PPMD's Falco Discussion Thread

[stingers]

results != skill dude
look at the buttons he is pressing, not the numbers next to his name

 

[Dr Peepee]

How do we quantify his skill based on gameplay except what is exhibited at tournaments?

Not sure I'd quantify, but if I were attempting to bridge this gap in skill comparisons, I'd want to look at what Westballz is inputting and his general strategy and see if it matched up with what Stingers said. This could also be compared to other Falcos as a basis of observation or even other players in general to see how Westballz matched up in ways such as adaptation, offense, defense, ways to handle momentum for and against himself, combo potential, etc.

Beating someone is important and means a lot when factoring in whether or not someone is good, but often we may miss key things about sets by taking them at face value(who won or lost) and applying that knowledge to an entire set. Whether someone played well or not can be of little consequence so long as someone won or lost. This is certainly true for whoever advances in bracket, but not necessarily for who one believed should have advanced in bracket based on one's own perceptions of skill and individual ability for a given player.


I'm devil's advocating here, but I'm sure it would be easier to speak against results-oriented ideologies than for them because I've found that the vast majority of this site is about results now.

 

[Warhawk]

results != skill dude
look at the buttons he is pressing, not the numbers next to his name

I'm sorry but S2J is at the skill level where I can't believe that he would be beaten by an unskilled player just because that player played Falco. I can believe Westballz is worse than S2J but managed to squeak out a victory, but not that he simply isn't good and that Falco alone let him beat S2J. Maybe you're right, who knows, but I simply cannot come to accept that with how good S2J is. I agree that results shouldn't be the only thing in determining where someone stacks up, but you don't beat someone who is probably a top 15 player in the world by not being good.

 

[Dark Hart]

Hi stingers

And I get what you said about him being the new lunin lol

 

[Sinji]

I'm devil's advocating here, but I'm sure it would be easier to speak against results-oriented ideologies than for them because I've found that the vast majority of this site is about results now.

Well there you have it. The truth. Been waiting on someone to say this for a long time.

 

[JPOBS]

I'm sorry but S2J is at the skill level where I can't believe that he would be beaten by an unskilled player just because that player played Falco. I can believe Westballz is worse than S2J but managed to squeak out a victory, but not that he simply isn't good and that Falco alone let him beat S2J. Maybe you're right, who knows, but I simply cannot come to accept that with how good S2J is. I agree that results shouldn't be the only thing in determining where someone stacks up, but you don't beat someone who is probably a top 15 player in the world by not being good.

brb, going to socal to take all their money with my falco.

 

[Bl@ckChris]

if you don't understand what stingers is saying, then watch the video's from oxy. it should be pretty dang obvious afterwards. i figured alex was talking out of his *** like he usually is, but then i watched the video and like pp, concluded he wasn't trolling.

i wouldn't say wes isn't good, cause he is. i know my ganon would surely lose to laser -> falco, utilt -> falco, double shine waveshine -> falco.

idk **** about falcon/falco, but it is certainly good that wes didn't let himself get grabbed much, cuz s2j still looked pretty good during the moments where he wasn't getting falco'd.

 

[JPOBS]

the set from oxy was terrible imo because every single game ended in random jank.

edit: while on the topic, who are the good active falcos?

I can only think of PP and westballz 0.o

 

[Bl@ckChris]

there aren't any, which is why people like me, stingers, and mahone infiltrate the topic and make it vaguely interesting.

the set from oxy is what it is as far as results, but the rest of the match is up for analysis, right?

i just wish s2j wouldve baited more of those utilts with empty jumps and grabbed his ***. i saw him magically outspace utilt with nair, and that was cool, but it was unreliable at best.

 

[Deleted member]

he plays falco like mk in brawl. just the same ****ing safe patterns and confirms over and over. its not good, its stupid. westballz is the new lunin lol. he beat s2j because that MU is hard enough for falcon, s2j was outplaying him by a decent amount but it wasn't enough.

I don't know where you got the idea that thinking necessarily = good, but you're in the falco boards.

 

[stingers]

it is mostly the stunning lack of adaption in any proper form that surprised me.

 

[Deleted member]

it is mostly the stunning lack of adaption in any proper form that surprised me.

adaptation is for matches where the opponent can play around your ****. again, welcome to the falco boards. you play falco because you don't want people to play around your ****.

I'm devil's advocating here, but I'm sure it would be easier to speak against results-oriented ideologies than for them because I've found that the vast majority of this site is about results now.

Playing devil's advocate is ok sometimes, but some people do it all the time. It's not good debating, it's just asking a question and demanding that someone else prove you wrong. The "burden of proof" homos rarely solve anything.

 

[JPOBS]

^Putting it another way, if s2j was losing to "laser->falco" and "uptilt->falco", I don't see how that's westballz' fault.

 

[whitemountain123]

@Dr PeePee: Thanks for the comboing advice—that all makes a lot of sense. Still, I’m a bit confused about what do you mean by

Pushing the spacie towards the edge around/a little before that percent is good because you get to set up easier tech chase situations or edgeguards by doing so. .

How do you specifically push a spacie toward the edge? Are you talking in general terms of gameplay when the spacie is at lowish percent or in terms of continuing a nair/dair→shine→dair→shine sort of setup? Do you mean you use reverse dair or specifically try to hit with the part of the shine that will send them closest to the edge?


About Westballz:

Regardles of how you want to quantify goodness, Westballz is good:

If we quantify based on results, he does well enough that, results-wise, I think most of us agree that he’s good (if you don’t, then the previous conversation people have been having seems kinda irrelevant).

If we quantify based on qualities/gameplay, Westballz is good because of a few reasons: his combos are strong (especially on fastfallers), he’s probably tied with Sion for current most technical falco who plays at a relatively high level, he’s innovated a bit with his tech skill (see his shield pressure for instance), he’s technical enough to support his often aggressive gameplay, some more that I probably am not thinking of or don’t realize.

But he’s not the top falco, and that’s probably because he’s often impatient (he seemed more patient in the OXY matches than usual), he does have approaches that tend to be very similar to one another, he’s not as efficient as he could be (compare to PP or Mango for ex.) and probably other reasons too.

@JPOBS

Th0rn is one of my favorite falcos. Probably not at Westballz' level, but he’s creative and just has a fun style to watch.

Oh and Sion, just don’t watch his videos from NWM

 

[Mahone]

on another note, do you think falco is just so good that it doesnt matter what he does (as stingers implies) and he is getting by on falco being hella good at this game?

I feel like people are assuming thats what me and stingers are saying. I can only speak for myself, but i would say that most of his success comes from other people NOT KNOWING HOW TO PLAY AGAINST FALCO, rather than falco being this amazingly broken character.

Most people will agree that mid/high tiers like luigi, ics, (axe's) pikachu have a lot of success based on the fact that people don't know anything about them, which i agree is true. Luckily for top tier players, once they find out how to play those characters, they can realize why they are not top tier and exploit their weaknesses pretty badly...

Falco and jiggs are special in this way, since they have the same mystery surrounding them (although not to the same extent) as the characters mentioned above. Unfortunately, they are also solid characters, so you can see falco/puff players abuse their characters strengths while their opponent does not exploit their weaknessess and it can lead to many huge upsets... such as POSSIBLY westballz dominating his region atm.

I think its similiar to when hbox was starting out and could do much better than his skill level would suggest, but i know I'm going to get a lot of **** for this example, because now Hbox is good so people will probably misunderstand what I'm saying. The same way I think people are misunderstanding what I'm saying about westballz... It's not like i think he should stop playing the way he's playing, or that he doesn't deserve to win, just that SOME of his results are due to the fact that people don't seem to handle falco well and that maybe if he plays people who DO understand falco, he might underperform according to your guys expectations.


TL;DR: Twitch would **** Westballz.

 

[Deleted member]

Falco and jiggs are special in this way, since they have the same mystery surrounding them (although not to the same extent) as the characters mentioned above. Unfortunately, they are also solid characters, so you can see falco/puff players abuse their characters strengths while their opponent does not exploit their weaknessess and it can lead to many huge upsets... such as westballz dominating his region atm.

disagree. there's no mystery involved, there's just little one can do in some of those situations.

i think westballz somewhat thrives because he's in the region where players tend to run into moves. but his success is definitely from being a skilled player. it's just hella boring to watch. even bad players know no-thought playing, it just looks like going through the motions and watching a good player struggle with it is kinda...disappointing. again, falco.

 

[Mahone]

disagree. there's no mystery involved, there's just little one can do in some of those situations.

i think westballz somewhat thrives because he's in the region where players tend to run into moves. but his success is definitely from being a skilled player. it's just hella boring to watch. even bad players know no-thought playing, it just looks like going through the motions and watching a good player struggle with it is kinda...disappointing. again, falco.

I don't think people deal with lasers and falco pressure well relative to other matchups they play. Same way people approach vs jiggs matchups in incorrect ways imo...

I will agree that you are more right when it comes to S2J, because falcon does not have as many options vs a lot of the things that falco does.

 

[JPOBS]

Falco has been one of the most popular characters in the game since it came out, and many of the best players in history have played falco. I don't feel like people don't know how to play against falco, that's just hard for me to accept, especially in a region where mango and zhu have played for years.

I think its more like that falco is really freaking good, and he has a plethora of viable mixups that are just absurdly hard to deal with.

Also, westballz and s2j know each others style really well, I don't think the same "hit confirm->falco combo" gameplay would work if it was other falco's vs s2j, they wud probably get eaten alive. I really want to see westballz vs east coast

 

[Deleted member]

i think most of the better players are solid vs falco and deal with his pressure accordingly. a handful are really terrible though. most players are just terrible at jigglypuff. thankfully, jigglypuff players as a whole tend to be awful at this game so it evens out.

real talk though, CA fox/falco players run into moves a lot.

edit: westballz would stomp most of the east coast pretty easily.

 

[Mahone]

Falco has been one of the most popular characters in the game since it came out, and many of the best players in history have played falco. I don't feel like people don't know how to play against falco, that's just hard for me to accept, especially in a region where mango and zhu have played for years.

I think its more like that falco is really freaking good, and he has a plethora of viable mixups that are just absurdly hard to deal with.

Also, westballz and s2j know each others style really well, I don't think the same "hit confirm->falco combo" gameplay would work if it was other falco's vs s2j, they wud probably get eaten alive. I really want to see westballz vs east coast

No doubt falco is good, i think he could easily be the best in the game and he is very hard to deal with, I just think people also don't know how to deal with a lot of his ****.

Ya, i was gonna mention that but i forgot... them knowing each other's styles makes a HUGE difference in how their sets go. I'm not really sure how it affects it one way or another tbh... it might be helping or hurting westballz, but i guess its safe to assume it's helping him since he's winning.

I know what ur saying about mango and zhu... maybe i just have to experience it for myself to understand the true power that is westballz lol, im having a hard time articulating what i see in those vids, because he is no doubt a great player, but it seems like there is something else going on... whatever

 

[Strong Badam]

it's not a lack of knowledge, moreso the fact that certain characters can't deal with some of his ****. falco, etc.

 

[Wake]

I can fly. We good.

 

[Dr Peepee]

adaptation is for matches where the opponent can play around your ****. again, welcome to the falco boards. you play falco because you don't want people to play around your ****.



Playing devil's advocate is ok sometimes, but some people do it all the time. It's not good debating, it's just asking a question and demanding that someone else prove you wrong. The "burden of proof" homos rarely solve anything.

Saying someone's character is broken and people can't play around what he's doing is EXACTLY what people did for MARTH up until RECENTLY and is bad form/debating/discussing a character. If I truly thought I couldn't play around whatever a character was doing in general with most characters then I'd want that character banned.

I'm not talking about burden of proof or anything like that. I wanted to level the discussion field, so I did so in the interest of productive conversation.

 

[ShroudedOne]

Falcon/Falco is extremely bad for Falcon. Westballz is also fairly good. I'm not sure the issue is entirely one thing or the other.

@Wake: Everyone should pick up Peach for Falco. It's so much better on this side. We just fly over everything.

 

[Wake]

We fly over and then smack his head with a crown. So much better than what silly Falcon can do.

 

[Deleted member]

Saying someone's character is broken and people can't play around what he's doing is EXACTLY what people did for MARTH up until RECENTLY and is bad form/debating/discussing a character. If I truly thought I couldn't play around whatever a character was doing in general with most characters then I'd want that character banned.

I'm not talking about burden of proof or anything like that. I wanted to level the discussion field, so I did so in the interest of productive conversation.

agree.

i wasn't calling you out or anything, i'm not a passive-aggressive douche like that. i was more getting at why the results-oriented camp is so strongly favored. there was a time when i was pure results-oriented and i pressed it into the community pretty hard when i took over the MBR. idk if you remember before then, i got a lot of criticism for not factoring in "other things". how times have changed.

 

[Bones0]

Falcon can fly over lasers and knee him. It's basically the same ****. Falcon players need to just stop being babies. "OMG I can't move out of shield!" STFU. You are literally twice as fast, so less shielding and more kneeing. "But Bones, you don't know WTF you're talking about!" IRRELEVANT!!! If you truly believe your character is holding you back... wait for it... here it comes... SWITCH CHARACTERS. :O

Also, pretty sure Westballz is good in every sense of the word. Maybe I'm completely remembering this wrong, but didn't he take PP to last game in a bo5? It's entirely possible he's bad vs. floaties though.

 

[ShroudedOne]

Question for anyone who feels like it: How is it possible to technically "outplay" someone during most if not all of the match, and yet still lose? I'm truly asking out of curiosity, because I would assume that you can't get outplayed in the majority of a match and still lose, regardless of the MU.

For example, stingers said that S2J was outplaying Westballz, but that it wasn't enough. I'm not denying that or agreeing with it, but if S2J were truly outplaying him, wouldn't he be reacting/adapting well enough to overcome the MU challenges? If he couldn't, I'm not sure that you could say that S2J was really "outplaying" him.

Perhaps I don't understand what it means to outplay someone? It just always confuses me when people say, "Person A was outplaying Person B for 99 percent of the set, but still lost." Or perhaps there is a threshold where you can be outplaying someone and still lose? (say, you could be doing this 80% and still lose, but if you did it 81%, you'd win?)

Sorry if this makes no sense. Just trying to figure out where people are coming from.

 

[Deleted member]

Question for anyone who feels like it: How is it possible to technically "outplay" someone during most if not all of the match, and yet still lose?

"Technical ability" is just the physical ability to press buttons such that your character does exactly what you want them to do. If you want them to do stupid things, you can lose because of it.

 

[Blistering Speed]

So, apparently Westballz isn't good because some noobs have some bull**** selective criteria about Falco as a character and some **** about the inherent necessity for unnecessary adaption. Cool.

 

[Wake]

Westballz is good.

 

[Veetaak]

In my eyes he played pretty poorly against s2j the last time but I've seen him play really good before

 

[WestBallz]

nvm looool anyway yeah i suck

 

[Deleted member]

you guys are all phaggots

give credit where credit is due westballz is a great player, beat hax in POOLS at apex


regarding my recent sets, i end up making some really bad mistakes, tbh each mistake really cost me and they are extremely avoidable. stuff like trying to f-smash a falco up-b --> dying

also i got worse at tech chasing falcoes literally trained only against fox for manifest so i can **** the top foxes (ended up facing 0 at actual tourney)

most of the matches could've went either way. 1 less big mistake (big cuz u get ***** for a 'tiny' error). But the fact that he ***** me for them is good, i just need to not be complacent and work on getting better

===

westballz is very good, me and lovage has been saying for a year or so and its a shame that they really ****ed up the northwest manifest vids because now its past the time of hype for the vids when he played extremely well vs everyone. hes part of socals **** crew and can't think of another falco besides pp who can compare

==

overall, pretty disappointed in westballz hate, i thought people would like our sets cuz some sick stuff happened but instead people just hate on westballz or discredit him

==

rewatched last match of grand finals and i shoulda beat him got GHEYed at the end

 

[choknater]

westballz is so good, he's been proving himself

 

[WestBallz]

ill poop on everyone at FC johnny i promise!!! Then theyll regret ever doubting you. and i wont sandbag in pools either.

 

[SUNG666]

I just felt like yalls recent set just wasn't up to your usual

Looked like Wes up tilted a ton of Johnnys nair approaches and everything just seemed slow for yall

I'm noob and they're pro tho

 

[Armada]

Don't understand the hate against WestBallz either. He is hella good and can for sure be one of the best in the world not to far from now. I think he is worse against floatys though but Im sure he is working on that.

He has really good results overall (especially lately from what I have seen). So the only reason people can hate on him is cause

A: They wanna see X/Y beat him and that dosen't mean he is worse
B: Don't like him because of the person he is

Not a singles of those arguments holds cause he is awesome both as a player and person.
Looking forward to play against you at the next tournament WestBallz =)

 

[ShroudedOne]

You forgot C: People really dislike Falco, lol.

 

[Blistering Speed]

People need to stop whining about Falco, it's getting really ****ing dull.