Piston Punch? (for counterpicks)

[Ian Viola]

Recently, I have been trying to find the utility of this move. I realize that the One-Inch Punch's knockback is no longer able to kill anything (it's so annoying that it doesn't just combo better) so I'm focusing on it as a standard kill move.

I think that this move would be good for counterpick purposes for two reasons.

1. Halberd and Town and City both sport sections where comboing into Piston Punch would be relatively easy for kills. This would allow for more stage options to go to upon loss and a set to switch to for when players counterpick said stages, and thus make for viable counterpick options once the stronger counterpick stages are banned/won on.

2. Switching to Piston Punch could play off of people's habits against Mii Brawler, namely the tendency to consistently DI as vertically as possible. This would work as a decent strategy, I would think, as having to adjust as such in one set can prove to be difficult.

Anyone have any thoughts? Am I being foolish or could there be some merit to this line of thought?

 

[Marrow]

I've always preferred Piston Punch, but I don't think it kills all that much earlier than HK would in most situations.

 

[Jigglymaster]

Recently, I have been trying to find the utility of this move. I realize that the One-Inch Punch's knockback is no longer able to kill anything (it's so annoying that it doesn't just combo better) so I'm focusing on it as a standard kill move.

I think that this move would be good for counterpick purposes for two reasons.

1. Halberd and Town and City both sport sections where comboing into Piston Punch would be relatively easy for kills. This would allow for more stage options to go to upon loss and a set to switch to for when players counterpick said stages, and thus make for viable counterpick options once the stronger counterpick stages are banned/won on.

2. Switching to Piston Punch could play off of people's habits against Mii Brawler, namely the tendency to consistently DI as vertically as possible. This would work as a decent strategy, I would think, as having to adjust as such in one set can prove to be difficult.

Anyone have any thoughts? Am I being foolish or could there be some merit to this line of thought?

I already do this for both exact reasons you just stated. Stages with low vertical blast zones or high platforms such as Halberd, T&C, Delfino, and BF are all stages that you might want to play with using Piston Punch. The second part is also correct, since both Up B's require the opponent to adapt differently, it can really mess somebody up.

The only thing I should suggest is that if you're going to use Piston punch, use it with the tiny Mii Brawler, Med/Med doesn't get enough out of PP. I should also warn that using PP is harder now due to the fact that the One Inch Punch happens quite a lot and when you do get it now it basically robs you of your kill. Not to mention PP is a much worse OoS option as you can get punished for whiffing it easier and it has less kill power than HK does from the ground, making Mii Brawler's life even HARDER to KO his opponents once they've passed the D-throw Up B comb % threshold.

Basically what Im trying to say is, unless you're going to halberd with PP, you need to master the art of making sure that your opponent does not go past 70% no matter what otherwise you pretty much lose.

 

[Ian Viola]

I already do this for both exact reasons you just stated. Stages with low vertical blast zones or high platforms such as Halberd, T&C, Delfino, and BF are all stages that you might want to play with using Piston Punch. The second part is also correct, since both Up B's require the opponent to adapt differently, it can really mess somebody up.

The only thing I should suggest is that if you're going to use Piston punch, use it with the tiny Mii Brawler, Med/Med doesn't get enough out of PP. I should also warn that using PP is harder now due to the fact that the One Inch Punch happens quite a lot and when you do get it now it basically robs you of your kill. Not to mention PP is a much worse OoS option as you can get punished for whiffing it easier and it has less kill power than HK does from the ground, making Mii Brawler's life even HARDER to KO his opponents once they've passed the D-throw Up B comb % threshold.

Basically what Im trying to say is, unless you're going to halberd with PP, you need to master the art of making sure that your opponent does not go past 70% no matter what otherwise you pretty much lose.

I already use tiny mii PP. I kind of expected medium mii w/ piston punch to die stupidly easily. I think I'd stick with Helicopter Kick for Delfino, personally, but I use different mii height/weight combos (looking into 50h/0w and 25h/0w currently) so the playstyle probably differs a lot.

 

[Jigglymaster]

I already use tiny mii PP. I kind of expected medium mii w/ piston punch to die stupidly easily. I think I'd stick with Helicopter Kick for Delfino, personally, but I use different mii height/weight combos (looking into 50h/0w and 25h/0w currently) so the playstyle probably differs a lot.

The thing is about Delfino is that during stage transitions the vertical blast zone gets insanely low. You can use that to your advantage, HK works on that stage as well but its a little bit easier for the opponent to see what you're trying to do.

 

[Ian Viola]

The thing is about Delfino is that during stage transitions the vertical blast zone gets insanely low. You can use that to your advantage, HK works on that stage as well but its a little bit easier for the opponent to see what you're trying to do.

The thing is that a lot of the people I play already avoid the top platforms on Delfino even without the matchup experience, and my worst matchup that's relevant to the NC scene is Sonic, and I'd have trouble getting him to the top platform to kill.

 

[kraven202]

As dapuffster said switching between both moves is a very good strategy, its actually really good for the same reasons you just said, Counterpicking

Using both PP and HK basically destroys your opponents stage counterpick strategies as it will ensure that you will always have the advantage, just ban Final D. and some other stage of your preference and see what stage they choose then choose either one of the moves accordingly. Even if you didnt use PP on the first fight, just by it being in your arsenal is good enough to either provoke fear on the people that know you use it or take by surprise the people that dont know. Or if you won then it makes their stage bans almost irrelevant. If you won with PP and they know about the stages its very likely they r gona ban halberd and either town and city or Delfino. But if you won with HK then its very likely the first ban is gona be Delfino then either one of the other two, either way it goes you will choose the stage then pick whichever move is best for that stage. There's also other stages that benefit from using both of those moves instead of just one, like duck hunt, castle siege and battlefield.

There's also the DI mixups because the DI for d throw then gets reversed and if they DI in by mistake they r done for.

While i do agree that HK is really good PP is also really good and the real advantage is in having both in your arsenal and not just use one or the other