Pikachu: A discussion

[PsychopathicEmus]

it's flashy! i like flashiness, as much as it screws me over =D. about short-hopping though...how did you guys practice short-hopping? just sitting there in training mode tapping the x/y button? or is there a better way for it(like for L-cancelling, you can do fox's dair-->reflector)?

 

[festizzio]

I can speak for myself here, although it probably won't help you much. I mained Falco for a long time before Pikachu, so pressing X quickly came naturally to me when I started Pikachu.

 

[Nigachu]

Yeah, shorthoping is quite difficult but im coming along with it but for some reason I always shorthop when I don't want to like when I want to shuffle through them and don't go far enough.

Question: whats a good way to approach a weapon spammy link?
I've tried baiting him to attack me but he often sticks to his campy strategy

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

ah...so practice with other characters first? my secondary is dr. mario, i hear it's a little easier with him

 

[Tagxy]

It could help, but to be honest I would just keep working with pikachu. Pikachu has the quickest jump among other characters, which his why is wavedash the hardest too. If you try another character it could throw you off. Usually what I do is fight a large character like DK on level one (now nine) and make my sole attack a short hop air neutral. If I accidently do a regular jump I don't attack. Make sure to practice your l-cancel too.

(like for L-cancelling, you can do fox's dair-->reflector)

What's this?

Question: whats a good way to approach a weapon spammy link?
I've tried baiting him to attack me but he often sticks to his campy strategy

Maybe others have a better strategy, but I you can try jolting him until he starts attacking. The jolts have more range, just wait him out.

 

[Anther]

Vs Link Psychopathic--
Rule number 1, you don't really want to approach link while he's holding a bomb, that's asking for trouble. Otherwise for the most part its getting used to the timings in which he's vulnerable while spamming. That's all there is to it in my opinion. When I first played my roommate, I couldn't approach him worth sheet. I called my girlfriend and cried that night that I lost 10 matches in a row to link. But eventually you should get used to some sort of pattern, just keep looking for it. Then the battle gets a lot more even...

Here's some vids of me vs link. You might be able to pick some tactics from our games..

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8158492619796367429#37m56s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5rTk_bLqGA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISFM6ZOfbM0

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

lol i dont think the link question was mine, but i have trouble with link anyway, thanks =D. and i'll try that nair strategy against the DK...gonna be hard to tell if i l-cancelled the nair though, it's just a quick move overall lol. thanks tag for the advice. and for the l-cancelling thing, there's this one thing you do in training mode where you choose fox. you then do a dair, l-cancel it, and immediately do a shine. if in the "hits" box or whatever it shows a number greater than one, it means you did the l-cancel, otherwise you failed =p.

 

[Anther]

lol, oops, I meant nigachu XD.

 

[festizzio]

lol i dont think the link question was mine, but i have trouble with link anyway, thanks =D. and i'll try that nair strategy against the DK...gonna be hard to tell if i l-cancelled the nair though, it's just a quick move overall lol. thanks tag for the advice. and for the l-cancelling thing, there's this one thing you do in training mode where you choose fox. you then do a dair, l-cancel it, and immediately do a shine. if in the "hits" box or whatever it shows a number greater than one, it means you did the l-cancel, otherwise you failed =p.

That works sometimes, but it's also possible to l-cancel it and have it still not be a combo.

 

[Nigachu]

Vs Link Psychopathic--
Rule number 1, you don't really want to approach link while he's holding a bomb, that's asking for trouble. Otherwise for the most part its getting used to the timings in which he's vulnerable while spamming. That's all there is to it in my opinion. When I first played my roommate, I couldn't approach him worth sheet. I called my girlfriend and cried that night that I lost 10 matches in a row to link. But eventually you should get used to some sort of pattern, just keep looking for it. Then the battle gets a lot more even...

Here's some vids of me vs link. You might be able to pick some tactics from our games..

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8158492619796367429#37m56s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5rTk_bLqGA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISFM6ZOfbM0

It's not that I can't beat my best friend's link, after all, I made him dread playing my pika. My general win to loss ratio with him is 3/1. He also doesn't grab as much as he should. I noticed that before he did. It's just that my other friends who play link (but don't nessecarily main him) just to pwn me and make me look worse than I accually am. It's just tough for me to adapt to different play styles when going up against the same character.

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

heh, i heard from my competitive smasher friend that in higher-up play, people use the first 2 stocks to experiment and analyze the other person's style of play, and uses the second 2 to beat them.

 

[D. Disciple]

heh, i heard from my competitive smasher friend that in higher-up play, people use the first 2 stocks to experiment and analyze the other person's style of play, and uses the second 2 to beat them.

Sandbagging anyone?

 

[festizzio]

heh, i heard from my competitive smasher friend that in higher-up play, people use the first 2 stocks to experiment and analyze the other person's style of play, and uses the second 2 to beat them.

That sounds like a lot of bs. >_> sandbagging johns

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

ehhh...dont think it's sandbagging. i mean, it's not like he wouldnt be trying his best to win. but he's really mindgame heavy. so he(and other competitive smashers?) uses the first 2 stocks to figure out how somebody plays and what he can do against them, THEN using the second two to actually implement them(give or take one stock lol). i mean, if he gets beaten, he'll readily admit that it was a fair match and the other player was more skillful. and he's a really good/modest guy. i was just mentioning that to nigachu because he says it's tough for him to adapt to other styles of play. so therefore, he could focus on mindgaming and figuring the other person out on the first two stocks instead of straight up using familiar strategies...and then on the second two stocks, take advantage of any holes in his playstyle.

edit: maybe i'm not thinking of sandbagging in the right sense...
sandbagging is when you're purposely not trying your best so you have an excuse when you lose, right?...or something like that?

 

[Fogo]

could somone describe pika's super WD in detail for me please?

im rather curious as to what it is, also, how do you do the thing where you QA to the ledge from standing on the stage?

i always end up going back and forth lol

 

[outRAGEous]

ill show you how to get on the ledge with up b, it's pretty easy. i don't know how to do the superwavedash but it looks like you have to have an opponent do something to get it to work. which is impractical looks neat though

 

[Anther]

To SuperWD, basically quick attack needs to clank with another attack while pikachu's at ground level. So it can happen if you're recovering horizontally and crash into a jab or certain projectiles... But you have to be at a perfect height for this one to work... so... Otherwise, the way that I do it consistently is to wait until you get your opponents projectile game to something that's somewhat predictable. Jump into the air, quick attack toward the ground, and then left or right into the projectile. If it clanks, then off you go!
I also think that if anyone wants to play with it more than I have, I think if you alter the angles of the second part of QA, you can shorten the distance of the slide by like half, which has led to me just mashing on the c-stick and getting a free d-smash/u-smash... plus looking ridiculously cool?!? I know right =D???

 

[Tagxy]

I tried doing it with just a quick attack on the ground, and it didnt seem to work. YOu have to go into the ground first for it to work, don't you?

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

for quick attacking from the stage onto the ledge, try jumping first, that helped me a bit. also, i think somebody mentioned that when you're sweetspotting, dont hold the control stick in one direction, just hit the direction and let it go back to neutral. for me, once i got the hang of getting on the ledge with the jump, going from standing onto the ledge came fairly easily. also, make sure you're not too close to the edge, that way it doesnt work...you want the majority of the first part of the quick attack to be over the stage

 

[Tagxy]

If you learn to do the shallow QA you can go to the ledge from basically anywhere on the stage with enough room for you to fall off.

 

[pikachun00b7]

Hmmmm... It seems(according to the roster) that me, Pikapika, pine, and N64 are going to Viva La Smashtaclysm. The only thing to do is a Pikachu FFA on big blue.

 

[psykoplympton]

since there is no wavedash in brawl, do you pika will have an advantage cuase of up-b tricks, granted he still has them?

 

[outRAGEous]

thanks anther

 

[festizzio]

since there is no wavedash in brawl, do you pika will have an advantage cuase of up-b tricks, granted he still has them?

That is entirely possible. He can still quick attack edgehog like in Melee, I didn't get a chance to try out anything else because I didn't even know there was anything else at the time, but I'm sure it's possible.

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

hmm...i was just thinking about this: which do you think helps pikachu more, mindgames or techs?
in my opinion...mindgames

 

[festizzio]

Mindgames, but it's nothing without speed. I was wondering if there's a list somewhere of all the attacks that ping sometimes and all the time with Pikachu's Quick Attack? I was trying it the other day and I found a few with my friend but if there's a list that'd be much easier.

 

[pikachun00b7]

hmm...i was just thinking about this: which do you think helps pikachu more, mindgames or techs?
in my opinion...mindgames

Hmmmm.... Upsmash.

 

[festizzio]

usmash is lame...nair spamming ftw. :D

Oh by the way check out this awesome Pikachu figure I got for $3.50 at a tourney I went to yesterday: http://www.go-pokemon.com/tfg/common/img/spin/NQ_17_Pikachu_Spin.gif

(Yeah I know it's not an actual picture of the one I got, but it's the exact same. )

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

lol festizzio...that's a fierce-looking pikachu >=). i HAVE to ask though...why do people seem to prefer the wizard(party?) hat pikachu?...i mean i understand the green one makes pikachu yellow-green. but red just seems to make pikachu a darker yellow...i usually go red hat, but i've started trying out hatless pikachu =O. haha, sorry for the random question XD

 

[festizzio]

I actually use the green hatted pikachu all the time, he looks like a pimp and green is my favorite color. Blue hatted pikachu doesn't look right, it's too big. And Pikachu's ninja headband outfit in Brawl is SICK!!

 

[PsychopathicEmus]

ah...lol...i dont really mind the hat...not sure i like the green tint pikachu gets though...anybody else have an opinion on this?

 

[festizzio]

So...nair out of sheild...I like it.

 

[N64]

uair out of shield ownsssssss

 

[festizzio]

Can't argue with that.

 

[Scissors Sir]

Can't argue with that.

Yes you can!!! Uair out of shield doesn't own... it only rents!!!

Uair out of shield can't afford to actually "own" anything...

Uair actually got into a fight with Bair and Nair cried

When Dair found out what happened, he called Uair to apologize for Bair and Dair's actions...

What the hell am I talking about?

EDIT: Uair out of shield owns!! Short hop uairs are cool too... u still have time to WD b4 u land from them.

I like to nair or fair and cancel into a rising uair.

My favorite when I can get it to work is

Falling nair (not started until ur close to overlapping the opponent)-> rising short hop uair (fall towards the opposite side of shield u start on) -> WD back to other side of shield -> grab

Just looks cool as hell (to me at least)

 

[festizzio]

I did cool stuff against jiggly by accident, I did two shffl'd nairs to (what was meant to be an usmash) a rising uair. People around me were like "callllllm down".

I was fighting my friend's fox yesterday and he was attacking my shield, and at just the right moment I did a shffl'd nair out of the shield and he just fell off the level and died. O_o I guess it must have really caught him off-guard.

Something cool to do that I learned while playing tagxy the other day: dsmash when they're hanging on the ledge, they can't do anything except jump to avoid it, and then they can't punish the lag.

 

[Tagxy]

Down smash is my crutch, I use it too often for my own good (but I love it so). I've also been playing towards the edge and offstage a lot more thanks to some of anther's videos. Leads me to lots of SD's, but I'm getting better. Of course that strategy doesnt work at all against falcos, his dair pwns.

 

[Fogo]

but you can destroy his recovery, my pika eats falcos instead of rare candies.

 

[festizzio]

but you can destroy his recovery, my pika eats falcos instead of rare candies.

Yeah that's if you can find a way to get him off the stage and have time to react to what he's doing, soooo much harder than it sounds.

 

[Fogo]

yeah, takes a min, but a well placed neutral can stop anything