Pikmin in Moderation?

[The |Egg| Sniper]

Not sure how much this may help people, but I've been experimenting with a way of training my Olimar that's probably considered odd amongst other Olimar players.

Mind you, during this whole time, Pikmin Throw (side B) is almost exclusive to filtering the platoon of Pikmin, not for offense.

For starters, I went on a suicide mission by using ABSOLUTELY NO PIKMIN (this includes tossing the starter 3 right off the side of the level). Yep, I lost, but not without a fight. Taking advantage of Olimar's tilts and nair along with the natural combo weren't totally useless. Nonetheless, the kills were not with Olimar alone.

After a few total blowouts, I sent my Olimar on a less futile, less lonely mission. Instead of tossing out every Pikmin he came across, I let him have one Pikmin pal to use as his right hand man (or sword...? n_n ) This part of the training helped evaluate the overall flow of Olimar while using a particular Pikmin. I took a liking to using reds for aerials, blues strictly for throws and smashes, yellows for throws and aerials, purples for just about anything their short, pudgy butts could do, and whites....well, I won't talk about the whites.

Once that gave my Olimar the basic rundown of how each Pikmin works for particular moves (not forgetting his basic combat training back in Mission: Impossible of no Pikmin), he was assigned another cohort. Now with two Pikmin, chains of attacks are very possible, considering there wasn't any lag time before being able to use another Pikmin (Also, the ability to use a full Dsmash, not just one side based on the direction Olimar is facing!).

From there, I'm sure I'll make it towards having a full platoon of six, but for now I'm sticking with three. Not sure how these strategies will help Olimars, but a few guesses might be:

-Less reliance on camping/Pikmin Throw Spam
-A better understanding of what each Pikmin does, even if it isn't clearly illustrated here on the Boards
-Actually managing the crew of Pikmin in an order that gives each move the best output.
-Remembering that Pikmin aren't Olimar's only basis of attack. Though not disjointed without Pikmin, Olimar's other moves can help keep the opposition off his back while he DOES recruit new Pikmin. A captain is only as good as his crew, and a crew is only as good as its captain, in this case.
-Knowing the opposition, and using the Pikmin more creatively against them (I.E more reds and purples vs Samus, Snake, Bowser, Charizard).

 

[templar rage]

The only problem with less Pikmin is an even-more-easily gimped recovery. In my experience, it seems that a full 6 Pikmin chain is more than twice as long as a 3 Pikmin chain, which isn't what to expect. Its probably just perception, but. . .
That aside, some of the points you made are decent, especially the one about managing your Pikmin better. It does make it easier if you have less, but it also makes it harder because you are limited to 3 colors, when all 5 have good uses.
For the record, I don't spam Side B , I hardly even use it, but I get where you are coming from.

 

[Stiffmystirr]

Templar: I doubt he meant using that certain amount of pikmin outside of experimentation, he just wants to gradually use +1 more and figure out the best way to use them individually, as pairs, triplets and so on. No one is silly enough to gimp their already terrible recovery move ;P Though I find myself normally with 4 pikmin, hard to hav'm all out all the time

Excellent idea, I plan on trying this out myself. There might even be some advantages of purposely keeping a low number of Pikmin (disregard what I just wrote to Templar x.x Suppose your opponent is in the danger zone, why have red and white pikmin at all at this point? Sure red can still send and hurt, but it's not as valuable as a blue or purple. And having only two out, both yellow for example, you know you're going to hit with a yellow, so you can combo without him taking out a purple and sending too far.

Yes I know this gimps the majority of his potential, but this is purely a situational occurence. I'm not saying throw your pikmin out and use 6 blues so you can throw spam all day, that's just silly.

 

[DarkStraw]

Sounds like a good way to learn olimar. I dont mind spamming my opponent with pikmin, but if they are good they will put the pressure on, you wont be able to spam that easily... but usually even against good opponents you can find time to throw a pikmin on them... whenever they arent expecting it. I like to throw a pikmin on them as they charge at me, then shield and grab. Pretty much any time they are at a distance to where they cant attack you, and you cant directly attack them, i find pikmin throwing very effective, even if its just one (sometimes you only have time to throw one) Later in the game when their % is higher its better to focus on trying to KO them, throwing hardly has any affect at all.

One upside to using less pikmin is, you arent plucking them when you could be attacking, i know as i play now i have to make openings so i can pluck pikmin... anotherwords when i throw someone instead of immediatly following up i choose to pluck pikmin instead (sometimes). Not to mention at the start of the match when your invinibilty hardly lasts long enough to get all 6 pikmin... most of the time im attacked right as i finish unless i shield or attack pluck sometime later. normally if you were any other character you would be using that precious invincibilty time to attack your opponent. But olimar has to pluck pikmin.

 

[The |Egg| Sniper]

I'd also like to mention that doing this also helps keep Olimar out of situations where he has to recover. In all honesty, I'd rather be sent flying to my death than agonize over basically KNOWING my recovery is going to be stopped by an edgeguarder. Sort of an "endurance training" sort of deal. It's very clear the gimp-bility of the Olimar recovery, but with most of my characters, I try to make sure their feet stay in safe zones at all times.