PPMD's Falco Discussion Thread

[Dr Peepee]

I described "next steps" in my post, but to reiterate it's about looking at what's just beyond what you do. So if you get hit at a certain time, figure out why. If you find you're getting stopped in your pressure at a certain time, figure out why. If your favorite neutral play loses to a certain way to play or pattern of coverage, what can you do to adjust? Shadowboxing reinforces by allowing you to practice this next layer of interactions, and you can even think them up as you're playing.

It may help to think about how they're abusing their own tools/their opponents' tools when watching other styles. Watching Westballz jump around you can see he abuses Falco's quick vertical speed and also his big Dair/Bair and laser. He also attacks into opponents where they have a harder time directly beating these options, such as the upward diagonal area in front of ICs(they have no way to hit anything here really).

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

I described "next steps" in my post, but to reiterate it's about looking at what's just beyond what you do. So if you get hit at a certain time, figure out why. If you find you're getting stopped in your pressure at a certain time, figure out why. If your favorite neutral play loses to a certain way to play or pattern of coverage, what can you do to adjust? Shadowboxing reinforces by allowing you to practice this next layer of interactions, and you can even think them up as you're playing.

It may help to think about how they're abusing their own tools/their opponents' tools when watching other styles. Watching Westballz jump around you can see he abuses Falco's quick vertical speed and also his big Dair/Bair and laser. He also attacks into opponents where they have a harder time directly beating these options, such as the upward diagonal area in front of ICs(they have no way to hit anything here really).

Ah, "next steps" is a lot more self explanatory that I thought. When you put it that was it's a lot easier to understand.

How do you feel about using the 20xx replay functionality as opposed to shadowboxing?

I've been struggling recently on FoD vs Marth when there's low platforms. When Marth is on a low platform, I feel like it's super hard for Falco to approach because of his added oos shield drop options. But also I feel it's hard to prevent the Marth from approaching because of his dash forward drop down fair which covers the majority of center stage. At the same time when I'm in the corner as Falco I struggle to establish my own stage when the low platform prevents me from lasering. Also full hopping out of the corner feels worse because Marth can reach the top plat with his sh uair. This is especially hard when I'm out of cc percent because then I can't just fh dj to the top platform and cc his swing.

 

[Dr Peepee]

20XX replay is great for testing ideas and even practicing some different things, but so far it cannot come close to replicating the vast array of possibilities mixed up in real time. I think it's a great supplement but not a replacement for shadowboxing.

In those situations where Marth is on a platform, you can shoot high lasers and space Bair to keep him from coming in. If you're really concerned you can also just react to runoffs with holding down/shielding and then shining him as well. You could probably mix some vertical play in there as well but I don't fully know how that'd work yet.

Yeah when you're cornered as Falco it's pretty rough especially with the low platforms. I sometimes get on the platform and shoot low lasers to hit Marth if he's not in dash or tries to jump at me, and then I can runoff attack or jump over him or counterattack him if he tries it. I'll mix between that and sometimes just yolo'ing him since crossing up if he shields is pretty strong and if I can get him to stick kind of close to me because of this slower platform strategy it makes him less likely to be wary of approaches. You may also find some success with FH in place then coming down with laser vs Dair to help yourself get set up/to kill time with the platform height and allow it to change for a better use for you.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

High laser and bair were the first answers that came to my mind. But I wasn't entirely sure of shooting any more than two high lasers in a row because of them being aggressive with fair. But I guess that's where the mixup with bair comes in. Do you think there's any merit to being aggressive with cc or shield?

What do you do when you can't dash back laser when you have stage control because there's a low platform behind you?

I like the full hop wait idea and I'll be sure to test that in the future.

Because being in the corner can be really bad on FoD as Falco, do you modify your gameplan on that stage? Specifically vs Marth?

What do you think of using wavedash aggressively while at low percent against a short hopping sheik? My main theory with this was to cc their aerial and then shine, but then in practice Falco's shine has too little range and their fair hit's you too far even at super low percents. I've also experimented with this against Marth's nair but I think it's too specific a timing to successfully get under their nair for an opening.

I've recently discovered that Falco's f throw knocks down sheik and fox at 37%, do you have any rules you like to follow for what throws you choose? For the most part I just up throw unless f throw will send them into an edgeguard position, but even then up throw can get an aerial follow up anyway at higher percents.

 

[Dr Peepee]

Being aggressive with CC/shield in my view is primarily good in that it gives you more of a threat on your dash in. This means they might not attack your dash in, which gives you access to more threats(such as getting on platform or attacking through them), more setups for your other main threats, and also generally wears down their shield which opens up more opportunities to poke them. You can still boost your dash in effectiveness if you can pivot Bair out of it or whatever, but it still helps to have these more immediate tools to use sometimes.

Yeah I don't cross up much on FoD and don't overextend as much there unless I'm positive they will move back. If I'm worried about a platform changing height or at a bad height then I may just spend a little longer shooting or just waiting for him to make the first move.

I'm not sure about ASDI down/CC shine vs Fair but if you wanted to test it maybe you can find some use. I doubt it would be something you could commonly abuse, and I'd prefer not taking damage and instead Fair'ing/Nair'ing/lasering the SH and otherwise pressuring the landing.

I like to throw for stage position, or for a tech chase, or for an edgeguard, and sometimes just if they're not expecting a certain throw. I don't like Dthrow except in a few situations.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

Is it good on any stage to cross up a marth's shield? I feel like for the most part it's just better to laser f tilt/laser grab if you have them cornered. Those are the primary options I search for against a cornered marth, or I just try to stuff their approach. Are there any other aggressive mixups you go for while they're cornered?

As I learn more about the sheik short hop vs Falco approach interaction (while also keeping in mind the sheiks dash attack distance), the more complicated it seems. But I feel like this is normally the opposite of what happens while I'm learning about certain interactions. Is this because I don't fully understand the problems each character has to consider? Or maybe it's because the timings/spacings where Falco approaches and gets a solid hit is so precise that each interaction is different in its own way? Every new solution I come up with seems to present 3 times more problems. Is this simply because of sheik's strong defensive game against Falco's approaches?

Because approaching seems so hard, I've started theorizing that it might be better to base my neutral around dash dancing in and out of their dash attack range, and use lasers to force them to approach. I use lasers quite sparingly in this matchup because it feels like you lose a lot more stage vs sheik and peach when lasering than vs marth fox falcon etc. In testing this out, their fade in short hops feel a lot easier to beat, maybe because I'm playing reactively rather than forcing my character in? Because sheik's approaching tools are much more limited, this seems like a more solid gameplan rather than forcing scuffle interactions where sheik has nair oos, cc dsmash, take laser f tilt etc

Also how do you like to respond to Marth's nair at a range of about one Marth dash attack where both characters have equal stage control? My preferable option is to laser it and then try to convert into an approach from there, but overall I feel like it's uncontestable and therefore I feel like I have to give up stage everytime the opposing Marth throws it out. It feels especially strong at closer ranges where I don't have time to dash back laser.

 

[Dr Peepee]

I don't recommend crossing up if someone is super cornered no, but slightly cornered it can still be pretty good since getting behind Marth or other characters can be a great position.

Well what you're learning about with Sheik here is one of the primary neutral interactions and it goes into Falco's main weak spot so it takes a lot of nuance to navigate it. Neutral in general is pretty complicated, but it helps to remember that humans tend to get comfortable with a small mixup pool and you can also use lasers and feints to see what they want to do, aka get free reads on their patterns.

You can switch to shooting higher laser vs it, or back up when you see him come in and shoot it before he lands for advantage OR back up laser/bair his landing so he's forced to shield. I think that between the hits you can also Nair/Dair him. Since Marth has to Nair pretty early to contort his body to dodge laser you can also run in and shine OOS him I'm pretty sure. Sometimes if you get caught off guard then you may just want to WD back or FH away as you see it coming if you don't want to/can't dash back and occasionally you'll just have to shield the spaced Nair and hold that. In those situations it can be helpful to back up a little pre-emptively to discourage Marth going for the Nair too frequently.

 

[Bones0]

PP, do you have any thoughts on KOing Peach? I am finding it increasingly common that I rack Peach up to high percents and struggle to get the KO. I realize this is a pretty common issue, but it feels like I just have to play neutral like normal and still win 4-5 more interactions just to KO her, especially on larger stages. Dtilt, fsmash, usmash are Falco's strongest attacks, but they all get punished really hard by Peach's OoS options, even when spaced perfectly. Jab can be used to set up an fsmash or usmash, but jab is also countered hard by shield. Peaches are content to stay grounded and abuse their shield since they realize Falco can't KO this style of play (Armada is notorious for this). This wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that Falco gets hit so hard by her aggressive mixups. I can try to grab to anticipate their shielding tendency, but Falco's throws don't lead to KOs while a single successful Peach spotdodge leads to dsmash and grab which are her best launchers. Then of course you have her YOLO dash attacks which start to feel like the Melee equivalent of a wakeup super, though even the more calculated Peach players get mileage out of the much safer close range float nair over lasers.

So I guess what I'm really getting at is I hate relying on high risk, medium reward neutral (situations where I get a punish with grab/nair/bair/ftilt), but I also hate playing low risk, low reward because I give up a lot of stage and it feels very difficult to maintain stage presence while also respecting her threat range. It's still a vague idea in my head, but one example of something I've thought about is baiting her into doing her desperation dash attacks. If I can laser and position myself in such a way that she feels like she has an opening, shielding and usmashing OoS could be a big game changer. It KOs no DI (a common occurrence with usmash imo) on Dream Land at 135%, which would be soooo nice compared to those toxic 200% stocks where I need to win neutral 5+ times, getting 1 hit at a time.. Some initial ideas are things like SH FFing too fast to get a laser out so she thinks she has time to stuff it, but I am able to land and shield in time. This seems like a relatively blunt approach to baiting so maybe you have some better ideas. I haven't even begun to theorycraft ways to set up dtilt or fsmash in neutral since that seems even more ambitious, but I guess there may be potential ways to set up those moves as well. Maybe WD back into dtilt can whiff punish her dash attack/quick float nair over lasers? Fsmash I'm at a total loss for ever since people stopped getting hit by laser into fsmash.

Alternatively, or at least additionally, maybe I could improve my sharking? Studying vods has made me realize how bad trying to jump up to hit Peach is, but even when I stay on the plats/ground and try to hit her right before/as she lands, I'm not seeing much success. Best case scenario is I get another bair which is hardly even a KO move in 2018 because of how consistently floaties DI for it. Worst case scenario, I get caught by an early FF aerial (dair usually) and end up above her. Edgeguarding-wise, I'm very consistent at Peach's low heights. If she's within range of a FH dair, I can generally threaten a spike to force her down to the ledge and keep her pinned. Unfortunately, sending her off stage with bairs/nairs and even throws all the time means she rarely gets forced to come in at this shallow of an angle.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

I don't recommend crossing up if someone is super cornered no, but slightly cornered it can still be pretty good since getting behind Marth or other characters can be a great position.

Well what you're learning about with Sheik here is one of the primary neutral interactions and it goes into Falco's main weak spot so it takes a lot of nuance to navigate it. Neutral in general is pretty complicated, but it helps to remember that humans tend to get comfortable with a small mixup pool and you can also use lasers and feints to see what they want to do, aka get free reads on their patterns.

You can switch to shooting higher laser vs it, or back up when you see him come in and shoot it before he lands for advantage OR back up laser/bair his landing so he's forced to shield. I think that between the hits you can also Nair/Dair him. Since Marth has to Nair pretty early to contort his body to dodge laser you can also run in and shine OOS him I'm pretty sure. Sometimes if you get caught off guard then you may just want to WD back or FH away as you see it coming if you don't want to/can't dash back and occasionally you'll just have to shield the spaced Nair and hold that. In those situations it can be helpful to back up a little pre-emptively to discourage Marth going for the Nair too frequently.

What exactly makes Falco strong behind Marth's shield? I've found that to be a pretty comfortable position myself but I don't exactly know why. Marths' bair oos seems okay but super punishable if whiffed. Also what do you think of shine sh turn around laser to continue pressure after a cross up? This is my go to option because I find Marth's like to wd oos after I cross them up.

For analysis, what do you think of pausing preemptively and then asking yourself what you would do, then watching the decisions by both players and comparing my decision to the Falco's I'm watching. I've never seen any top player analyze like this, but I've been trying it and I feel like it's better in helping me show my own weaknesses. Before this I've just been watching situations over and over until I have a feel for them and can picture them in my head quite easily, and then coming up with multiple answers from there.

What do you do when you notice a pattern in someone else's gameplay but don't know how to punish it? I recently watched Santi vs Drephen and was surprised to see Santi not punish Drephen's full hop dair oos even after something like the 10th time. In analysis, the answers against that option seems so straightforward, but when Drephen's not mixing it up and Santi's still getting hit by it occasionally, then there must be a reason.

So to reiterate for Marth's nair, laser is the only real option to straight out beat it, other wise I should respect it unless I have a timing read down and try to go in between the hits. Is there a way that I can laser/dd/feint in the first place to prevent him from using it? I think their nair is especially hard for me to deal with when they're also mixing in dash attacks against my half dash back lasers, because the ranges that those two moves cover is the mid-range area that I like to play vs marth. Thus I then feel obligated to either approach hard, back away with laser, or full hop to top platform. The obvious answer that comes to mind is to dair in place the dash attack, but is there any other way I can play if those are the marth's two primary offensive options?

 

[Dr Peepee]

PP, do you have any thoughts on KOing Peach? I am finding it increasingly common that I rack Peach up to high percents and struggle to get the KO. I realize this is a pretty common issue, but it feels like I just have to play neutral like normal and still win 4-5 more interactions just to KO her, especially on larger stages. Dtilt, fsmash, usmash are Falco's strongest attacks, but they all get punished really hard by Peach's OoS options, even when spaced perfectly. Jab can be used to set up an fsmash or usmash, but jab is also countered hard by shield. Peaches are content to stay grounded and abuse their shield since they realize Falco can't KO this style of play (Armada is notorious for this). This wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that Falco gets hit so hard by her aggressive mixups. I can try to grab to anticipate their shielding tendency, but Falco's throws don't lead to KOs while a single successful Peach spotdodge leads to dsmash and grab which are her best launchers. Then of course you have her YOLO dash attacks which start to feel like the Melee equivalent of a wakeup super, though even the more calculated Peach players get mileage out of the much safer close range float nair over lasers.

So I guess what I'm really getting at is I hate relying on high risk, medium reward neutral (situations where I get a punish with grab/nair/bair/ftilt), but I also hate playing low risk, low reward because I give up a lot of stage and it feels very difficult to maintain stage presence while also respecting her threat range. It's still a vague idea in my head, but one example of something I've thought about is baiting her into doing her desperation dash attacks. If I can laser and position myself in such a way that she feels like she has an opening, shielding and usmashing OoS could be a big game changer. It KOs no DI (a common occurrence with usmash imo) on Dream Land at 135%, which would be soooo nice compared to those toxic 200% stocks where I need to win neutral 5+ times, getting 1 hit at a time.. Some initial ideas are things like SH FFing too fast to get a laser out so she thinks she has time to stuff it, but I am able to land and shield in time. This seems like a relatively blunt approach to baiting so maybe you have some better ideas. I haven't even begun to theorycraft ways to set up dtilt or fsmash in neutral since that seems even more ambitious, but I guess there may be potential ways to set up those moves as well. Maybe WD back into dtilt can whiff punish her dash attack/quick float nair over lasers? Fsmash I'm at a total loss for ever since people stopped getting hit by laser into fsmash.

Alternatively, or at least additionally, maybe I could improve my sharking? Studying vods has made me realize how bad trying to jump up to hit Peach is, but even when I stay on the plats/ground and try to hit her right before/as she lands, I'm not seeing much success. Best case scenario is I get another bair which is hardly even a KO move in 2018 because of how consistently floaties DI for it. Worst case scenario, I get caught by an early FF aerial (dair usually) and end up above her. Edgeguarding-wise, I'm very consistent at Peach's low heights. If she's within range of a FH dair, I can generally threaten a spike to force her down to the ledge and keep her pinned. Unfortunately, sending her off stage with bairs/nairs and even throws all the time means she rarely gets forced to come in at this shallow of an angle.

So for outright KO'ing, I found some success with starting pressure, backing off, and then moving back in with laser Dtilt. It takes a while for shields to regenerate and this gives you some time to work with. Run in Usmash or laser Usmash is pretty good if you force those immediate floats as a pressure mixup, and sometimes Peaches like to spam FC into jabs or DA and you can Fsmash this DA startup/small jab spacing, especially more when they come OOS with FC. You can also get kills more often if you can try to get Peach to float away and then Bair her so she DIs badly, which is why I definitely wouldn't recommend staying grounded when she's high up. My view is that while outright KO'ing is good and should be worked on, you'll find more often that juggling and edgeguarding can give you kills more reliably and safely if you know the flowchart. Oh yeah, and for DA you can hold down vs it for quite a bit if it's not the initial hit, and you can hold down over 100% if it's the third, weakest farthest hit iirc. That gives you access to Dtilt/Fsmash/Usmash/whatever.

As for baiting DAs, I just get kind of close to Peach where I can't safely laser but farther than jab range(closer can be better or worse for some Peaches) and will get them out of FC/WD back a decent amount of times even against Armada. Other Peaches all pop the DA much more reliably in this space, which makes WD back or even slight walk back hold down pretty good here if you want some setup for direct kills.

I find that I can get hit by falling Dair and sometimes fall and shine or Dair her back or whatever. Dtilt/Fsmash/run Usmash out of tech chase is still underexplored and quite useful I believe, primarily when she's closer to the corner so she can't fully tech roll away.

I just loop FH drift in fade back to stage facing away from her if she's high up. This threatens a massive distance if you combine it with DJ, and Peach can't change float direction quickly so she's got to deal with it eventually I find. If she goes over DJ height that's cool too since she burned float at that point and maybe also DJ so you get a much easier Uair/Bair/whatever attempt from a juggling standpoint.

What exactly makes Falco strong behind Marth's shield? I've found that to be a pretty comfortable position myself but I don't exactly know why. Marths' bair oos seems okay but super punishable if whiffed. Also what do you think of shine sh turn around laser to continue pressure after a cross up? This is my go to option because I find Marth's like to wd oos after I cross them up.

For analysis, what do you think of pausing preemptively and then asking yourself what you would do, then watching the decisions by both players and comparing my decision to the Falco's I'm watching. I've never seen any top player analyze like this, but I've been trying it and I feel like it's better in helping me show my own weaknesses. Before this I've just been watching situations over and over until I have a feel for them and can picture them in my head quite easily, and then coming up with multiple answers from there.

What do you do when you notice a pattern in someone else's gameplay but don't know how to punish it? I recently watched Santi vs Drephen and was surprised to see Santi not punish Drephen's full hop dair oos even after something like the 10th time. In analysis, the answers against that option seems so straightforward, but when Drephen's not mixing it up and Santi's still getting hit by it occasionally, then there must be a reason.

So to reiterate for Marth's nair, laser is the only real option to straight out beat it, other wise I should respect it unless I have a timing read down and try to go in between the hits. Is there a way that I can laser/dd/feint in the first place to prevent him from using it? I think their nair is especially hard for me to deal with when they're also mixing in dash attacks against my half dash back lasers, because the ranges that those two moves cover is the mid-range area that I like to play vs marth. Thus I then feel obligated to either approach hard, back away with laser, or full hop to top platform. The obvious answer that comes to mind is to dair in place the dash attack, but is there any other way I can play if those are the marth's two primary offensive options?

Marth has limited options there. He can't grab, has to Bair which isn't fast or strong or leading to kills usually, or he can WD OOS away which is still bad for him since his back is still to Falco. Why laser if you cross up? Why not aerial them as they move away? Get the big reward!

Yeah I REALLY like that analysis method and agree that it's super good. Much more engaging than just taking things as they are. I also like watching situations then comparing them to old, similar situations and thinking about how their decisions evolved over time and how I might have done things differently or use part of their thought process.

These questions can be hard to answer without things like direct confirmation from players and your own experimentation/studies of psychology. My best answer would be something related to awareness and the other options involved. So Santi may have been looking for already difficult Sheik options to cover and that was occupying his attention, making it harder to beat something out of his awareness. It might also be that he's setting up an approach and then is slow to transition to beating this option. It could be that this option looks really obvious and beatable but he hasn't done the practice(mental or physical) to beat it and so his muscle memory works against him. It could be tension making it hard to adapt and/or compounding these things. When I come to something I'm not sure how to answer, I make some best guesses and move on. Often I will find more answers as the set progresses. Some things like that I might not totally know, but with enough time and various sets I could figure out if it was a one-time thing or a positional misunderstanding, or something else.

You can prevent Nair by beating it more. If you think he wants to approach, then you can just wait a moment or do a dash or two that makes him think you want to laser. If he lunges at this time then he will lose. You can back up a little farther and laser or just WD back if you're unsure and want to observe as well. Once you get one laser out you should be more okay against these types of things if you keep the lasers steady, so if you need to back up and get one out then move forward a bit with another you can start keeping them lower and should have time to shield and punish Nair OOS since he will be stunned by lasers hitting him. If that doesn't quite work let me know.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

I never thought of aerialing them as they wd away, I think this option felt wrong to me because I didn't want to give up the strong position of being behind them if they continue to shield. When you do chase them with an aerial do you do a high, mid, or low nair? I'm assuming nair because it's best against dashback. If I remember correctly from your old vods you used to use a higher nair/dair.

When you refer back to old situations, do you look at different vods or simply go back to when the situation happened the last time in the same vod? Are there any other types of analysis I can look into?

One thing I've picked up from all your advice to me is how valuable observation is. I'm slowly starting to add that to my pool of "rewards" from interactions, ie percent, positioning, juicy hits. It's started to help me put value on low risk low reward and high risk high reward options because even if you don't get the hit/stage positioning you still get the info. As a rule of thumb against a player where you don't know how aggressive/defensive they are, would you prioritize low risk low reward interactions for the first couple situations in the set so that you get to glean info? Even against one of the gods that you've studied a lot would you still do this yourself?

It's always interesting when the answer to a situation is to just wait a second and not do an certain option instead. I've definitely done a similar answer to waiting a moment in just dash dancing in place, but I think i undervalued how simple but effective one or two dashes can be. Do you recommend using simple movements for dash dancing instead of using lot's of small timing mixups? I've found through shadowboxing practice that i've started to develop a feel for some off tempo patterns (which I've found takes a lot of focus!), but now I'm wondering if I should be building and strengthening basic movements before trying to move on to more complicated things. I know you've mentioned in the past using a metronome?

 

[Dr Peepee]

I typically just high Nair/Dair them but it can depend on if I think they will hold down or some other factors. High or mid I'd say. I like catching people OOS whether it's jumping or WD startup or shield poking so I think high stuff is usually better.

Between vods is something you might be interested in. So, does Westballz fall for a similar Sheik strategy OOS vs just one person, or all Sheiks at an event, or ever? What changes if he's playing well at different events?

You can gather information extremely quickly even vs players you've never seen before because someone who falls into a certain category often falls into others you establish, but yes I will play a little more for observation and/or do more stuff I just think is "standard" good stuff early on to see how they respond. And vs top players I find this especially important because they will study me back and I want to scout their new tactics asap to beat those and gain advantage. Though I think I personally would be okay with also just trying to put them off balance early with more aggression or something too so they can't access their new tech as well....there can be many ways to approach playing such good players I think.

Basic movements are always more important and mastering those is foundational and what allow you to really build speed. Metronomes are not really required just another option. What matters is you get really familiar with tools individually and then some of how they work together. Don't add complexity too quickly, as there is a great amount in even one dash.

 

[Bones0]

So for outright KO'ing, I found some success with starting pressure, backing off, and then moving back in with laser Dtilt. It takes a while for shields to regenerate and this gives you some time to work with. Run in Usmash or laser Usmash is pretty good if you force those immediate floats as a pressure mixup, and sometimes Peaches like to spam FC into jabs or DA and you can Fsmash this DA startup/small jab spacing, especially more when they come OOS with FC. You can also get kills more often if you can try to get Peach to float away and then Bair her so she DIs badly, which is why I definitely wouldn't recommend staying grounded when she's high up. My view is that while outright KO'ing is good and should be worked on, you'll find more often that juggling and edgeguarding can give you kills more reliably and safely if you know the flowchart. Oh yeah, and for DA you can hold down vs it for quite a bit if it's not the initial hit, and you can hold down over 100% if it's the third, weakest farthest hit iirc. That gives you access to Dtilt/Fsmash/Usmash/whatever.

As for baiting DAs, I just get kind of close to Peach where I can't safely laser but farther than jab range(closer can be better or worse for some Peaches) and will get them out of FC/WD back a decent amount of times even against Armada. Other Peaches all pop the DA much more reliably in this space, which makes WD back or even slight walk back hold down pretty good here if you want some setup for direct kills.

I find that I can get hit by falling Dair and sometimes fall and shine or Dair her back or whatever. Dtilt/Fsmash/run Usmash out of tech chase is still underexplored and quite useful I believe, primarily when she's closer to the corner so she can't fully tech roll away.

I just loop FH drift in fade back to stage facing away from her if she's high up. This threatens a massive distance if you combine it with DJ, and Peach can't change float direction quickly so she's got to deal with it eventually I find. If she goes over DJ height that's cool too since she burned float at that point and maybe also DJ so you get a much easier Uair/Bair/whatever attempt from a juggling standpoint.

Thanks, this is really helpful. Just want to quickly clarify a couple of things:

1. When you talk about lasering into dtilt, are you hit confirming the laser? Or are you backing off and reengaging when their shield is low enough to poke? Whenever I try this kind of stuff, I can't react to them shielding the laser or not, and if they do shield (which is common at KO %s) I get punished which is why I stray away from it.

2. Similar question for the fsmash. Are you keeping track of their shielding tendencies and predicting their jab/DA after FC aerials? I generally bair in place when I think she'll jab to avoid jumping into it, but maybe I should bite the bullet more often and dtilt/fsmash. I might be able to hit confirm a laser dtilt if I am reacting to her jab/DA startup instead of my actual laser hitting since that gives me a significant number of extra frames to react.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

I've always thought about looking for situations between vods, but I haven't due to how daunting the task seems. But when considering positions that certain players like to abuse I think that's a good place to start. Have you tried this when reviewing your own vods?

Do you recommend going the safer route at the beginning of the game for mid level players like me? I feel like being aggressive can be just as effective in some cases, but maybe it's better to practice looking for info and patterns.

I feel like I have a pretty good sense of Falco after playing for approximately four years. So how should I go about practicing and deepening my understanding of the simple movements? And then how should I be putting them together? What individual movement tools should I start looking into?

How does Falco sh nair interact with Peach's FC Fair. I tend to go for it more at lower percents for fear of trading at higher percents. I know it's only one option against the many intricacies of Peach's float. Is it better against a higher Peach float or lower? On a similar note, how do I go about dash dance lasering against the float so that I don't put myself into a corner? Full hop bair/nair to top plat are the first answers that come to mind but I feel like there's no obvious answer besides sh bair. Many of my Falco friends have recommended up tilt but through analysis I've found that it only beats the fair if the hitbox isn't out, otherwise it trades or loses outright to fair. Have you found that to be the case with up tilt?

 

[Dr Peepee]

Thanks, this is really helpful. Just want to quickly clarify a couple of things:

1. When you talk about lasering into dtilt, are you hit confirming the laser? Or are you backing off and reengaging when their shield is low enough to poke? Whenever I try this kind of stuff, I can't react to them shielding the laser or not, and if they do shield (which is common at KO %s) I get punished which is why I stray away from it.

2. Similar question for the fsmash. Are you keeping track of their shielding tendencies and predicting their jab/DA after FC aerials? I generally bair in place when I think she'll jab to avoid jumping into it, but maybe I should bite the bullet more often and dtilt/fsmash. I might be able to hit confirm a laser dtilt if I am reacting to her jab/DA startup instead of my actual laser hitting since that gives me a significant number of extra frames to react.

1. Yes I am mostly hit-confirming. I'm backing off after initial pressure then re-engaging with laser. I could also re-engage with an aerial though if they wanted to shield and maybe that'd be more comfortable for you since it shrinks their shield more and you can space it and have more hitlag to use to confirm.

2. The shielding tendencies should be something you can scout fairly quickly imo, and it's not something to go for too early in a set unless you get an early read.

I've always thought about looking for situations between vods, but I haven't due to how daunting the task seems. But when considering positions that certain players like to abuse I think that's a good place to start. Have you tried this when reviewing your own vods?

Do you recommend going the safer route at the beginning of the game for mid level players like me? I feel like being aggressive can be just as effective in some cases, but maybe it's better to practice looking for info and patterns.

I feel like I have a pretty good sense of Falco after playing for approximately four years. So how should I go about practicing and deepening my understanding of the simple movements? And then how should I be putting them together? What individual movement tools should I start looking into?

How does Falco sh nair interact with Peach's FC Fair. I tend to go for it more at lower percents for fear of trading at higher percents. I know it's only one option against the many intricacies of Peach's float. Is it better against a higher Peach float or lower? On a similar note, how do I go about dash dance lasering against the float so that I don't put myself into a corner? Full hop bair/nair to top plat are the first answers that come to mind but I feel like there's no obvious answer besides sh bair. Many of my Falco friends have recommended up tilt but through analysis I've found that it only beats the fair if the hitbox isn't out, otherwise it trades or loses outright to fair. Have you found that to be the case with up tilt?

Yeah I wasn't suggesting you had to start looking between vods, but it was just another avenue to eventually explore. There's so much in an individual set that you can have a lot of use for that often. I don't usually use this for my own play in videos so much now that I think of it, but maybe I should! Good question.

Being aggressive doesn't mean being reckless, it just means engaging first and staying closer. You can gain info while doing that. It's really about preference, but your question does make me feel like you'd be alright with approaching it like I do with just playing your game and maybe being slightly more conservative early on for data.

Practice single dashes across the stage. Forwards, backwards. Think of the tools connected to it, how far it goes, other properties. How do these influence the opponent? Keep doing the dash. Then finally move to WD. Repeat forever because there's always more deepening to be done. Eventually when you do feel a deeper connection you'll know it, and can move on to combining things like dash and laser.

Nair will lose to early Fair but iirc it often beats or trades with mid or late Fair. You'll need to scout what Peach players use. Armada pretty much exclusively does early Fair so you'd want to use Fair vs it or just challenge the landing/shine OOS depending on how high the Fair is. If it's later Fair you can Nair/Bair/Utilt as well. You can occasionally run in and FH Nair the float too, and this kind of threat is what you should use to keep Peach from bullying you into the corner with float. Pick Peach and float around with her, and you'll realize her float speed and ability to change direction are pretty bad, so even Falco's pitiful DD is enough to bully her back in my opinion. Also, I like getting on a side platform and lasering her, which always hits if she stays floating since she has to float just above side platforms. If she goes down you can falling laser to pressure, and it becomes more mixups from there.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

Yeah I think I definitely do have a natural tendency to stay more conservative at the beginning of sets, but at the same time I realized I sometimes get thrown off when opposing players start off super aggressive, which leads to my own uncalculated aggression; so I guess that's just something I have to keep in mind.

I'll definitely practice single dashes/wavedashes/simple movements. Besides thinking of how each movement affects the oppposing player, should I be thinking of the dash in the context of a certain matchup/position as well? Is it better to do that or to consciously observe the dash and try to internalize it.. or both? I think for an activity like this it would be best to do right before bed, which is a strategy I use for studying for tests and seems to work pretty well because your mind computes the practice overnight. Have you ever tried prioritizing the info you want to learn most right before you got to sleep?

When you go on the side plat to laser Peach, do you do a full hop/instant double jump falling laser? Or do you waveland on the plat then shoot a laser. I've found sometimes with the former option the peach's simply float towards you then punish your landing or your dair lag if you try to dair them. The problem I've also found with lasering them from the plat is that they simply drift back and ff. And then the worst part is at low percent where if you come at them with dair/nair from the side plat they can still sdi down away then nair/dsmash. So what do you do after you've done the laser on the side plat? I have tried the option that you mentioned of dropping down and lasering but that just seems to reset the position and then the peach is floating in the middle of the stage again. Am I simply not fast enough on the second laser?

So I got to practice against two Marth's today, one slightly worse than me and one slightly better.

The first Marth was slightly worse than me, super swingy, and played the mid range distance with nair/dash attack (which was super lucky of me to run into the perfect Marth.) So at first when he would approach I would try the mixup of dashing back once and then seeing what they would do. At first this worked by punishing their whiff with grab. It was working so much in fact that I started experimenting with dash back dash in shield, which I found works if they want to be a few pixels more aggressive, or if I don't have as much space left. So luckily my opponent finally adapted by undershooting his aerials and taking the space. I lost 2 or 3 games to this until I realized why the option wasn't working anymore and then adapted by just waiting in place for two beats, instead of dashing back on the first beat and then punishing on the next. For a while we played those two mixups until my opponent started to be even more passive and play with cc/d tilt/aerials in place/slight drift forward. So it was here that I realized this activated my laser game/more aggressive options. So thanks to that one initial option that you recommended to me my opponent and I were able to play the full circle of mixups which was super interesting to consciously watch evolve before my eyes.

The next Marth I played was definitely better than me, and while it was even at first he quickly started 2 or 3 stocking me. Against this Marth the wait option/dash back option didn't work nearly as much, if at all. I observed that he was playing way more ranges than just the medium one. After our friendly sesh I asked him what I could have done better, and he said my lasers were really strong, but the only option I choose afterwards was to go in. I'm guessing this is the reason the option didn't work as well, because I probably had a pattern of waiting with laser/dash back then going in to try to beat his approach. I also think I was slightly tilted from his super strong punish game on fd but that's a whole other thing to discuss. In comparing these two Marths and the options they went for, it's super interesting to see that not lasering was much stronger against one, and lasering a lot was stronger against the other. Do you think this is a fact of one Marth being better than the other? Or simply because of the nature of the options against each Marth's playstyle. I'm inclinced to think it's the second reason because I would expect for better Marth's to know how to deal with lasers better. Perhaps I should have been more patient with lasers and then done the dash back/wait in place option, instead of going for one or the other.

 

[Dr Peepee]

You could consider positions and such too, but generally I reserve that for shadowboxing.

I don't practice before bed as I like meditating before bed too much now, but I can see why that could be useful. If it works for you then do it.

Yeah so the Peach hitting you thing, I sometimes move back on the platform so I'm harder to hit, or just go to top platform if I see that coming. Generally though if Peach is going to come into me I like hitting her first, and if you're too close to where she can react in this way then sometimes wavelanding or DD'ing can be better. Also if Peach falls as you go up, then you fall with laser, or SHL on the side platform again, or fake with runoff DJ laser back onto the platform. If you keep messing around you can usually find something that works there. If Peach does manage to jump as you go down then she's usually backed up a lot so you still gain stage space and can switch to a grounded approach instead. You can also just use the top platform some here if you'd like.

I don't know much about what the second Marth did, but he probably played more passively overall even if he played more ranges. This means he'd dislike lasers but really like countering your eventual approaches. You want to press in on him some with partial lasers forward so he can't just wait for you to come in, and it also positions you close enough to beat out most of what he can do. He'd dislike this and be forced to approach more, which opens your whole game up in the same way you described about the first Marth.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

Is there a certain type of meditating you like to do? I find the one where you acknowledge each thought and then try to move on as the most effective for me right now. I used to just focus on focusing on my breath but in defining it as acknowledging thoughts imo makes it more applicable to melee because I can acknowledge the fact that I got hit/messed up and more easily move on from there.

Do you think going to the top platform on BF/DL against a grounded Peach is a neutral position? I feel like it's slightly in Peach's favor because my first goal would be to get to the ground safely before I can prioritize winning neutral again. Although now that I think about it Falco can easily go to either side platform from there, which seems pretty strong considering all the options you mentioned above. What are you looking to do on the top platform, if the gameplan is slightly different on each stage then I'm most curious on how it works on Battlefield.

It makes sense that you like hitting Peach first because trying to avoid Peach's gigantic hitboxes is tough and often leaves Falco with little stage to work with and counteract. Does this mean I should revolve a gameplan against Peach around baiting her in and then anticipating her approach early? Is it for this or a similar reasoning that Armada likes to do early fairs?

I like the options from the side platform you mentioned above because it seems in some lines Falco can end up with some gained stage positioning for a low risk, which I feel like is what Peach's tend to get automatically against Falco's who are bad at the matchup (like me lol).

What do you think about approaching a grounded Peach? I ask such a vague question because I was watching Leffen vs Trif and I noticed that not even once did Leffen approach when Trif was on the ground, even when Trif was out of cc percent.

I didn't really try to describe what the second Marth did because I didn't understand what he did exactly. Although in reading your analysis you're completely right. Looking back, dashing back and waiting against that style of Marth is practically gifting them stage control. Everything is a lot clearer now; I felt pressured from the corner to laser and as a result approached rather quickly. Even though I mixed up my offensive options quite well the fact that I'm approaching after every laser or two really gave him an easy read on me. It's interesting that the way to beat his style of slowly gaining space through passive aerials is by lasering a lot and slowly creating your own space.

The more I talk to you the more I'm noticing how laser is integral to Falco's gameplay. Everyone of course knows it's his main neutral tool but I feel like I'm starting to get a better intrinsic understanding of how important it is. Because without it I'm sure that passive style of Marth would be amazingly strong, considering Marth is quite strong against Falco's platform game it would be hard for Falco to play against that style without throwing a hitbox across the stage forcing the Marth to approach and contesting his position passively. Now I feel I should be focusing more on understanding the interactions between characters and laser. Should I include some kind of laser practice in my practice of simple movements? Or should I wait to introduce laser only after I've started to get a better feel for Falco's dash/wavedash?

 

[Dr Peepee]

I do the breath focus as a primary form, but if there are other thoughts I acknowledge them and occasionally go over them/allow my subconscious to come up with answers to those issues later on. I may also use it as a time to visualize. The foundation is the breath focus to me.

Spacies are good on the top platform which is why Westballz goes up there so much. It abuses fall speed and his decently sized aerials plus laser and it removes his SH startup(though if you want to hit someone horizontally farther away you still need to SH but it has depth). So many Falcos associate being on a platform with loss of control like when Marth/Fox throw them up there, but it's a great position if you are willing to work without lasers and abuse other traits sometimes. Anyway, on BF it's a bit different than other levels for two main reasons. The first is the side platforms extend directly under the top platform's edge so you can't just run off and attack without falling through the side platforms first(you can do this on YS/DL for example). The other difference is the top platform is SO HIGH that some plays that might be harder to react to/unreactable on lower platforms become more reactable here. So you might end up doing things like moving to side platform then attacking, or falling with laser more often since you can't just surprise people with direct speed as easily. You may also need more empty land, waveland, or DJ back to the top platform fakes. Anyway, to get around to explaining vs Peach a little, it's definitely not a good position for her if you're up there. She has to DJ(super slow) to get to you, or otherwise pull then throw a turnip, or jump and up-B to hit you. None of that is fast or punishing at all. So you get control of how to manipulate this in large part(it's a little different on lower top platform stages but still not an inherently bad position, especially thanks to shield dropping now). From there you can fall with laser closer to the side and either shoot high to intercept her float attempt, or low to keep her grounded depending on how you want to do things. You can get on a side platform to transition to lasers vs her float and to extend your SH range, or if you get on one closer to her you can use it to attack her where she can't easily dodge/get a move out in time if she's reacting to you getting there. I also find the SH at her and shine option to be surprisingly good in a variety of matchups as a mixup so I recommend playing with it.

I'm okay with letting her swing first, but I don't like letting her bully me across the stage with the threat of Fair. If she Fairs that's also okay since I can attack her landing pretty well and apply pressure. Armada likes early Fair because it at least beats the typical grounded Bair/Utilt that Falco could easily do to make Peach leave him alone, but the downside is he has to space for those wins and if you back up slightly then you get to challenge his landing every time.

I love approaching grounded Peach. As Falco you need to take that position over her floating imo. Really though what I love hitting most is Peach trying to go from ground to air, so that's a big part of why I go after her on the ground. Another reason I like grounded approaches is because they seem to be more secure since she can only really WD back or shield if I do it well and also discourage jump, which makes laser close pretty strong and gives me access to pressure, Dair, and Bair at least. The high damage moves that can also lead to more punishes are nice, and I don't personally mind grabs, but I have to admit I seem to be an outlier when it comes to this. =p

Laser to partly take space isn't the only strategy. You can also take big swings yourself and just do things like empty hop in drift back into SH aerial and other aggressive plays. If you wanted to camp him out and get damage while doing it you could totally do that too. Of course I will advocate for what I'm comfortable with, but it's true that, at least in some situations, there isn't a best answer and it matters much more what you'd personally like to do.

I think laser is so important and so misunderstood, so I'd recommend starting practice on that right away as well. I do lots of lasers in place, slight lasers forward, full lasers forward, same for backward, then combining with dashes and/or WDs as starting points. I also recommend some combination of laser and Bair/Utilt as that's still simple and helps you get used to covering laser's weak spot.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

I think I've never really been a fan of the top platform because being aggressive from there feels like I have less control in how the next interaction will take place because I'm guessing how to not get hit rather than how to get an opening. I'm gonna pursue full hop/dj mixups more. Do you have any general advice of where to start? I'm quite comfortable off of the top plat of BF and DL because it's safer and I've experimented with the mixups you mentioned of getting down safely, but what should I be looking for offensively? Is that too vague a question considering the infinite mixups there are with ff, drift, matchup, stage etc? If I were to specify I'd say Sheik and FoD because those seem to be my weakest stage/matchup rn. Through some analysis I've noticed that when the Falco is coming down near a platform they tend to be more successful maybe because they have the added mixup of landing on the platform?

I've always loved BF's top platform for the reason that it's the highest and thus the safest, but now it's even more clear to me why Wes loves yoshi's. It also makes sense why my offensive vertical mixups have been less successful because I resort to top plat most often on BF.

I've used the sh/fh shine option most often vs predictable full hoppy foxes, but trying it from the side plat or in general against Peach never occured to me. I'll def look into incorporating that. I feel like I don't see that option used that much right now. Is it because top players simply have not explored it enough?

I'm super surprised you like approaching grounded peach for a few reasons. One is you already mentioned that Peach's float isn't as strong as it seem because it's quite slow and she can't change directions quickly. Also I always figured characters to be inherently worse when they're in the air because they have less access to pretty much everything, shield, roll, the threat of jump, dash back, DA etc. I think I ran into the same problem against Peach as I did against that Marth that beat me. I would get trapped in the corner from her float and fair threat, then feel obligated to either approach or laser minimally and then approach. Thus the Peach's caught on and then punish my predictable attacks.

So how should I go about approaching Peach's on the ground who mixup shield, cc dsmash, and wd back dsmash (those seem to be the options that most Peach's on my level prefer). In my experience cross up Dair is worse on shield and is vulnerable to bair oos, but it's better against cc. Should I be looking for a reallllly low dair in front of them on shield to avoid the problem of its frame disadvantage on shield? You mentioned laser close, should I land with the laser outside of her grab range? If so, what should I do from there? Is it better to just land right in front of them with laser and then go for shinegrab/straight up grab?

There's so much info that you've given me over the past couple of days. How should I go about absorbing the info? Right now I do a lot of rereading and visualizing, and of course applying the info when I can like against those marth's. Should I focus my questions more onto one matchup to more easily make connections between your responses? Should I only pursue further questions once I've tested the stuff you've told me to try? Should I go deeper in each topic we've discussed before moving on? How do I know if I'm even asking the right questions?

 

[Dr Peepee]

I'm not sure what your initial question wants. Do you want FH/DJ mixups, or top platform mixups, and only vs Sheik on FoD?

I don't think platform fighting has been that explored in general to be honest.

Well, normally you can't easily hit Peach out of the air so it's just easier to fight her on the ground. More defensive Peaches will float and FC in such a way where you won't usually hit them out of the air and have to play for the ground game more often. If you can hit moderate and aggro Peaches out of the air though, by all means do that instead it's way better.

I don't really know if you can make crossup Dair consistently work, or only work if they're off balance. I just go for super late aerials or spaced Bair and also laser close into walk shine or grab or shine grab. Also keep in mind that just getting an advantaged position on Peach does not give her many options. You don't need to go ham on pressure and can let her shield wear down some(using spaced aerials and some waits, etc) so early Dair can shield poke more reliably and suddenly anything you do gets pretty strong. I'd just experiment if I were you and worried about getting countered.

In the thick of learning, there's only so much you can see or feel. If you notice yourself getting better then that's good enough. If you feel yourself burning out, then switch to refining some knowledge and focusing more on practice and internalizing what you do have. You'll be alright, trust the process.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

I think I was unclear with my question because I'm not quite sure where the better place to start would be with vertical mixups. What do you think I should explore first?

Through some analysis I found that landing with laser right on top of their shield is pretty bad if they choose to throw out any hitbox at all, so it makes sense that you land with laser further and then walk to their shield. The walk seems really strong because I feel like the Peach would have to be pretty aggressive to contest that, and it's just seems safer for them to wait and react to shield pressure anyway. If you're shield pressuring them, how do you deal with up b oos? I know that double shine is the only thing that beats it outright, but I feel like you would choose a different route of dealing with it.

I think the hardest part is trusting the process, because getting better in Melee comes with time, so I don't have feedback on certain practices for a while. I think I'll just stick to the rule of "you get out of Melee what you put into it".

In a similar vein, is it important to have set goals? Right now I'm in college and don't have access to tourneys with players better than me, so my philosophy is to just be the best I can be with the time I have available. For the time being this feels sufficient for me, but what do you think the difference is between working as hard as you can for the sake of working hard and working hard to get to a certain level/goal/player?

 

[Dr Peepee]

I'd say start with runoff/WD off aerials and laser, landing on side platforms or going through the platform and landing in the middle of the stage, and faking and getting back onto the top platform.

You maintain decent advantage too if you walk, and you can always jab/Ftilt or spaced aerial or laser again if you need to. Laser to run grab I don't think loses to anything besides spotdodges or rolls depending on spacing/staling iirc. For up-B OOS, you can either land from an aerial into shield, space aerials more(or drift back if closer), or shine immediate aerial also works iirc. It's not like Peach gets a big reward off of it so I'll press her on it sometimes. If she pops it a lot then you just make the spacing more ambiguous and/or mix in more double shine and such imo.

Setting goals can still be possible. You can be more consistent at tech, understand tools more deeply, rank up more on netplay, see more things in videos, or communicate your ideas more effectively to others. Sure your main focus can be enjoyment of learning, but having benchmarks so you can track your progress is a great way to keep yourself going.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

While she doesn't get much off of upB oos, I was wondering about it because it seemed to be the only oos option where the solution seemed unclear to me. And I feel like Falco really has to push his stage advantage on Peach when he gets it because I feel like it's so hard to get in the first place.

How do you go about understanding tools more deeply? I've always thought of which tools could respond to a situation, rather than which situations could be applicable for a certain tool. Should I be trying to figure out how to bait the options that a certain tool counters?

Do you like setting goals of multiple time lengths? Like different goals for the next week, month, year?

Is the point of "slowing it down" mid game to give yourself time to see how your opponent has adapted? What if my opponent has already adapted to the tools that I use to "slow it down"? Going to the top plat against icies/Peach seems like a strong way to slow it down to allow yourself to take a breath and mentally recollect. Is there a way to extrapolate info from that position that you can then apply to the neutral positions you were fighting in earlier?

How do Falco's lasers interact with Peach's quick FC Nair? I figure shooting high lasers while close to Peach would be strong against that option and PS. But the trade off is you have less stun on their shield. How is this mixup connected to the laser walk forward option you mentioned earlier? Is there a range where I can threaten the walk forward but also bait out the sh nair?

 

[Dr Peepee]

The up-B OOS can also be punished fairly reliably if you block or dodge it, so this should discourage Peach from using it if you can counter it.

You can approach tools from whatever angle you want. Those you listed are all fine. You can also look at tool clusters to see weak spots, so for example if you look at Falco's main tools you see his front facing diagonal above him is weak since nothing easily covers there unless he turns around. This helps you understand manipulation and matchups.

You can do it that way, or you can look at a major long-term goal and set benchmarks for shorter time spans to check in and see how you're progressing. I tend to find that I most like goals that I can envision that make me feel inspired to achieve them, so whatever process you use to get that feeling is probably best.

Slowing it down could be done for a variety of reasons. Tempo change, letting nerves set in, changing positional fighting like with top platform, giving yourself time to reflect on a difficult position, and so on. As for your top platform question, yes if you find the opponent anxious to get you or casually waiting that can tell you how they may act once back in neutral and also how they handle having the lead or not having the lead. They may also change how they fight and include more coverage/thought to you going up to the top again, which can be abused.

You can just shoot higher but not too high and still get decent advantage, but yes it is a trade off. If you suspect Peach may do this, you could laser then immediately turn around. Utilt and AC Bair could be useful here, but you can even pre-emptively SH so you can Bair her shield or laser if you want change up pressure.

 

[The_Bookworm]

The up-B OOS can also be punished fairly reliably if you block or dodge it, so this should discourage Peach from using it if you can counter it.

You can approach tools from whatever angle you want. Those you listed are all fine. You can also look at tool clusters to see weak spots, so for example if you look at Falco's main tools you see his front facing diagonal above him is weak since nothing easily covers there unless he turns around. This helps you understand manipulation and matchups.

You can do it that way, or you can look at a major long-term goal and set benchmarks for shorter time spans to check in and see how you're progressing. I tend to find that I most like goals that I can envision that make me feel inspired to achieve them, so whatever process you use to get that feeling is probably best.

Slowing it down could be done for a variety of reasons. Tempo change, letting nerves set in, changing positional fighting like with top platform, giving yourself time to reflect on a difficult position, and so on. As for your top platform question, yes if you find the opponent anxious to get you or casually waiting that can tell you how they may act once back in neutral and also how they handle having the lead or not having the lead. They may also change how they fight and include more coverage/thought to you going up to the top again, which can be abused.

You can just shoot higher but not too high and still get decent advantage, but yes it is a trade off. If you suspect Peach may do this, you could laser then immediately turn around. Utilt and AC Bair could be useful here, but you can even pre-emptively SH so you can Bair her shield or laser if you want change up pressure.

OMG. THE PPMD!

I have a question for you. Do you think Falco still deserves to be ranked 2nd in the tier list, or do you think other characters like Marth and Jigglypuff are more deserving of the spot?

 

[Dr Peepee]

HELLO THE BOOKWORM

I think it comes down to what you want in a tier list. Most people just want something results-based with a tiny bit of extra wiggle room so Pikachu isn't above Marth(some sarcasm here).

At the moment I think Fox and Marth should be somewhat tied for first with Falco probably being 3rd after that. I certainly wouldn't mind if Falco stayed second though as it's not like either him or Marth have fulfilled anything close to their potential.

Also, I think Puff is no better than 5th in the game. Hbox and I seem to have pretty similar opinions on the character after all these years lol =p

 

[Josniff640]

What are everybody's thoughts on using lazer during shield pressure? I saw Leffen's video that showed it can drag their shield closer to you, I use it sometimes when I'm looking for a roll, but is it really worth not doing a Nair for example to use a lazer? It feels unsafe to me, but I'm not sure.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

The up-B OOS can also be punished fairly reliably if you block or dodge it, so this should discourage Peach from using it if you can counter it.

You can approach tools from whatever angle you want. Those you listed are all fine. You can also look at tool clusters to see weak spots, so for example if you look at Falco's main tools you see his front facing diagonal above him is weak since nothing easily covers there unless he turns around. This helps you understand manipulation and matchups.

You can do it that way, or you can look at a major long-term goal and set benchmarks for shorter time spans to check in and see how you're progressing. I tend to find that I most like goals that I can envision that make me feel inspired to achieve them, so whatever process you use to get that feeling is probably best.

Slowing it down could be done for a variety of reasons. Tempo change, letting nerves set in, changing positional fighting like with top platform, giving yourself time to reflect on a difficult position, and so on. As for your top platform question, yes if you find the opponent anxious to get you or casually waiting that can tell you how they may act once back in neutral and also how they handle having the lead or not having the lead. They may also change how they fight and include more coverage/thought to you going up to the top again, which can be abused.

You can just shoot higher but not too high and still get decent advantage, but yes it is a trade off. If you suspect Peach may do this, you could laser then immediately turn around. Utilt and AC Bair could be useful here, but you can even pre-emptively SH so you can Bair her shield or laser if you want change up pressure.

I like that idea of "feeling" out goals to see how they apply to me, will definitely pursue that.

Is the top plat and lasers the only easy way to scout out your opponent with low commitments? I guess you could edge stall too.

So it seems like a really strong position to land with a laser a character length or two away from Peach's shield. Do your aggressive mixups revolve around this? Like only crossing up shield and landing in front of their shield with low aerial so that landing a bit from their shield stays a strong option? Or is that line of play only better against certain levels of aggression/defense?

Is it strong to play against Pikachu at a range where her dash nair would hit at the peak of her jump while I'm at low percent? Because even if the nair hits she can't follow up because she'll end up so far behind me? If this is the case, then how can I take advantage of playing at that range? Also does this mean it's dangerous to play at the range where her nair would hit on the way down? Can I apply the same/a similar concept against Falcon's nair?

 

[Dr Peepee]

What are everybody's thoughts on using lazer during shield pressure? I saw Leffen's video that showed it can drag their shield closer to you, I use it sometimes when I'm looking for a roll, but is it really worth not doing a Nair for example to use a lazer? It feels unsafe to me, but I'm not sure.

Laser can be better since it has less lag than Nair, can make people want to move OOS since they saw you put yourself in lag, and can catch rolls, as well as hit someone moving OOS and help you confirm a punish. It's still pretty unsafe, but if you're mixing aerials and shine grab and double shine, it'll be pretty hard to beat it on reaction since they're looking for so much.

I like that idea of "feeling" out goals to see how they apply to me, will definitely pursue that.

Is the top plat and lasers the only easy way to scout out your opponent with low commitments? I guess you could edge stall too.

So it seems like a really strong position to land with a laser a character length or two away from Peach's shield. Do your aggressive mixups revolve around this? Like only crossing up shield and landing in front of their shield with low aerial so that landing a bit from their shield stays a strong option? Or is that line of play only better against certain levels of aggression/defense?

Is it strong to play against Pikachu at a range where her dash nair would hit at the peak of her jump while I'm at low percent? Because even if the nair hits she can't follow up because she'll end up so far behind me? If this is the case, then how can I take advantage of playing at that range? Also does this mean it's dangerous to play at the range where her nair would hit on the way down? Can I apply the same/a similar concept against Falcon's nair?

You can just dash in WD back. Free read.

Different spacings are good vs Peach. Getting close encourages her to pop options more, while getting pretty close makes her more okay with shielding or WD back since you usually won't be able to easily pressure as long. I'd just examine the positions and options if I were you.

Hitting Nair high up they can often Uair out of it pretty sure, and if not they can chase your DJ away with Uair. If you hold down that won't matter though. Lasers and Dair/Bair stuff Pikachu's everything anyway so as long as you have those out at most ranges you'll be alright.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

Oh yeah I've used dash in wavedash back in the past against fox especially, def gonna apply that to other matchups. Also, I've been testing out the jump shine in neutral, and it's become one of my favorite aggressive options against Falco. What makes it such a strong option in the ditto?

Does that mean the pikachu matchup boils down to mixing up your timings well? Since those options stuff everything she does? I've played anther before and that seems easier said than done. Of course he's a whole other caliber of player, maybe I was approaching too much? Pikachu's oos options seem pretty strong against Falco, so should I be mostly playing defensive against her?

I have a big tourney coming up next saturday. How do you like to prepare a few days before the event? In the past I've just played as much as possible to solidify and become comfortable with all of the options I've been experimenting with leading up to the event.

One thing I noticed from my local yesterday was whenever I got hit, my immediate reaction was to think "what could I have done better/why did I get hit?" I'm beginning to think this isn't a great question to ask myself in the middle of the match because of how open ended it is and it seems to easily distracts me from the match. Should I be thinking in general terms/giving myself general directions such as "approach less" or "laser more"?

 

[Dr Peepee]

It's strong because Falco wants to jump, has slower jumpsquat, and if he lasers it has lots of vulnerable startup you can shine. Also if you're doing it you can often get frame advantage which is great since Falco's OOS isn't strong when you're up close besides reading what you do or rolling.

If you're lunging a lot at Pikachu I think you're probably overdoing it, but it's okay to do that sometimes safely. You don't need to push in hard on Pikachu since you beat everything Pika can do. Mid lasers are pretty likely to hit standing/running/Nair'ing Pika, and then from there you can move in to space on Pika or to shine grab or whatever. Getting behind Pikachu is really the only thing I wouldn't recommend due to Uair OOS, but if you just mix in shielding pretty heavily when you're back there it's not so bad. Usmash OOS in front of you isn't that great as it isn't very big, and Pika's grab is pitifully small and Pika's shield isn't great either, so that's a prime time to bully the character I think.

Review all relevant matchups, keep intense practice, then as you get closer it can be okay to just take it easy and trust you did all you could so you can let knowledge settle in and help calm your nerves some.

It's a fine thing to ask yourself, but you should ask it more when you're on the respawn platform or between games or you get hit high but don't die lol. Otherwise yeah it's better to just focus on DI'ing and what comes next.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

Reviewing all relevant matchups seems like a pretty hefty process. Do you just go over the general rules you follow when facing each character? Or do you do something a little more involved than that?

Is meditation the answer to stop myself from asking myself questions? Should my goal while playing tourney sets be to play as consciously unconscious and fluid as possible? Is it ever okay to ask myself questions while playing neutral/getting comboed/comboing? One part of me says melee is too fast for that and requires too much focus, but another part naturally does that as habit from friendlies. Does his mean I should practice clearing my mind more while playing friendlies?

My main teammate is a fox player, and we both feel like the other player should approach more. I’ve found that I’m super successful with controlling a space and walking out the opponent while my teammate plays neutral and using laser to aid both of those. But my fox teammate thinks I should go in more because falcos combos get amazing damage and fox has a faster run speed and drill which are better at saving me. What do you think the balance should be in a fox falco comp?

I also saw you approaching with full hop a lot when teaming with lozr at bmr2, especially on fd, which In my experience is a little too aggressive. What is the reasoning behind using that as one of your main approach tools?

 

[Dr Peepee]

Relevant can just mean what's at your local coming up, or what's in your bracket as projected at something bigger. Ideally you're always working on all matchups. Then you can review notes you make/watch quick refresher videos before an event if it's been a while since you've looked at some.

It may help to also train to be serious and integrate everything you've learned as if you're in tournament. Most people are always in this mode, and alternating modes helps you train relaxation along with playing hard. This gives you intensity and focus along with adaptation. You can train moving this focus to different times in friendlies and that should work fine, basically.

I've always liked going in personally, but I played defense pretty well with Mango when we teamed too. It might be more up to preference than anything. Maybe you both should experiment playing either way, or, and this is something I really want to do in the future, alternate going in vs staying back. This doesn't just mean the next time you two are clumped up, but when one of you is already in front. So if you're going in and putting some pressure on, you guys have a word or signal or something that allows you two to switch off. This could give you both a wide area of coverage and make it much harder for the opponent to handle the speed and combined attack angles of both spacies.

I'm not sure I normally want to FH approach, but if I'm fighting opponents that go up a lot then it's better at intercepting them. Vs Puff she can't hit above her head well so that makes your Dair very strong against her if you get above her too(though being under her is also good).

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

What should be my approximate ratio of playing to win and playing to learn in friendlies? I feel it should definitely be skewed towards the playing to learn/test stuff, maybe like 80%/20%? Is this just a matter of feeling out what fits for me?

My teammate and I naturally alternate, we just follow the simple gameplan of whoever is in front goes in, like you said. But switching mid pressure is a whole new concept. How should we go about switching? Should I full hop out while my teammate goes in? And then when I want to switch in should I shoot high lasers and approach while my fox teammate runs under them?

Yeah you used the full hop a lot against hbox/crunch. Seemed like it was pretty strong against them, can't Jiggs up air straight up beat falco's dair though?

I struggle against Peach in teams. I think because Falco has to be super precise in singles, and that level of precision is just not achievable in doubles. Maybe I'm just not that great at the Peach matchup but would there be any reason other than the one that I said for why Peach is hard to fight in teams as Falco?

 

[Bones0]

With so many players being considered serious threats these days, what do you think makes some players able to win so consistently? I would assume that the ability to adapt to a wide variety of play styles is the main factor, but to dig deeper, what makes a player able to be flexible like this? I'm wondering if inconsistent players tend to be more focused on counterplay in the sense that they go into a set trying to identify their opponent's strategy and counter it instead of execute their own strategy and force the opponent to adapt. Obviously elements of both are important and there's going to be a lot of overlap, but if this is as important as I think, what are some helpful ways to structure a game plan that both forces the opponent to react to me as well as remain flexible in case my gameplan doesn't work at first? I feel like Falco should be somewhat easy to play proactively with since lasers give him an easy way to force mixups.

 

[Dr Peepee]

What should be my approximate ratio of playing to win and playing to learn in friendlies? I feel it should definitely be skewed towards the playing to learn/test stuff, maybe like 80%/20%? Is this just a matter of feeling out what fits for me?

My teammate and I naturally alternate, we just follow the simple gameplan of whoever is in front goes in, like you said. But switching mid pressure is a whole new concept. How should we go about switching? Should I full hop out while my teammate goes in? And then when I want to switch in should I shoot high lasers and approach while my fox teammate runs under them?

Yeah you used the full hop a lot against hbox/crunch. Seemed like it was pretty strong against them, can't Jiggs up air straight up beat falco's dair though?

I struggle against Peach in teams. I think because Falco has to be super precise in singles, and that level of precision is just not achievable in doubles. Maybe I'm just not that great at the Peach matchup but would there be any reason other than the one that I said for why Peach is hard to fight in teams as Falco?

It depends. Closer to events you'd certainly want to switch more to playing to win, and maybe sometimes if you want to integrate what you've learned more you'd need to lean more on playing to win. Generally though I do think preferring playing to learn will benefit more.

I don't know the exact things so much, but your ideas would be good starting places.

Nah Puff's Dair at absolute best trades I'm pretty sure, but that's only for strong Dair of course. I'd check it out for yourself if you're unsure.

Not being able to back up sucks against Peach, and not being able to move around the stage so easily makes it harder to avoid her moves. It's still playable as Falco improves his ground game in the matchup I think.

With so many players being considered serious threats these days, what do you think makes some players able to win so consistently? I would assume that the ability to adapt to a wide variety of play styles is the main factor, but to dig deeper, what makes a player able to be flexible like this? I'm wondering if inconsistent players tend to be more focused on counterplay in the sense that they go into a set trying to identify their opponent's strategy and counter it instead of execute their own strategy and force the opponent to adapt. Obviously elements of both are important and there's going to be a lot of overlap, but if this is as important as I think, what are some helpful ways to structure a game plan that both forces the opponent to react to me as well as remain flexible in case my gameplan doesn't work at first? I feel like Falco should be somewhat easy to play proactively with since lasers give him an easy way to force mixups.

I think about this more lately as well. With so many close sets among such a wide range of players, it does seem to come down to who wants it more/who is more refined when it comes down to it. Refinement is important on a game-side of thinking because it means when things get difficult your superior training and knowledge will give you an edge more consistently.

To get to your main question, getting into aerial range with laser advantage is a great way to force an opponent to hold a strong mixup. It's not unreasonably difficult to get there in any matchup either. Proactive play, to me, is just one that breaches space first but not necessarily the one that approaches first or the most. So if you get kind of close and are good enough at mixing your approaches, I'd say that goes a long way toward being proactive. This is simplified and obviously harder in practice, but still may be useful.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

Do you think there would be a way where Falco can shoot lasers in the back while the fox plays in center stage not really approaching but playing defense and taking space with up tilt, d tilt, shield, dd etc?

What do you do to learn as much as possible from sets that aren't recorded? I always try to talk to the people I lose to after the fact, but people don't always give great analysis/advice and beyond that I feel like there isn't much else I can get out of a set besides "improve on x matchup because I lost to it last tourney". So sometimes I come out of sets not knowing if I played subpar, the opponent has a strong style against my style, or the opponent simply adapted to some of my common tools.

Yeah in teams my way of thinking is Falco has to play super defensive against a peach in the air and aggressive against a grounded peach. But this leads to becoming predictable. Maybe I just have to coordinate better with my teammate to have us switch so that he's taking the peach?

I've been practicing the simple dash, wd, and laser movements. I can't say that I've felt any stronger connection to any of the moves, but one thing I have noticed is when I add another dash or two to my movement, I definitely feel a "disconnect". I put disconnect in quotes because I'm not sure it's the word that's appropriate for the thing I'm experiencing but I think you know what I'm getting at. I think because it's harder to picture how some complicated movements affect the opponent without having the simpler building blocks in the first place. I guess in this case I'm using how much I don't know about dash dancing as a way to gauge how much I DO know about it. Not really a question but just wanted to know what you thought about that.

 

[Dr Peepee]

That would probably work a little, but can't be maintained without changing a lot up and accounting for all of the opponent angles of attack too. Something to play with.

This is where the memorization of what happened from friendlies comes into play. If you can at least learn why you're getting hit on every stock, that can help a lot. You can also just ask someone to record with your phone in the meantime.

If Peach comes in too hard you can sometimes hit her out of the air with dash FH Nair, but there's a lot of depth even in those things themselves. So if you go in vs grounded Peach, do you go straight in or wait/dash back first? What about lasering first or no lasering? You get the idea. You can also just switch off yeah.

When practicing simple moves, are you thinking of their main attributes and how these impact the opponent? Are you paying attention to the inputs and, ideally, getting better at them? Sometimes it will take some time as others have told me, but being mindful while doing this will be useful. I think you are already aware of this on some level when you get overloaded by adding complexity.

 

[MambaGreenFalco]

If I’m aware of why I’m getting hit shouldn’t that for the most part translate into a win? Or are you saying I learn why I’m getting hit before/after the set?

So you’re saying I have to mixup my defensive and offensive options but for the most part I should stick to the rules of being defensive while peach in the air and offensive while she’s on the ground?

I think I have a natural tendency to think of how these moves could be applied in certain situations, like I remember myself picturing dodging Marth da or peach fair with the dash away. But no I’m not really focusing on the qualities of the movement, and thinking of how they affect the opponent is the hardest for me to do.

I am trying to think of how they affect the opponent, but for some reason that’s super hard for me to verbalize. I think it’s because my mind naturally gravitates to specific situations to see how the move could be used , and then from that asking myself how I would use, let’s say full dash back, to bait and avoid their attack. Of course there’s a huge difference between waiting a bit and then dashing back or doing it instantly so I think thinking of the moves in specific situations offers too much intricacy. So how can I think of ways dash back would affect the opponent without the context of specific positions? Should I be thinking in properties of neutral or maybe what an opponent would logically think as a result of a dash back. Like “oh look my opponent dashed back maybe in the future I should take the space that they gave up or overshoot my move”. I may be rambling because I think I’m trying to define a process that I’m not familiar with, and I’m not sure what questions I should and shouldn’t be asking myself while practicing.