PPMD's Falco Discussion Thread

[victinivcreate1]

Welll shine is just faster and sets up for combos OOS which is pretty cray, Shine hits on frame 1 it's the fastest move in the game, use it.

Shine OoS is frame 6...

 

[Russ The Love Muss]

Shine OoS is frame 6...

It hits the frame you start the shine though. The same thing can't be said for other moves

 

[Heero Yuy]

How does the Falco-Sheik matchup work out now (the guides I found are outdated)? I recently started using him against Sheik in P:M and would like to know the Melee aspect.

 

[AirFair]

Hey, as a new player, I was wondering, what buttons do you prefer to use to jump with falco? I use X alot with Marth, and since I play falco a bit as well, I wanted to know so I could get used to that as well.

 

[Sylmar]

Welll shine is just faster and sets up for combos OOS which is pretty cray, Shine hits on frame 1 it's the fastest move in the game, use it.

So the only advantage is speed (not to downplay this advantage, obviously speed is super important)? Also, I keep hearing everyone talk about the crazy combos you can do out of shine OOS, but can't you just dair OOS into shine for the same combos + the percentage from the dair AND the advantage of having both jumps at your disposal during the combo?

 

[tauKhan]

So the only advantage is speed (not to downplay this advantage, obviously speed is super important)? Also, I keep hearing everyone talk about the crazy combos you can do out of shine OOS, but can't you just dair OOS into shine for the same combos + the percentage from the dair AND the advantage of having both jumps at your disposal during the combo?

Well, the speed difference is quite huge, and even slight differences can make a difference in common tight pressure situations. I guess dair OoS could be useful if you shield a very laggy move. Some other points to consider are that you would have to do the dair when you are still rising, which makes it hard to follow up. If the dair doesn't knock down, it probably usually doesn't combo (don't know about this), and if it does, it can be teched to high percents since it's a spike, and you would be rising in the air when they tech, so it could be difficult or even impossible to chase.

 

[Jackson]

Ok... So I'm trying to shine Oos the same way I double shine (quick slide from X to B) . I always shield grab. Is this because I have to brush over A from X to B, so the game reads it as a shield grab? If this is true, this is a problem, because it will essentially stop me from doing a really good shine Oos since I really don't wanna use Y to double shine.

 

[AirFair]

umm can anyone answer my question?

Hey, as a new player, I was wondering, what buttons do you prefer to use to jump with falco? I use X alot with Marth, and since I play falco a bit as well, I wanted to know so I could get used to that as well.

 

[Sylmar]

Well, the speed difference is quite huge, and even slight differences can make a difference in common tight pressure situations. I guess dair OoS could be useful if you shield a very laggy move. Some other points to consider are that you would have to do the dair when you are still rising, which makes it hard to follow up. If the dair doesn't knock down, it probably usually doesn't combo (don't know about this), and if it does, it can be teched to high percents since it's a spike, and you would be rising in the air when they tech, so it could be difficult or even impossible to chase.

Okay. Thank you very much!

 

[tauKhan]

Ok... So I'm trying to shine Oos the same way I double shine (quick slide from X to B) . I always shield grab. Is this because I have to brush over A from X to B, so the game reads it as a shield grab? If this is true, this is a problem, because it will essentially stop me from doing a really good shine Oos since I really don't wanna use Y to double shine.

Well if you jump, hold shield and press a, you're going to jc grab ofc. So that's probably what you're doing wrong. I guess you must learn to release shield precisely or before you jump if you don't want to do Y -> B.

@ AirFair

I think using y is ebjectively better for falco, since you got to be able to press b - jump - b fast. However, it's certainly possible, and not even that hard to be great with only X. For example, I think west and axe both use only x. So it's about preference, though I believe you will have a little easier time learning techs using Y.

 

[Bones0]

Unless you're fighting years of casual experience with this game, you should just switch to Y imo.

 

[Jackson]

I use X because it lets me use double shines in my gameplay: i never touch the Y button, so it would be too akward to try to use it just for that purpose.

I might have to just settle for release shield - shine.

 

[AirFair]

Yeah, I use Y for all of my wavedashing. Just wondering. Thanks for your feedback!

 

[BTmoney]

I believe PP plays with X. It's really not a big deal at all and it doesn't prevent you from doing anything. Some things are just slightly easier with Y

 

[xman]

Hey, as a new player, I was wondering, what buttons do you prefer to use to jump with falco? I use X alot with Marth, and since I play falco a bit as well, I wanted to know so I could get used to that as well.

I doubleshine with x and shine oos with y with no problem. It just takes practice see whatever is easier for you.

 

[rnv]

Okay, question. I usually only get to practice against level 7 bots (I've tried getting friends into Melee, it's not their thing, and I can't easily get to any smash scenes around me more than once every month and a half or so). So yesterday, I was playing Falco against someone who has probably played Melee once before in their entire life.

He picked Pikachu and beat me. I wanna find out how to beat the strategy he was using with Falco.

Basically what he did was REALLY simple and predictable, but I just couldn't figure out how to beat it. I should preface this by saying we only played on FD because I let everyone pick whatever stage they wanted and he picked FD more than once (and beat me on it more than once).

All he did was spam neutral B across the stage (the bouncing electricity jolt thing) and forced me to approach. No matter what I did to approach, he had a simple reaction - if I tried coming from above with a dair or something (which was weird anyways because the Pikachu neutral B goes high enough to hit you out of a SHFFL'd dair) he would just use usmash. If I tried to come in from the side (even harder, considering rolling towards him would let him hit me for free and trying to shine to reflect neutral B just left me vulnerable because of lag after reflecting a projectile...) he could just fsmash me (and occasionally he would dsmash + thunder, but he really only did it where he was standing, so I could DI out of it easily).

So he basically just repeated this for the entirety of 2 games. I knew almost exactly what he would do in any situation (his moveset was literally limited to neutral B and fsmash/dsmash/usmash for 90% of the game) but no matter what approach I tried, I got hit by one of his smashes because of the neutral B limiting my approach options and hitting me out of whatever SHFFL'd aerials I tried.

I understand this is probably a simple solution considering how predictable he was being, but I honestly couldn't beat it. For the record, I was able to beat him on battlefield and dreamland - it was just FD where I couldn't figure out how the hell to approach him without the help of platforms.

edit: being new to the forums - would this be a topic appropriate for a new thread or should I just keep it in here? thanks

 

[Jackson]

Okay, question. I usually only get to practice against level 7 bots (I've tried getting friends into Melee, it's not their thing, and I can't easily get to any smash scenes around me more than once every month and a half or so). So yesterday, I was playing Falco against someone who has probably played Melee once before in their entire life.

He picked Pikachu and beat me. I wanna find out how to beat the strategy he was using with Falco.

Basically what he did was REALLY simple and predictable, but I just couldn't figure out how to beat it. I should preface this by saying we only played on FD because I let everyone pick whatever stage they wanted and he picked FD more than once (and beat me on it more than once).

All he did was spam neutral B across the stage (the bouncing electricity jolt thing) and forced me to approach. No matter what I did to approach, he had a simple reaction - if I tried coming from above with a dair or something (which was weird anyways because the Pikachu neutral B goes high enough to hit you out of a SHFFL'd dair) he would just use usmash. If I tried to come in from the side (even harder, considering rolling towards him would let him hit me for free and trying to shine to reflect neutral B just left me vulnerable because of lag after reflecting a projectile...) he could just fsmash me (and occasionally he would dsmash + thunder, but he really only did it where he was standing, so I could DI out of it easily).

So he basically just repeated this for the entirety of 2 games. I knew almost exactly what he would do in any situation (his moveset was literally limited to neutral B and fsmash/dsmash/usmash for 90% of the game) but no matter what approach I tried, I got hit by one of his smashes because of the neutral B limiting my approach options and hitting me out of whatever SHFFL'd aerials I tried.

I understand this is probably a simple solution considering how predictable he was being, but I honestly couldn't beat it. For the record, I was able to beat him on battlefield and dreamland - it was just FD where I couldn't figure out how the hell to approach him without the help of platforms.

edit: being new to the forums - would this be a topic appropriate for a new thread or should I just keep it in here? thanks

If he's camping you that hard, outcamp him with lasers. You can also use shine to reflect his projectile. He should have to approach you.

 

[rnv]

If he's camping you that hard, outcamp him with lasers. You can also use shine to reflect his projectile. He should have to approach you.

Yeah I tried SHLing him from the other side of the stage but I guess that's something I really need to work on - he could just duck beneath my lasers and if I tried fastfalling the laser wouldn't come out before I hit the ground. Thanks for that, I'll consider it if I face him again on FD

 

[Jackson]

Yeah I tried SHLing him from the other side of the stage but I guess that's something I really need to work on - he could just duck beneath my lasers and if I tried fastfalling the laser wouldn't come out before I hit the ground. Thanks for that, I'll consider it if I face him again on FD

Yeah, controlling the height is hard. But if you can get those REALLY low lasers, you will wreck him, man!

 

[Bones0]

Okay, question. I usually only get to practice against level 7 bots (I've tried getting friends into Melee, it's not their thing, and I can't easily get to any smash scenes around me more than once every month and a half or so). So yesterday, I was playing Falco against someone who has probably played Melee once before in their entire life.

He picked Pikachu and beat me. I wanna find out how to beat the strategy he was using with Falco.

Basically what he did was REALLY simple and predictable, but I just couldn't figure out how to beat it. I should preface this by saying we only played on FD because I let everyone pick whatever stage they wanted and he picked FD more than once (and beat me on it more than once).

All he did was spam neutral B across the stage (the bouncing electricity jolt thing) and forced me to approach. No matter what I did to approach, he had a simple reaction - if I tried coming from above with a dair or something (which was weird anyways because the Pikachu neutral B goes high enough to hit you out of a SHFFL'd dair) he would just use usmash. If I tried to come in from the side (even harder, considering rolling towards him would let him hit me for free and trying to shine to reflect neutral B just left me vulnerable because of lag after reflecting a projectile...) he could just fsmash me (and occasionally he would dsmash + thunder, but he really only did it where he was standing, so I could DI out of it easily).

So he basically just repeated this for the entirety of 2 games. I knew almost exactly what he would do in any situation (his moveset was literally limited to neutral B and fsmash/dsmash/usmash for 90% of the game) but no matter what approach I tried, I got hit by one of his smashes because of the neutral B limiting my approach options and hitting me out of whatever SHFFL'd aerials I tried.

I understand this is probably a simple solution considering how predictable he was being, but I honestly couldn't beat it. For the record, I was able to beat him on battlefield and dreamland - it was just FD where I couldn't figure out how the hell to approach him without the help of platforms.

edit: being new to the forums - would this be a topic appropriate for a new thread or should I just keep it in here? thanks

When you FH above him (or anyone in this game), he has to account for multiple different approach timings. Falco's FF is way too fast to react to. So if he is consistently usmashing you out your vertical approach, it's because you're not mixing up FF with no FF and FH with DJ. Hell, you can even throw in a shine stall right above him and then dair after his usmash whiffs. Ultimately though, you should be able to WD OoS to deal with Thunderbolts. You can also attack aerial Thunderbolts to cancel them out, but I'm not 100% sure if you can do that with the grounded version (you can at least use grounded moves, but find out if you can aerial through a Thunderbolt and hit him).

 

[Boomhound]

I might have to just settle for release shield - shine.

Just tap up on the control stick and shine, much better than releasing.

 

[Jackson]

Just tap up on the control stick and shine, much better than releasing.

the up to down motion on the control stick usually results in me shining pretty high up though. i guess i need to work on it.

 

[OninO]

@ Jackson The other way you can doubleshine is by doing a roll up on the C-stick directly onto the B-button while moving down on the control stick. It works, and it's kind of nice, but the timing can be a little trickier if you're trying to do them as fast as possible because the time between C-stick up and B depends on shield stun.

In other words, I find it easier to work with my own ****ty but consistent reaction time for shine OoS.

 

[Oskurito]

@ Bones0 Are you going to apex?

the up to down motion on the control stick usually results in me shining pretty high up though. i guess i need to work on it.

Do you use X or Y to jump?

If you use X then watch this. (watch it anyways, it might give you some ideas).

 

[Jackson]

@ Bones0

Good video. I think I'll work on doing it without brushing A

 

[Boomhound]

the up to down motion on the control stick usually results in me shining pretty high up though. i guess i need to work on it.

It's not ideal but an aerial shine is better than nothing- your opponent is less likely to DI your shine OOS so you can follow-up with an aerial.

 

[Bones0]

@ Bones0 Are you going to apex?

Probably.

 

[Oskurito]

Probably.

You have to go, I think you have potential. It'll be a good experience, and if you make it out of pools into the stream I'll be like "hey! that's the dude with 10K posts on smashboards" lol jk <3

 

[Bones0]

You have to go, I think you have potential. It'll be a good experience, and if you make it out of pools into the stream I'll be like "hey! that's the dude with 10K posts on smashboards" lol jk <3

Apex has never been a good experience.

 

[Berble]

Why isn't Apex a good experience? I've heard the same thing from others but I don't know the reason

 

[Bones0]

Why isn't Apex a good experience? I've heard the same thing from others but I don't know the reason

In 2012, ALL of the Melee setups on day 2 were hijacked for Brawl pools which still hadn't finished, so no one even WENT the venue. Everyone that played Melee basically payed for 3 days and only got 2.

In 2013, most of the pools times were switched in the middle of the night (we checked them right before going to sleep). ~1/3rd of the players didn't know they had to show up early. For example, I think my pool was scheduled for 6 PM or later, and it got switched to 8 AM. I just HAPPENED to go early so I got to play (with only 1-2 games of warmup). Half of my bracket pool was DQed, and either right before or just after finishing the entire pool (can't remember), a couple players had finally showed up and (rightfully) complained that they were DQed. We REPLAYED the entire pool, thus saving absolutely no time anyway, but ofc some people still weren't there so they got DQed TWICE.

In 2014 The floorplan was so poor that there was no room for friendlies in the main room. You had to walk across the hotel to a separate room for friendlies, and there was just an overall lack of setups. Fire marshals even showed up and kicked everyone not playing out of the room. The bracket was also seeded ridiculously. Only 1 person did the seeding (no one person will have an accurate perception of the entire world's skill base). They also did bracket pools going all the way up to top 8 (if I'm not mistaken), which led to massive bracket jank like S0ft beating Ice TWICE in the top 16 portion of the bracket.

These are the most major issues that come to mind for me, but there's been some other issues such as way too much time, resources, and space being devoted to art gallery stuff that ends up being DEAD 90% of the time. I'm not trying to say they shouldn't have it because there are plenty of people interested in that stuff, but they always seem to devote way more to it than is necessary while lacking severely in setup space.

The only real attraction to Apex is: 1. watching the high level matches live with a huge crowd and 2. getting to play tons of different players from different regions. I live in a really isolated area, so even travelling to locals is hard, and the top players in my region refuse to play friendlies with anyone ranked below them so the only time I get high level friendlies are at OoS tournaments. When you take into account how little setups there are, you still don't get a good number of friendlies because every setup with a top player is basically guaranteed to be a 4-man rotation. At pretty much any other tournament series that I've been to, people tend to not go beyond 3-man rotations because it just takes forever. So yeah, I'll probably go again this year knowing all this stuff because I'm at a level where I think I could handle 4-man rotations a little better by winning occasionally, and I might not get seeded into a death pool round 1. I would never recommend Apex for newer players that just want to PLAY a ton though (some players are fine just spectating/checking out booths all tourney, so for them it'd be fine).

 

[Oskurito]

Whoa, it sucks to hear that apex is like that, I thought it had a lot of setups and people where playing friendlies all over the place.

I live in a really isolated area, so even travelling to locals is hard

That sucks man, you either need a car or a good friend who has a car.

and the top players in my region refuse to play friendlies with anyone ranked below them

Whut? that sounds like they're *******, lol

 

[BTmoney]

So, Falco is the best character in the game all things considered. I'm convinced.

I've been playing for the losing team for 3 years, Fox. Falco is like playing Sheik and Fox at the same time. 20XX is a meme, not a manifestation and Haxdollarsign is a false prophet.

It's like every time you make a tech skill error instead of dying like Fox your combo or edge guard somehow becomes easier and more deadly at the same time.

How do you lose with this character? inb4 new Falco only Yoshi's meta.

 

[Bones0]

So, Falco is the best character in the game all things considered. I'm convinced.

I've been playing for the losing team for 3 years, Fox. Falco is like playing Sheik and Fox at the same time. 20XX is a meme, not a manifestation and Haxdollarsign is a false prophet.

It's like every time you make a tech skill error instead of dying like Fox your combo or edge guard somehow becomes easier and more deadly at the same time.

How do you lose with this character? inb4 new Falco only Yoshi's meta.

Yeah, that's why there's so many top Falcos. You have PP... you have Westballz... ummmmm... yeah, that's about it.

 

[1MachGO]

Yeah, that's why there's so many top Falcos. You have PP... you have Westballz... ummmmm... yeah, that's about it.

Don't forget Mango (and Zhu is pretty good).

There are just more good players using Fox.

 

[Alexander Duprey]

Uhh porkchops, and give me a year and I'll be up there I promise. FL getting slept on. seriously tho, how do I practice my ToD combos on FD against fox without a training partner? I can combo lv 1's and empty controllers to death no problem, but when I'm playing someone with really good DI my combos come up short and I end up having to play a really campy defensive falco that goes for safe 2-4 hit combos that don't kill.

Also I'm still having issues DD'ing and Lasering at the sametime while keeping up with faster players, I want my lasering and dash dancing to be unanimous, but i am often think of them separately which means I'm thinking too much about movement during a match and not enough about my opponent.

Currently I'm jsut grinding it out but without a training partner I feel like shadow boxing will only give me bad habits.

Thoughts?

 

[Landry]

So after Puff being one of my worst (and least played) matchups I learned a lot about it last night after playing a bunch of friendlies. I realized just how good dair is against her (even if she's shielding) and how my gameplan should revolve around keeping Puff grounded whenever I can and just walling her out when she takes to the air. Playing more patiently and letting her come to me has helped me a lot but I'm still just starting really grasp the general macro concepts of this matchup. Does anyone have input on this matchup? All advice would be much appreciated.

 

[Bones0]

Don't forget Mango (and Zhu is pretty good).

There are just more good players using Fox.

Mango never uses Falco vs. Peach, Puff, ICs, or Samus, and he often doesn't use him for the other top tier matchups just because he mainly uses Fox these days. Zhu and Porkchops are good players, but they're not on the same level, and most other top tiers have way more representatives within that same skill gap.

 

[Twilight Emblem]

https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/java/redgreen.html So I just took this online reaction test after prepping on purpose to have better reaction time for the test and i'm not too fast with raw reaction time. Usually i'm like 2.4 average or something like that.

How do you guys feel about the concept of improving reaction time on purpose and what info do you have on training it up? I'm trying to google my butt off to find ways of training up raw reaction time but i'm coming up really short. I think having a better base raw reaction time would benefit me better over all as long as I don't translate that to playing trigger happy and hasty

 

[Bones0]

https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/java/redgreen.html So I just took this online reaction test after prepping on purpose to have better reaction time for the test and i'm not too fast with raw reaction time. Usually i'm like 2.4 average or something like that.

How do you guys feel about the concept of improving reaction time on purpose and what info do you have on training it up? I'm trying to google my butt off to find ways of training up raw reaction time but i'm coming up really short. I think having a better base raw reaction time would benefit me better over all as long as I don't translate that to playing trigger happy and hasty

Online reaction tests are basically worthless because of discrepancies in screen/input lag on computers. I know I did reaction time tests and my laptop and thought my reactions were terrible. I was playing Smash at someone else's house and tried to show them how bad it was on their computer with a CRT monitor and my scores were significantly improved (beyond the range of normal variation).

I think raw reaction time actually isn't that critical in Melee. It's much more about situational awareness. If you find yourself missing reactions like shielding a Falco's laser, then you don't just have terrible reaction time. You just aren't paying attention to that specific situation and might be hesitating because you don't have a set solution. If you react to the laser but still aren't sure if you should shield or jump, then obviously that decision making time impacts your effective reaction time. Those decision making moments are not only much more significant in terms of relative time, but they are much easier to improve simply by focusing and training your reactive decision making.