When I mean terrible recovery, I mean easily predictable/gimp-able it is. Luigi doesn't have very good aerial mobility, so his extreme floatiness doesn't exactly help vary his recovery. Both the Brawl tornado and Brawl Up-b only really help vertically and even if it does launch him towards the stage ever so slightly, it's still easily punishable. Not to mention that its really punishable upon landing if you miss the edge. The green missile is still as punishable as it was before. Sweetspotting the ledge certainly helps, but anyone good enough at edgeguarding can easily find a way around this. Maybe saying terrible is a little bit of a stretch, but I don't think it's good by any means. Imo, he's outshined in a lot of places.
The Brawl tornado is basically two DJs plus it gives Luigi some needed protection. If you try to gimp Luigi, he can just use his misfire, as long as he's been saving it and only using regular ones up 'till that point. The upB let's him recover a little further from the ledge now. Let me tell you how Luigis usually recover in Melee. They missile to a point a good distance directly below the ledge, a very awkward position to try to gimp them. Then they tornado to gain some height and/or chase you off the ledge if you're trying to edgehog them. If they still need to, they use their DJ + aerials to further rise and cover themselves. Then they upB. If you were still on the ledge after that, you get knocked off and maybe subsequently gimped.
Drawbacks to this strategy:
- Tornado has to be 'primed' onstage first.
- Luigi can be hit somewhat easily out of the tornado at the end.
- Misfires are unpredictable and unreliable.
- Missile can't be sweetspotted.
- The upB only really goes straight up and down. You have to hug the stage when you're ready to use it, so you're not really allowed to mix up your recovery much before getting to that point. Once you hit him away once, he's usually done.
ALL of these drawbacks have been addressed. Tornado doesn't have to be primed anymore, I think it gains more height, and it can be acted out of sooner. Misfires can be stored and used when needed. If the opponent threatens you, misfire in his face and
force your way onstage. Green Missile can be sweetspotted so the opponent can't just depend on gimping Luigi after the missiles. The upB goes
much further horizontally after the ascent. This means that Luigi can still get another shot at recovering as long as he DI's high after the gimp attempt. It isn't a once and done deal.
IMO, Luigi has a recovery that's around.....the middle when it comes to how good it is compared to the rest of the cast, not great but not bad either. The Brawl tornado helps a lot and the new Brawl upB lets him go horizontally enough for it to be a great blessing. Luigi doesn't have to 'hug' the stage anymore and can upB from a little bit of a distance now. There's NO way the Green Missile is "still as punishable as it was before" when Luigi now has full control over releasing the misfire and and can just release it on reaction to your edgeguarding attempt. Misfire was scary before but it's outright dangerous now.
