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Really struggling with Zelda...

Captain Phobos

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Apr 4, 2017
Messages
134
Location
Minnesota, United States
One of my friends who I play with has started using Zelda more and more, and I constantly get my ass utterly destroyed. Even though Zelda is considered low tier, I have absolutely no idea how to fight her. It's hard to describe exactly what's so hard about fighting her, but somehow I just can't seem to land a hit at all with her up special and neutral special evading all my attacks.
 

Rickster

Smash Master
Joined
Feb 23, 2014
Messages
3,834
Location
Faerghus
Switch FC
2713-1285-8029
Beating Zelda is all about either playing defensive or overwhelming her. Defensive is way easier though, since she has many laggy moves. Shield Nayru's Love, and if you see them start to teleport when they're not recovering, just block. If she hits your shield there's 500 years to punish, if not you still have like 300 years to run over and hit her.

Cloud and Fox have the mobility to bait Zelda pretty easily, but she can be aggressive offstage. For Cloud just play defensive, as Fox just bait her with speed.
 

Lola Luftnagle

Banned via Warnings
Joined
Nov 16, 2016
Messages
616
Here are some things to remember:
  • Since she can't do **** to approach, she wants you to come to her so she can get her more defensive game going. Don't approach recklessly, you hear?
  • Din's Fire and Phantom Slash are not appropriate camping moves for her since they're quite slow and leave her open. But they become more useful for her when you're off-stage, which Zelda can go on offense.
  • U- and n-special are handy for Zelda, but they recover very poorly. If she commits to either of these, let her have it.
  • Her attacks possess mediocre hitbox placement, so some small characters like :4kirby: or :4gaw: or :4olimar: she'll have difficulties hitting, so...
 

KlicKlac

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Aug 4, 2015
Messages
235
Location
Syracuse, New York
NNID
KlicKlac
You can destroy zelda with projectile camping / spamming. Just keep running back and camping and zelda will be forced to approach. Read the approaches with grabs or just an attack with range.
 

AncientCode42

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Apr 17, 2015
Messages
87
Location
Tennessee
NNID
Surge_Production
The thing about Zelda is that she's all about reads, setups and scoring early KOs with her punish game. However the key to taking advantage of this is to account Zelda's weaknesses, which she has many of. First off Zelda is slow as **** take advantage of this. Zelda players are all about patience, if you are just as patient you don't need to worry much at all, especially since Zelda has trouble landing. Dins Fail and Phantom Slash are tool slow for long ranged moves, meaning she can't camp force her to approach and just read her options. If you can be as patient as the Zelda player you should have no issues tackling her Toolkit.
 

Eithnul

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jul 14, 2017
Messages
3
Here are some things to remember:
  • Since she can't do **** to approach, she wants you to come to her so she can get her more defensive game going. Don't approach recklessly, you hear?
  • Din's Fire and Phantom Slash are not appropriate camping moves for her since they're quite slow and leave her open. But they become more useful for her when you're off-stage, which Zelda can go on offense.
  • U- and n-special are handy for Zelda, but they recover very poorly. If she commits to either of these, let her have it.
  • Her attacks possess mediocre hitbox placement, so some small characters like :4kirby: or :4gaw: or :4olimar: she'll have difficulties hitting, so...
You obviously never played against a Zelda like this one. Skip to 1 minute and 17 seconds to see how you should time your Teleport attacks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g08CEmE_sis
On this next video there is a Teleportation move NO ONE DARES to even attempt because of how Risky it is. Skip to 1 minute and 33 seconds to view this move. It is also HIGHLY unpredictable and unlikely for someone to expect a Zelda to be this risky. Since she is labeled to be low-tier and "Patient". You will find only a handful of Hyper-Carry Zeldas in the Smash community and they are not to be underestimated.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRWdrRVU1lg

Overall on these videos the opponents were overwhelmed by a Zelda who takes on the Power approach, since they are not used to fighting a Zelda who's approach is so Bold.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrBXXXY6bvU
 
Last edited:

Luminario

Smash Lord
Joined
Jun 7, 2014
Messages
1,829
Location
Your guess is as good as mine
You obviously never played against a Zelda like this one. Skip to 1 minute and 17 seconds to see how you should time your Teleport attacks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g08CEmE_sis
On this next video there is a Teleportation move NO ONE DARES to even attempt because of how Risky it is. Skip to 1 minute and 33 seconds to view this move. It is also HIGHLY unpredictable and unlikely for someone to expect a Zelda to be this risky. Since she is labeled to be low-tier and "Patient". You will find only a handful of Hyper-Carry Zeldas in the Smash community and they are not to be underestimated.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRWdrRVU1lg

Overall on these videos the opponents were overwhelmed by a Zelda who takes on the Power approach, since they are not used to fighting a Zelda who's approach is so Bold.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrBXXXY6bvU
Jesus that's quite the aggressive way to play Zelda. You'd get punished to hell and back if you tried playing like that against someone who really knew what they were doing though, so that high risk playstyle wouldn't be the best idea for every situation, or even most situations.
 

Eithnul

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jul 14, 2017
Messages
3
Jesus that's quite the aggressive way to play Zelda. You'd get punished to hell and back if you tried playing like that against someone who really knew what they were doing though, so that high risk playstyle wouldn't be the best idea for every situation, or even most situations.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PuDNblYwxQ

Idk that Fox looked like he knew what he was doing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4e5bBPZRWMk

That Sheik too, but I wonder why they didn't dodge her <, > + B...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fNoumxnGjI

THAT IS ONE HELL OF A CLUTCH WORK AGAINST GANONDORF O_o @ 1minute 53 seconds
You'd think she would lose, but at the end she pulled one hell of a combo and teleportation kill.
 
Last edited:

Luminario

Smash Lord
Joined
Jun 7, 2014
Messages
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Your guess is as good as mine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PuDNblYwxQ

Idk that Fox looked like he knew what he was doing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4e5bBPZRWMk

That Sheik too, but I wonder why they didn't dodge her <, > + B...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fNoumxnGjI

THAT IS ONE HELL OF A CLUTCH WORK AGAINST GANONDORF O_o @ 1minute 53 seconds
You'd think she would lose, but at the end she pulled one hell of a combo and teleportation kill.
You gotta remember that these are just the few replays we see where such a playstyle worked out well in the end. We don't see the ones where something like a shielded Nayru gets them killed.
 

Eithnul

Smash Rookie
Joined
Jul 14, 2017
Messages
3
Few? This guy has a lot of Replays with the same aggressive Zelda Playstyle. His channel is full of Zelda Aggressiveness.
 

Rickster

Smash Master
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Feb 23, 2014
Messages
3,834
Location
Faerghus
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That Zelda is...not good. Extremely unsafe and predictable neutral. The Fox was being way over aggressive and just kept running into their spam, which is why they lost. That playstyle will only ever "work" in lag against a low level FG player.

I know it sounds harsh, but that really isn't an effective playstyle for Zelda at all, and it bothers me that people think of this when they say "good Zelda"
 

Luminario

Smash Lord
Joined
Jun 7, 2014
Messages
1,829
Location
Your guess is as good as mine
Few? This guy has a lot of Replays with the same aggressive Zelda Playstyle. His channel is full of Zelda Aggressiveness.
Yea, a few. He has 22 replays of Zelda uploaded over the course of around a year. There could be hundreds of other Zelda matches that he's done, with an unknown amount of these he lost due to this playstyle. Like Rickster said, this playstyle just doesn't work for Zelda's moveset and stats.
I know we all want Zelda to have this super secret playstyle or tech that would make her remotely viable against competent high tiers, but those weren't the cards we've been dealt.
 
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