Pikachu and Spacies

[Gunslinger]

Howdy y'all, I main Link in PM so you can imagine I have a pretty hard time against space animals. Since everybody and their grandma mains them. I was wondering how Pikachu fairs against them, thinking of making him a secondary to handle the spacies. It seems he has good OOS options (up smash if the space animal is in front of you, up air if they're behind). His edgeguard game against them seems really strong with u-air, f-tilt, f-smash, bair, thunderjolt, and thunder. I only see him having difficulty edgeguarding Wolf for his fast up B and his dangerous side B (don't wanna trade with that). However, in neutral it seems the spacies have an edge over Pikachu, he seems like the perfect wait to get combo'd by Falco's pillaring, Wolf's dair-shine tech chases, and Fox's up throw -> up air. I'm not as worried about Fox's combo as I main Fox in Melee and am good at DI'ing away from the throw and SDI'ing the up air. I also feel like there's a certain advantage of playing Pikachu as not many notable people play him (aside from Axe, Anther, and Esam, along with a few others I can't think of) so there's a bit of a surprise factor.

Anyways, just wanted to ask you Pikachu mains how you feel about dealing with spacies and if Pikachu is worth picking up to fight them.

 

[Paradoxium]

I think pikachu's up smash oos is a terrible option against space animals but his uair oos shield is really good.

I really enjoy the spacie match up as Pikachu, he has an amazing combo game n them consisting of mostly up throws, up smashes, and upairs. They are also really easy to gimp, especially Falco.

 

[herbmaster%]

Staying clear of their shield pressure is important, of course. approaches is the nair, followed up with a rising u-air, thought the main concern with fighting anyone with pikachu is getting too close, especially with space animals. The q-a cancel is a sweet tool for evasion, bait, defense, and approach. You can cancel next to them and aerial.

 

[Scatz]

Pika can handle the spacies if you're not caught being impatient. It's still similar to Melee matchups cause you have to respect their tools in the neutral, but Pika was practically left unchanged (buff to Bair) while spacies got nerfed a little. Wolf is similar, but Usmash OoS is safer to use on him than Falco and Fox.

It's really a question of whether you want a character where landing that one combo can wreck spacies or have a character in which your fundamentals need to be strong throughout the match/set instead of relying on certain hits.

 

[Gunslinger]

Thanks for the replies, guys. Pikachu seems like a really interesting character against spacies. He has a CG and some disjointed hitboxes like Marth, offstage gimping game like Sheik, down-smash like Peach, and an upsmash like Fox. His QAC seem like a really interesting dynamic, kinda like M2's teleport how you can act out of it. I'm definitely going to go in the lab with Pika when my Wii gets repaired.

 

[Paradoxium]

Thanks for the replies, guys. Pikachu seems like a really interesting character against spacies. He has a CG and some disjointed hitboxes like Marth, offstage gimping game like Sheik, down-smash like Peach, and an upsmash like Fox. His QAC seem like a really interesting dynamic, kinda like M2's teleport how you can act out of it. I'm definitely going to go in the lab with Pika when my Wii gets repaired.

Well for now the chain grab isn't that effective, it throws them really high so they can only be chain grabbed for a little bit

 

[Gunslinger]

Well for now the chain grab isn't that effective, it throws them really high so they can only be chain grabbed for a little bit

I'll definitely keep that in mind, thanks. How do you feel about conditioning them to DI with up-throw then back-throwing them off stage?

 

[jayeldeee]

What someone taught me a while back with Pika is that b-throw can be good against spacies at a little higher percent. If you're able to get them near the edge and b-throw off the edge, it leaves them vulnerable to a potential snipe from a thunderjolt (with of course, Falco being the best to do it on due to his crappy recovery). I guess it's something to try out and mess around for a bit to get the hang of it.

 

[Paradoxium]

I'll definitely keep that in mind, thanks. How do you feel about conditioning them to DI with up-throw then back-throwing them off stage?

Hell yea I'm all for di mix ups, once they're are off stage I usually just nair them, such free edge guards lol

 

[Leeroythuggin]

Hell yea I'm all for di mix ups, once they're are off stage I usually just nair them, such free edge guards lol

Nair is definitely a good edge guard, but as far as the back/up throw DI mix up goes... That probably wouldn't work because back throw is so telegraphed that anyone can see it coming conditioned or not

 

[Paradoxium]

Nair is definitely a good edge guard, but as far as the back/up throw DI mix up goes... That probably wouldn't work because back throw is so telegraphed that anyone can see it coming conditioned or not

Yea the only Di mix ups you can get are prolly uthrow and dthrow, fthrow and bthrow are way to slow