Pika Q&A/FAQ Thread: Ask a Quick Question, Get a Quick Answer!

[Alphicans]

Don;t let yourself get hit by spindash to bair. It's a total gimmick. Make sure to DI that ****.

 

[PZ]

You can punish a sonic for spin dashing but most of the time it depends on the type of spin dash and your timing so moves like what ESAM said work best of course dash attack has a very lengthy hit box that I think would either beat it or clank with it.

 

[Cassio]

So Ive been making frequent use/experimentation of using pikas f-smash as a spacing or counter-spacing tool. Perhaps too much, but its resulted in pretty interesting tactics.

More specifically its the extreme tip of his fsmash, which outdisjoints almost every attack in the game and very conveniently also has a highish vertical reach. In conjunction with good spacing or stutter stepping it becomes a very useful tool. Its also handy that the tip knocks opponents up in a very convenient position for pikachu to follow up with other attacks.

Heres three examples that apply broadly.

1. Aerials (ikes nair, kirbys bair, etc.)
Suppose you encounter an opponent attempting to space with safe low aerials. Space yourself to be outside their range and use fsmash to catch them with the balls high verticle range.

2. Boxing (Snakes tilts, Ikes jab, etc.)
Lets say an opponent whiffs an attack or is otherwise trying to cover or hit inside close quarters space with a quick move. Instead of dashing in, an fsmash will cover virtually any offensive option in the game (think moves like wario/kirby fsmash too).

3. Spacing (MKs ftilt, Marths dtilt, MK/Marths Fsmash, etc.)
This ones a bit trickier, but still very handy. Its best used against opponents you suspect will try to space a move just outside your hitbox or on your shield, and again outranges most any move.

Theres a few more but these are the best ones. Essentially it becomes a tool to disrupt spacing. I wouldnt call fsmash a spacing tool itself since its pretty bad to just toss out, and feel the term counter-spacing is a better fit. What makes it so handy is how frequently characters attempt to rely on their own spacing tools to combat pika.

So far Ive found it extremely useful on:
Ike, Kirby, Luigi, Snake (the ones that tilt anyways...)

Handy against:
ROB, GW, DK, Marth, MK, Peach,

And mostly situational against:
Lucario, Olimar, Diddy

Never do this against:
Wolf, MK's glide attack

Havent tried it much against anyone else yet.

 

[infiniteV115]

Is it just me or does Pikachu lose to Ness?
Cause I played a few Pika vs Ness matches yesterday against a Ness main from my region, and I didn't really land anything except for uairs...and followups from uair, and other things because he rolls too much (like the CG)

But it seems like a Ness who spaces well and doesn't have easily exploitable bad habits is pretty hard to approach. Am I just playing the MU badly? (It's very possible cause I only 2nd Pikachu and haven't really tried him out in tourney yet)

 

[Pikabunz]

Dunno if Pika loses but Ness is definitely one of his harder MUs.

 

[Syko_Lemming]

It's one of those matchups like peach, where you have to have pre-emptive strikes in order to do anything. Ness likes rising fairs, so full hopped dairs are good.

If he's doing a lot of rolling, isn't that easily punishable?

 

[infiniteV115]

Yeah, that's what I was saying; the only things I was getting was
-uair, when he zoned badly
-Followups from the uairs
-Things (usually grabs) from when he rolled OoS, cause he had a bad habit of rolling OoS and I was able to capitalize

I'm saying I think it's a tough MU because outside of the capitalization on the rolling (which has more to do with the player himself than Ness), I couldn't really do much.

 

[Pikabunz]

The grab release cg helps out a lot in this MU. If you grab him, gr cg him to the edge of the stage then throw him off and try to edge guard him. If you grab him at high percents you can kill him with grab release to up smash.

 

[infiniteV115]

I know that, and did that whenever I grabbed.
Except I usmashed every time cause I figured that the next time I got a grab, the pummels would refresh my usmash.

I hope ESAM namesearches.

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

Ness advice you want?

 

[infiniteV115]

Yes please :D

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

Against ness you are going to want to focus on grabbing him and edgeguarding him.

Playing onstage works, but only if he is on the ground or above you. The battle pretty much becomes you picking your moves carefully. D-tilt is good if he is on the ground (Dash grab at 0 after d-tilt is almost guaranteed, and it is guaranteed if they trip). His **** does a lot of damage really quickly (PK Fire bat does like...45%). Just be patient enough to not get hit by the PKF stuff and you should be good.

If he is in the air facing you, his fair will beat anything you have. If he is facing away, space your uairs so that you can get a uair nair without running into one of his hitboxes. Don't try to punish fair unless he literally falls right on top of you, in which case you can shield grab or nair OOS. He is very limited if he is anywhere above you in the air unless you are in the fair bubble range. Abuse that with your fair and uair, and sometimes even dair.

You will learn through playing it what moves can mess with what in certain situations, so I can't really teach that. You must learn that for yourself (it relates to the player habits too much for me to say X always works).

The key to this MU is edgeguarding. Honestly, with how much better I've gotten at it, it seems like +1 Pikachu. You can stop his recovery with a plethora of things in several different situations:

If he is below the stage, still has his DJ, and could DJ to where he could land on stage (height wise), you should wait for the DJ and hold out jab. If you notice that he starts to up-b, just run off and nair immediately. Get ready to tech because the tail of PKT might hit you, but that comes down to timing.

If he is out there with nothing and is forced to up-b, jump out there facing the stage (Back to ness). Uair footstool the **** out of him when he starts to PKT. It is stupidly broken, and depending on where he is you can do it once, QA to the ledge, and do it again.

If he recovers high, just respect it and try to hit him back off when he comes down with fair/uair as I said before. Nair is hard to land on him in the air, but you can do it with practice.

If he recovers low but far enough out that he could DJ fair your jab attempt, you could T-jolt him. T-jolt will beat everything but nair (which you could then punish) and magnet. If he magnets, he is lower and now you can edgeguard him with edge grabbing and uair footstool. If you wanna be ballsy, you could go for a QA down-off and then up-on stage. It could interrupt him, I've done it a few times vs Shaky and killed him for it.

Example videos~

me vs coney
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsEXXo28KLw

me vs shaky (Old, you won't see most of the edgeugarding I discussed)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lq9fyy0TP4Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIwzRd-V4AY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdXBxpsQxDA

 

[infiniteV115]

Edgeguarding, right.
That's probably the reason I thought it was so hard, most of the battle was onstage, and...you know, fair XD
Thanks a bunch though, I'll definitely come back and read this again when I've tried the MU out a bit more. I think I still need some more practice with Pikachu before I'll be able to edgeguard optimally. But really, thanks.

 

[Stealth Raptor]

..... why did coney use ness vs you? @.@

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

Because when I played him I would 2 or 3 stock him on every stage that wasn't Battlefield.

 

[TheReflexWonder]

What is the highest percent you can grab a Falco and start with a fresh D-Throw to chaingrab him?

 

[Cassio]

To what percentage? At some higher percents you can CG but it ends early. tbh I dont think a clear answer even exists.

 

[TheReflexWonder]

I guess to whenever it doesn't work at all from a fresh one.

 

[Stealth Raptor]

Iirc from fresh it stops cging in the 40-50s, and in the mid 30's it stops going to 100+, the cg thread has the info, check the forum directory



I clearly remember grabbing kismet once in the 40s and he popped out around 70

 

[me9595]

Im pretty new to playing Pikachu, in fact, im just starting to pick him up, but i want to know how to QA in the same direction twice, im assuming that it requires letting go of the joystick after the first part and then reaiming it in the same direction

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

The only time you can QA twice in the same direction is if you are on the ground. What actually happens when you see it is somebody is inputting right for the first input, and then down right on the 2nd input. You can't QA in the same direction twice without being on the ground and moving left/right.

 

[Bees!]

How do you guys deal with RCO? It seems like when Pikachu is recovering sometimes after recovering you have the landing penalty. How do Pikachu mains deal with this?

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

You get away from your opponent with another QA and then just SH and land. Or you stay on the ledge until your opponent backs up and then get on for free.

 

[_Kadaj_]

I miss hanging out with you Eric!

 

[Stealth Raptor]

Also if you qa into the ground and don't jump it gets rid of it for relatively little lag

 

[Cassio]

I used to hate this stage, but the more I play on it the more I think Yoshi's Island Brawl is Pikas second best starter stage (first best dependent on the MU, second best overall). Smashville still sucks though.

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

Meh, it is really MU dependent. I think the best overall stage for Pikachu is Battlefield. **** is godlike, we have plenty of places to land so recovering isn't an issue, platform pressure is amazing, and we still have plenty of room to CG.

 

[Cassio]

Yeah BF is still my favorite, but if I win a game there sometimes I need a solid second stage. But Im starting to like Yoshis more than FD in some cases especially against CGable characters. The platform helps against characters with projectiles and assists our projectile, and doesnt heavily assist them in platform camping/running away compared to other platform stages. Actually I got the idea bc you always CP snake there.

I kind of like it vs Diddy too and jury is out on MK but Im liking it more and more.

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

Against MK I personally like BF and PS1. I don't really like FD too much...I actually don't like FD against any character, really. I mean, it is still good, but I like things to wrap around with jolts and have ways to maneuver with QA, but I also like the ability to D-throw uair footstool for free pretty much.

 

[Voltz]

Yeah, and MK wont try a gimp as often because it is risky on PS1.

 

[Cassio]

The stage I like FD for is against Marth and Peach. In some cases I like it more than SV so Ill end up there anyways (vs diddy I hate how small the stage is regardless of the fact that theres a platform, and it helps him recover too often).

Yeah I was gonna edit my post because I dont play PS1/Lylat enough to judge them, I just dislike them because I dont have experience. I see you go to PS1 a lot though so Ill play with it more.

Also Tyrant doesnt think lylat is a good stage for MK. Im not sure if its just because hes unfamiliar with it but itd be pretty awesome to just strike SV and have 5 good stages so Im going to play around there a little more too.

 

[Pikabunz]

Has anyone tried camping the edges on YI? I think it could work nicely in some MU's. As long as you stay low you become much harder to hit and some attacks just completely miss you. Like with Peach, her jabs and grabs will miss unless she's right in your face. Also, in this position, Pikachu's fsmashes will aim upward. This gives Pikachu sort of an anti-air attack which is pretty good against Peach I think. What do you guys think?

 

[Cassio]

I think thatd work pretty well. Sometimes I do that unintentionally just because I like being near the edge. Now that you mention it I think YI is probably better vs peach too. Itd probably help on the ledge too since I think pikas head sticks up higher than most characters and gets hit by more stuff. The nice thing about fsmash close to the edge is if its shielded you just grab the ledge

YI is the only slope that helps pikas fsmash from close to the ledge, all the other ones aim down and I miss when I dont mean to

 

[Pikabunz]

I think we should make a stage pick chart.

Is this format fine?
[collapse="Starter stage chart"]
x = strike
1 = top priority pick
2 = 2nd priority
3 = 3rd

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| | | | :yoshisb: | s1:

[/collapse]

[collapse="Counterpick chart"]

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:rainbowcruise::brinstar:​

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[/collapse]

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

OH MY GOD A POTENTIAL NEW THREAD ON THE PIKACHU BOARDS THAT WASN'T STARTED BY ME?!? BRILLIANT!!

I'll help with it, of course.

 

[Pikabunz]

I just did a counterpick chart too.

Oh and those stages I put there are just placeholders.

 

[| Big D |]

How do I beat Dedede?

I can't get past his aerial pressure with bairs and always fall for his inhale on landing.

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

You just have to be patient. You can't go rambo with falling aerials or he will just grab you. He will Pshield T-jolts as well, but you just have to play slow. Pretty much everything you do is faster than what he can do, so just throw it out (Things like D-tilt, Sh retreating fair work wonders). When you get in, make it count. CG him to hell, juggle and edgeguard him to hell. For edgeguarding, grab his up-b and pummel. He doesn't get more jumps so he has to up-b immediately.

 

[Pikabunz]

ESAM, post here http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=323740

 

[Luckay4Lyphe]

Does this work? http://youtu.be/ftkcvtj79Ik?t=1m49s