, but just a quick rundown on a few important custom things:

- Know her options out of Super Speed. She can continue the move and come to a halt, jump, grab, dash attack, roll, or unleash a jump cancelled usmash. Palutenas will also use it to escape aerial pressure or to recover, so be aware of where she'll be, and make sure to shield since they will often try to fair/bair out of SS on the way back to the stage.

- Do NOT shield Explosive Flame. Or, more specifically, don't shield the last hit. The last hit ignores shields, so you want to completely avoid EF is possible, or shield the first few hits and then roll away from or spotdodge the last.

- If you can, avoid taking Palutena to a stage with platforms. If there are platforms, she can use Lightweight infinitely on the platform and completely bypass the cooldown period. You probably won't be able to avoid platforms completely, so if you do have to go to a platformed stage, I'd advise to go to one with only a few platforms, or oddly placed ones. Smashville would be pretty good since the platform constantly moves and since the stage is small it's harder for her to avoid Shulk during Lightweight cooldown. On the topic of stages, always ban ones with low ceilings because Lightweight allows her to kill at 0%. Literally >_>

Spoiler: Example

 

[Linkmario00]

Didn't they remove the Lightweight glitch in last patch?

 

[S.F.L.R_9]

Didn't they remove the Lightweight glitch in last patch?

Nope.

 

[Sha-Shulk]

What's the Lightweight glitch?

Also, how do you get the shulk watermark design in your comments?

 

[Linkmario00]

What's the Lightweight glitch?

Also, how do you get the shulk watermark design in your comments?

It's a particular glitch that let Palutena refresh anytime she wants Lightweight whitout suffer the cooldown. Seems they didn't patch it in 1.0.6

 

[Sha-Shulk]

Sounds weird.

How does it KO then, if it is not an attack?

 

[Berserker.]

What's the Lightweight glitch?

Also, how do you get the shulk watermark design in your comments?

Basically, it allows Palutena to keep refreshing lightweight's up-time but you need a platform to perform it on

As for the water mark, you need a premium but this isn't the right thread for that topic

 

[kenniky]

Sounds weird.

How does it KO then, if it is not an attack?

Lightweight just makes Palutena be super fast and OHKO string dthrow --> nair --> uair

 

[Linkmario00]

About stages, I'd choose Battlefield due to Palutena being more of a vertical killer (Up smash and Up air) and Battlefields high sealing

 

[KuroganeHammer]

Palutena focuses on zoning with her high-priority aerials, his attacks can beat out her fair and dair, but you probably won't beat her uair and you outright lose to her bair.

She struggles to kill outside of getting a grab, but she has good grab range and is quite a fast character, so being grabbed is inevitable.

I'd say, played perfectly that the matchup is fairly even at 0,maybe slight Shulk advantage at +1.

Don't let her cheese you with Counter in Buster.

You should ban Halberd/T&C/Delfino because they have small ceilings and uair or usmash will kill you at absurdly low percents (50-60%).

With customs, she's suddenly significantly more mobile than you and bull**** like dair > nair > uair becomes a true combo and will kill you starting from 40% with high rage. -2 at least.

One last thing, keep the pressure on her, don't just LET her refresh lightweight.

I'm a bit late soz.

 

[Sha-Shulk]

About stages, I'd choose Battlefield due to Palutena being more of a vertical killer (Up smash and Up air) and Battlefields high sealing

*sealing* = ceiling.

 

[Berserker.]

I think this MU is a +1. Initially I thought pale-tuna was easy since her ground game sucked but she has moves that may make Shulk need to think twice. Watch out for ger b-air, U-air and dash attack. 1 of em can Ko shulk vertically at low percentages while the other 2 makes her pretty much invincible. Her reflector can gimp Shulks recovery with the slight push back. She fares against shulk really well in air. F-air comes out really fast and has good range so your spacing needs to be on point with f-air or b-air.

This MU becomes a -1 or -2 though with customs since she's basically Ebola with customs.