PPMD's thoughts on controlling space with Bair vs Nair

[Mastodon]

So I was talking with PP yesterday at a local event here in Raleigh about some falcon stuff. In the past, I've read and heard that bair is a good move, but only for punishment/edgeguarding situations mainly. Personally, I like the move a lot in a lot of situations, but like most falcon players I've gotten into the habit of using nairs primarily in neutral situations since it has the most reach. According to PP, falcon players should be trying to use bairs more instead because it is all one solid hit unlike nair which has some time between the two hits making us vulnerable. He was mainly referring to the use of pivot bairs, but I think he also implied that moon walk bairs may be okay as well. As a newer falcon player, my opinion isn't the most valid but I'm inclined to agree with him for several reasons.

I'm curious to see what you guys think about this. The falcon meta has been pretty well fleshed out, but could PP be on to something here? I know I'm certainly going to be doing some research on it in my playing.

For the record, I asked him about falcon's status as a viable character and PP says "falcon is definitely viable".

 

[0Room]

Wait Mastodon you're in Raleigh :o
Also Bair is totally underrated and I've said that for a long time

 

[Mastodon]

Yeah. I was at BMR on saturday. I usually play at smashville where PP and other former NC PR players live. It's funny; he's usually jogging outside when I play there.

 

[Mystic-]

Hmm I have felt that bair is underused in neutral but I've struggled to actually implement it in my games. For the record, I don't think Falcon's meta is nearly as fleshed out as it may seem but I suppose that all depends on what you define as fleshed out

 

[Spak]

Oh, cool. I'm in Apex, so I go to SNS every once in a while. Looks like NC is Falcon Central (other than Florida because FL stands for Falcon Land). Anyways, thanks for posting PP's opinion on Bair vs Nair.

 

[Coffeemug]

IIRC isn't bair more disjointed than nair anyway? meaning it's slightly safer. Either way i agree with it should be being used more. I'll occasionally fall back on it because of habit from my ganon days and it always helps me reset situations and get a solid hit in.

Also I remember someone in our region filmed a combo video in one day and said they just spaced bairs in neutral to set up like 80% of the combos lmao

 

[0Room]

Yeah. I was at BMR on saturday. I usually play at smashville where PP and other former NC PR players live. It's funny; he's usually jogging outside when I play there.

I was there too as one of the TOs :o

 

[Nephilim III]

Moonwalk bairs feel ABSOLUTELY magical to land.

 

[ShiftingShadows28]

I think bair can be better than nair for covering space at times, especially when you read an approach and you can dash back and bair or aerial di backwards with a bair to stuff them.

The only downside I feel is that bair shows no immediate threat of coming forwards and still being safe like the nair can, meaning you cannot cover space far infront of you very well. So I reckon:

Nair: more versatile, fairly good at covering space in any horizontal direction

Bair: stronger at covering space where you are and when retreating v.s. an approach.

 

[MacDeezi]

Whenever I Nair I just get hit in between, so it does seem Bair could help with that

 

[SoapSuds]

Upair seems pretty good for controlling space. Empty hops threatening uair are really useful as it's usually strong enough and disjointed enough to hit people away if they jump at you or challenge you, it's very fast, and if they shield you can do the latest upair on their shield to setup up for a grab or a DD punish. If they really start shielding you can set up for a better grab with Knee. And you always have the option to nair or even double jump away/ onto a platform.

I think that generally attacking like this is much more powerful than using running nairs. Combining those ideas with analog jumps/ neutral jumps with drift gives falcon huge depth in his neutral game.

Bair is pretty good at controlling space behind you, I like to use it when dashing away by doing an analog jump all the way backwards and basically bairing in place, I also like it when rising up to platforms. Interestingly though, upair covers about the same place behind falcon but in +3 frames. Still, because falcon's bair angles downward I think that upair is probably better when people are chasing you from slightly above while bair is better when they are chasing you on the ground. That said the opponent needs to have some % to take very much hitstun from the late foot hitbox of upair while bair is a stronger attack.

 

[Livin]

Pivot bairs and moonwalk bairs sound awesome, I'll try working them more into my gameplan!

I've found shield stop bair to be super helpful in neutral. When someone approaches while you're DDing, shield stop bair can catch them by surprise. It's a safe move as well. So long as you're not spamming it, they'll have a tough time whiff punishing it.