PPMD's Falco Discussion Thread

[Rubyiris]

a question for all falcos:

versus people who CONSISTENTLY SDI the initial drill away, to the point where shine misses 100% of the time, and dtilt only hits maybe 50% of the time, what should I do in this situation?

To iterate on "consistently" we're talking 90% of the time, my drill WILL be SDIed away. I've asked a few people over aim and they were skeptical that people can consistently SDI the move, but its a problem to the point where it feels like linking two non-laser moves against certain players in my region at low/mid percent is only luck on my part.

Mogwai has suggested mostly just to not bother trying to commit against players like this.

Yeah! suggested various shine/laser mixups.

Just looking for more options to consider in the future.

 

[JPOBS]

they are SDI'ing the single dair hit so far that the dtilt doesnt hit more than 50%? lol thats ridiculous i dont even....

anyway, you can jc grab, or do a short hop forward->shine->plaform waveland combo. turnaround uptilt if you're a baller.

 

[X1-12]

jump but don't D-air, then WD back into anything, or try overshooting the D-air, so jump closer to them. maybe even mix up with N-air. You might even be able to do your D-air late then pivot grab (dash away, dash back, grab)

 

[Falcinho]

If you do the dair late you should be able to grab or dtilt most of the time

Or you could mix up the timing of the dair to make SDIing harder or mix in fairs, nairs, weak reverse bairs if applicable

 

[Rubyiris]

they are SDI'ing the single dair hit so far that the dtilt doesnt hit more than 50%? lol thats ridiculous i dont even....

anyway, you can jc grab, or do a short hop forward->shine->plaform waveland combo. turnaround uptilt if you're a baller.

as ridiculous as it is, they're doing it on nearly every dair i throw out.

and some of the people doing this aren't even ranked players in az, lol.

also to iterate, they aren't sding on anticipation, so against certain players throwing out a nair/fair/weak bair at low/mid percentage is just asking for a 1-way ticket to ccgrabland.

 

[JPOBS]

well yea CC on reaction->**** is common place today against most people worth their salt.

the sdi thing is surprising though, i havent really come across it as being a consistent problem.

 

[Mogwai]

errr

dair comes out on frame 5. bair/nair come out on frame 4. Unless you're playing against ****ing robots, they are anticipating to an extent. That doesn't necessarily change the fact that nair/fair/bair will often result in a CC grab, because I think what players like that do is DI down and away which lets them cover both options, but I'm fairly certain that they aren't capable of actually reacting in 0.05 seconds, as you would need to to differentiate between nair/dair on the approach.

 

[KirbyKaze]

yea, you definitely have.

you also asked me if I'd assist with an effort to do something really gay to Cactuar but I don't remember exactly what it was.

the answer, as always, is a loving 'no' KK.

=[

But I want to play with the white Falco main D:

 

[JPOBS]

well when i say react i mean "they see me leave the ground and realize im proabably going to do an aerial and given the situation theres nothing they can do to stop it so they hold down"

so i guess it is anticipation as well meh same thing. most people are always holding down at low percent anyway

 

[X1-12]

actually surely if they SDI away you can just run forward then shine.. you'lll probably have to D-air later though

 

[Mogwai]

you have to dash -> JC Shine probably and I still have a lot of doubts about that being fast enough to beat a grab. just WD backwards and shoot them. That should be the default when you don't know what to do.

 

[JPOBS]

lol i love how mogwais advice always boils down to "*shrug* shoot them or something" <3

 

[Mogwai]

it's true though!

Problem: someone does something you don't know how to deal with and can't come up with a good counter to...

Solution: shoot them, you have a ****ing gun after all.

 

[Druggedfox]

*With Infinite bullets.

Never forget that part =D?

 

[forward]

a question for all falcos:

versus people who CONSISTENTLY SDI the initial drill away, to the point where shine misses 100% of the time, and dtilt only hits maybe 50% of the time, what should I do in this situation?

To iterate on "consistently" we're talking 90% of the time, my drill WILL be SDIed away. I've asked a few people over aim and they were skeptical that people can consistently SDI the move, but its a problem to the point where it feels like linking two non-laser moves against certain players in my region at low/mid percent is only luck on my part.

Mogwai has suggested mostly just to not bother trying to commit against players like this.

Yeah! suggested various shine/laser mixups.

Just looking for more options to consider in the future.

I would recommend watching videos to see what other Falcos are doing against people who smash DI the dairs.

 

[Mogwai]

^ that's actually really good advice

I think a large part of why I'm falling off at this game is that I can never bring myself to spend time watching new vids.

 

[Dr Peepee]

Anyone have any video examples of this?

Mango did it to me some in our friendlies but I just anticipated his DI and overshot/undershot my Dair from my normal spacing to counter it. I don't know if there are really mixups beyond that.

 

[prog]

so, i asked you about it at apex and zhu at tunes, but i'm trying to integrate fair in combos when i'd normally nair. any advice? sometimes i do it and they go backwards, etc.

also, is that you i see playing League of Legends?

 

[trahhSTEEZY]

I got completely outplayed by a fox (SK92) in tournament/MM's yesterday. I could really use some advice in this matchup. Ill have vids of it within today/tomorrow.

I just remember overhearing the fox about how theres an angle while playing as fox, vs falco, where fox has like 100% advantage if he comes in from this angle. Any idea on this? It'd be great to know what angle to avoid getting ****ed over by.

I can almost always consistently shineOOS with falco against anyone, except fox (it's new for me). Should i be waiting to shine after he shines from an 'aerial-to-shine' approach?

Any advice in this matchup greatly appreciated

 

[Druggedfox]

@Rubyiris and all other falcos

If you're fighting a fox/falco/falcon and they are smash DI'ing BEHIND you, try nairing at low percents. Nair doesn't hit them far enough away at low damages for the shine to miss unless they predict it and DI away. If they are DI'ing the dair in front of you, you should be able to reverse uptilt.

If this is at high enough damage that they're getting away from reverse uptilt then I would imagine the dairs will be knocking them into the ground anyway? I could be wrong however, but that's what I've seen from my experience (my main smash partner SDIs dairs as well on a consistent basis, and I know how frustrating it is).

If somehow nairing when they DI behind, and reverse uptilts aren't working, then you have a couple other options:

-Overshoot/undershoot your aerial like PP said.
-Grab/run forward grab depending on how far they go. After the grab, you of course have all sorts of mixups with back/upthrow which generally can guarantee you a hit afterwards. Possibly an upthrow --> shine/aerial combo.
-Run forward and jump shine. This should look more or less like when a falco (this is like, classic shiz...not sure who he got it from... forward anyone? =PPP) dairs someone into the ground (and they miss the tech), and then immediately jump-->shine--> double jump --> bair combos them. This works really well on not only fastfallers, but all characters that SDI your dair. You should learn to expect it and watch their DI, so you can react accordingly by jumping and shining into an aerial to continue the combo. If a fox SDI the dair away from you, and you just jump forward shine -->dair, unless they are consistent enough to SDI the dair and immediately SDI the shine afterwards, you can just continue your combo normally from there.

Those are the main ones I think are useful... idk what everyone thinks of them, but in my experience they work really well.

 

[JPOBS]

I got completely outplayed by a fox (SK92) in tournament/MM's yesterday. I could really use some advice in this matchup. Ill have vids of it within today/tomorrow.

I just remember overhearing the fox about how theres an angle while playing as fox, vs falco, where fox has like 100% advantage if he comes in from this angle. Any idea on this? It'd be great to know what angle to avoid getting ****ed over by.

I can almost always consistently shineOOS with falco against anyone, except fox (it's new for me). Should i be waiting to shine after he shines from an 'aerial-to-shine' approach?

Any advice in this matchup greatly appreciated

when the vids are up post em here and i'll critique em for you if u want

as for the the angle thig, its bs that its a 100% angle that will work, but from what i gather from your description, im betting they're talking about the angle where they ful hop over your lasers and punish with nair/dair from that awkward angle that you kinda have to be ready for. i dunno for sure i'll check it out when you got vids.

 

[Brookman]

Dear Doctor PEEPEE,

I have Chronic neck pain and fatigues, can you diagnose me?

Thanks,
Brookman

 

[Dr Peepee]

Dear Doctor PEEPEE,

I have Chronic neck pain and fatigues, can you diagnose me?

Thanks,
Brookman

You'll have to let me inspect you in person(asap from the sounds of it), people like to lie over the internet for some reason so I don't trust online descriptions of ailments.

Hope that's straight,

Dr ****

 

[forward]

Hey Dr Peepee, do you think that there is a maximum level of skill that can be achieved in technical knowledge of smash bros?

I want to emphasize though that this is different than the level of skill one can obtain in reading people.

 

[Dr Peepee]

Hey Dr Peepee, do you think that there is a maximum level of skill that can be achieved in technical knowledge of smash bros?

I want to emphasize though that this is different than the level of skill one can obtain in reading people.

sorry for being dense, but when you say "technical knowledge" do you mean knowledge regarding tech skill or just the overall knowledge of the game? Based on your emphasis it seems like the former is what you're going for, but I don't want to answer the wrong question.

 

[forward]

I was referring to overall knowledge of the game. Do you think there is a limit, or close to one, of the necessary skill needed to win?

 

[Brookman]

I don't think the game can be broken into a mathematical formula which you can use to break down indivudual scenarios in a match.

It seems to me that's what you're asking, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Dr Peepee]

I was referring to overall knowledge of the game. Do you think there is a limit, or close to one, to learn all of the necessary tools needed to win?

I think that there is not a a true limit on how much knowledge one can glean from this game. When I see someone with a new playstyle doing well or just showing me a new way to play even when they might not place as well as me or know as much overall, it shows me that everyone has their own unique spin to put on this game and, while we may try our best to get all of it inside our minds, we can't truly capture the ideas of those who bring some new, interesting idea(s) to the table that could push us over the top of our competition/to the full extent of the game's capabilities to have someone win.

*sorry about the run-on

Learning all of the top tricks and pushing your own style to the limit with as much as you can learn from playing with/talking to other top players seems to be a more realistic goal/limit to reach and something only Mango(maybe Ken?) has really done it seems. That may just be his reading ability though, which would be that other thing you talked about.

These are my immediate thoughts, but I am fully open to yours and any discussion you would like to have on the subject. I'm sure you have thought it out much better than I have haha.

 

[Little England]

I have a couple sets from a tournament this past weekend. In general I feel like I throw out a lot of useless lasers and aerials. Is there a way to break this habit? (I assume it just comes with conscious practice just like breaking every other bad habit) I'm also working on getting the best out of my punishes. I believe this just takes time haha. I really want to know if there is something fundamental missing from my game. Maybe something I'm doing wrong defensively, or a poor choice/habit I have. Basically, how do I take my Falco to the next level?

Here are some videos vs Falcon:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVqhblZVs6s WF

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmHfOBlJzgk GF 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLfes4y8Ysk GF 2

oh and friendlies against a Marth:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWnuykHCNb8

 

[FoxLisk]

little england:

okay i just started watching. i watched the first v. CF match. i had no idea a falco could play that matchup THAT differently from how I do, haha, so it's hard to critique. let me say a few things though:

you appear to be very underconfident in your plan. your first stock you played very aggresively, stayed up in his face, forced rolls and punished them, etc. you completely destroyed him. it seemed like he just doesnt know how to stand up to a lot of pressure.

then you had a stock advantage and started laser camping. my guess would be you did that because you have this acquired knowledge from the falco boards saying 'laser moar lawl,' and not because you were thinking about the match. laser camping while you're ahead is fine, but you were at no apparent risk if you just kept pressuring him. what you did wasn't optimize a strategy by camping and maintaining a small edge, what you did was take something that was working and stop doing it, which is pointless. you only need to switch up your style when it stops working.

also: learn to edgeguard properly, and for god's sake don't roll in every time.

love the running sh shine -> waveland. i do that myself

reacting faster to his rolls is gonna be important, but that's also very difficult to do. try to watch his character very closely. it's easy to react to where they end up, but really you need to react as soon as they start moving if you want to punish.

in the second match you got grabbed a lot from poorly spaced nairs. think more about them, i guess. your intuition that you throw out a lot of useless aerials is probably leading you in the right direction on the front. you dont always have to nair, and sometimes you got punished for doing so when you shouldnt have.

I think overall your falco is very fluid, which is nice, and you have solid execution. i think you just have some bad habits to break and you need to be more efficient.

hope some of this helps or was at least interesting!

as a side note: i'd lay off the suicide spikes until you can land them. when shiz does it it's cool, when you mess it up you just kinda look arrogant.

 

[KikoMePlease]

How do you guys go about punishing rolls during shield pressure? I usually just react to it w/ a waveshine or dash attack but are there better things that you can do?

 

[Druggedfox]

Watch mango =D

A lot of the tier during shield pressure mango simply does a retreating aerial and watches what his opponent does. Of course all falcos do this, but mango seems to be the king of "roll calling". He has a conscious thought that he is predicting his opponent will roll, and reacts in a manner that, if they do roll, he can punish them, but if they don't roll, he hasn't lost any positioning etc.

Another more basic/technical thing that requires less reading ability is to add in lasers during pillars. If they roll you'll keep on the pressure with lasering, if they don't, you only have landing lag of 3-4 (can't remember) frames and can just immediately shine to continue pressuring normally. This can prove a useful tactic against opponents who roll too much.

 

[Little England]

Its easy to look at the edge guarding from my perspective, but I don't know if you noticed how incredibly tight his spacing was on his recoveries. Not trying to make an excuse of course because all it requires is patience. Thanks for the advice.

(Your logic about the suicide spikes does not make senses though lol)

edit/ I don't want to sound off putting, or sound like I'm giving a rebuttal for every critique someone gives me. I just have to address the advice mentioned and ask questions, so that I can understand better.

Having said that, I don't see at all a habit of me rolling in. The way you worded your post "for god's sake" made it seem like a glaring bad habit, but I don't see it at all >_>

 

[FoxLisk]

Its easy to look at the edge guarding from my perspective, but I don't know if you noticed how incredibly tight his spacing was on his recoveries. Not trying to make an excuse of course because all it requires is patience. Thanks for the advice.

(Your logic about the suicide spikes does not make senses though lol)

edit/ I don't want to sound off putting, or sound like I'm giving a rebuttal for every critique someone gives me. I just have to address the advice mentioned and ask questions, so that I can understand better.

Having said that, I don't see at all a habit of me rolling in. The way you worded your post "for god's sake" made it seem like a glaring bad habit, but I don't see it at all >_>

oh, i meant teching in, that's probably why. there were 2 or 3 places where he dthrowed you, kneed in place, and kneed in place again and hit your tech-ins with both knees. that shouldn't happen. i think there wree 2 places where it did happen and a third where you teched in again and he predicted tech away.

also i dont really care if you give me rebuttals or not. you asked for advice, i gave what advice i could, and if you take it and improve that's great, and if you resist it by making excuses and don't improve it doesn't bother me at all.

however, i will say that your attitude of 'his spacing was tight so i didnt edgeguard' is just a mental block to improving that aspect of your game.

rewatched: in the first match against CF, you teched away twice and in about 8-10 times. In place: 0.
In match two, you teched away twice, in place three times, and inwards 7 times.

 

[Little England]

Its easy to look at the edge guarding from my perspective, but I don't know if you noticed how incredibly tight his spacing was on his recoveries. Not trying to make an excuse of course because all it requires is patience. Thanks for the advice.

What mental block? Read the bold.

That statement about giving a rebuttal was directed towards others, not you lol. You've already been helpful. I'm going to go back and watch Winners and Grand Finals to see just how much I got punished for teching in. Thanks for that info.

 

[KikoMePlease]

Hi Little England ! I just wanted to point out some things (kinda minor) in the vids. A LOT of the time the falcon would roll towards you right when you landed a spaced nair but you never punished (you actually almost never reacted to any of his rolls.) Just like lasering, you can't shield pressure just for the sake of shield pressure, look for how your opponent tries to escape that pressure. Another thing that happened a couple of times is that he just jumped right after you f throwed him off the ledge but you just let him back on =P

 

[falcojackolantern]

what direction should i throw with falco?

 

[Sion]

all throws have uses.

fthrow is really good for throwing off the stage and fast paced pressure
uthrow combos into something most of the time
dthrow on platform is pretty deadly and sometimes used to reset pressure i suppose
bthrow links to a lot of things when DI'd incorrectly and generally gimps well off stage

just from personal experience

 

[omgwtfToph]

sion *****

LEMME ADD TO THAT THO

if youre fighting fox you get even more bull**** throw stuff that nobody really does.

-uthrow is the "default" direction to throw fox and USUALLY leads into stuff, even though it usually doesn't actually combo because a laser will hit them and cut their hitstun, you get stuff like uthrow shine, uthrow aerial, and even uthrow fsmash sometimes. you kind of have to figure out which way they're going to DI. if you watch mango's old-*** falco combo video "one week" even does uthrow re-grab on mike haze's fox (as in, he CHAIN GRABS fox, with falco... lol)

-dthrow is really oldschool but still *****. dthrow shine always combos if they don't DI to one side, which is hard to react to if the fox isn't used to it. dthrow dsmash stuff is best avoided by holding to the side and shielding, but if the fox just tries to shield you can dthrow regrab (stupid ghetto chaingrab lol)

-bthrow leads to another grab if the fox doesn't DI right. so you can do dumb bull**** like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQr3E6QY394#t=0m28s lol. NOT SAYING that this is actually a good idea, but this is to show that it'll work on even good players, if they're unsuspecting. a better use for bthrow regrab is when your back is to the ledge; then you can do bthrow, turn around regrab, fthrow, gimp. which brings us to...

-fthrow. fthrow fox off the stage and you have like a 50% chance of killing him. think he's going to jump back and recover with a side B or up B? run off the stage and shoot 2 lasers at him. he drops below the ledge; you get a guaranteed dair edgeguard. think he's gonna wait in his shine or go for the ledge (the only way to avoid the lasers)? then just wait and dsmash him or something. EAZY. also, fthrow leads to techchase at some %'s. only florida falcos use fthrow on the stage though; if you're not from florida just do uthrow in those situations lol


so yeah hella **** works lol. experiment! falco's grabs ****. sion *****

 

[JPOBS]

also, falco is like the easiest char in the game to get grabs with because the nature of falco's game forces opponents to shield so much.