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Tips on ness?

Seb59

Smash Rookie
Joined
Dec 3, 2018
Messages
4
Switch FC
SW-1849-2367-9097
I was wondering if anybody could give me some tips or ways to train with ness. I want to main him in ultimate, and I need to know the basics of his moves and combos. Thanks!
 

Seb59

Smash Rookie
Joined
Dec 3, 2018
Messages
4
Switch FC
SW-1849-2367-9097
I don’t use side special dat much but forward air I spam
 

PK Puff

Smash Rookie
Joined
Dec 22, 2018
Messages
1
First off, practice recovery from any possible angle. Whether it’s straight up, the bottom corner, horizontally, or down, you want to get it so you always get the ledge grab. Recovering too high can result in a fatal punish if your opponent is good.

For me, side-b is mostly used for spacing. I use it in the air mostly so it goes diagonally. It keeps the opponent away from you so you can land safely.

I mainly use up-b for edge guarding (be sure to use the tail and not the head), and of course, recovery.

Since down-b can cause the opponent to flinch, I use it for spacing if they get to close. Down-b also stalls your jump, so you can use it to delay your landing and throw the opponent off timing.

Up-air got a new rework in Ultimate. It now has multiple hitboxes, and can pull opponents into it. It’s pretty good for killing at high percents, but your opponent can slip out of it.

Forward-air and back-air are pretty much about the same as in smash 4. Back-air can kill early at ledge, and forward-air can kill at really high percents.

Down-air has am increased sweet-spot hitbox now, so it is easier to spike. Down-air is also a viable option for combo starters, such as:

- dair —> fair (combos into fair)
- dair —> bair (read DI)
- dair —> uair (can kill)

Up smash has killing power now, so it would kill at around 100% or higher. You can also use it to edge guard your opponents by standing on the ledge (facing off the stage) and charging up smash.

Down smash can also be used to edge guard your opponents, but instead of facing out, you are faced away from the blast zone, at the edge.

Forward smash can deflect projectiles if you release at the right time. It also has a similar “tipper” effect that increases knockback if you hit the sweet spot.

Down throw can combo into fair. You can also land a dair somewhere in the combo if the opponent DI’s in.

Forward air is pretty good for getting your opponents off stage. That’s about all I use it for.

Up throw is pretty useless. Sometimes you can land a uair in there. You can use it to get your opponents off the ground I guess.

Back throw is Ness’ strongest throw. It can kill pretty early (about 80 or 90). At really low percents, you can back throw into fair or bair. Whichever works. However, it isn’t the strongest back throw anymore. Ness has been dethroned and Incineroar has the strongest back throw now.

I don’t really suggest spamming PK Fire. You could maybe get about 2 PK Fires in a row for easy damage. But any more than that, and you’re just being annoying.

I play in a passive-aggressive style. If there’s an opportunity to combo or get some damage, I’ll take it. If I’m losing by a stock or quite a few percent, I’ll play really aggressive, because if you stay defensive, they will keep attacking you. It’s best to push them and make them defend, rather than being pressured. You don’t have to play like this though. Play whatever suits you best.

And up taunt is the best taunt. If your opponent teabags you, kill them and teabag the heck out of them. Maybe an up taunt or two.
 

AJb1205

Smash Cadet
Joined
Jan 19, 2016
Messages
45
NNID
AJb1205
Ness's up b has a lot more knockback now compared to smash 4. And since you can only air dodge once in the air now it's a much better tool for your usage. When my opponent is in the air but not quite at kill percent I like to pk thunder them to make landing difficult for them while getting some damage. Though you have to practice it because they can air dodge away from it so try to twirl it around a bit before trying to hit them to catch an air dodge.

Since Ness's nair has disjoint now so you have more range. The move comes out quickly so it's a good move to get opponents off of you and it does solid damage too.

When coming back on stage I usually like to come onto the stage with a forward air to get my enemy away.
Be wary of certain characters when recovering and try to conserve your jumps. When you PK Thunder to recover and you hit someone then you don't go as far, so they might try to jump into you if you're fairly low and you'll be barely unable to make it back. People also jump straight into the ball which will send you into free fall. Some characters might simply snatch it from you like Villager/Isabbele, Rosalina, etc. Another useful thing for Ness and Lucas is that if you up b into a wall and press up b right after then you get another one so keep that in mind.

As for Ness's throws:
Forward Throw: Only use this one to get your opponent off stage. There's not much else to do with it.
Up Throw: This throw isn't very good and you can't really get anything off of it, nor kill with it so you should never really use this throw honestly unless someone comes up with something that it's good for.
Down Throw: The main combo throw. You wanna go for down throw double/triple fair. As Puff said you can also get a bair off of it if they SDI towards you. Bair has pretty good knockback as well.
Back Throw: The infamous kill throw. I believe Ness only has the 4th strongest kill throw now with Incineroar being the best, Dr. Mario and then Shulk. Obviously you want to be closer to the ledge to get the kill. A PK Fire can be a free backthrow for you. Although this is one of your best kill options, don't try too hard to get it as you can be easily read and the opponent will focus on not getting grabbed so it's up to you to set up a situation for yourself to get it.

Ness's neutral b definitely feels more useful now. It has always been a strong move but with the way airdodges were it was never really useful unless you got a hard read. Now it is definitely a lot more threatening because if you airdodge if you don't have a top tier recovery then you're dead, and if you don't air dodge then you get killed by this powerful move. Lucas can use PK Freeze a lot more freely since it's faster. I still don't really see myself using PK Flash a lot though.

PK Thunder 2 can also be a cool and flashy way of killing your opponent. You can also kill at fairly low percents with it as well. It's a hard move to hit so you can't be predictable with it as you'll easily be punished if they see it coming.

Since Ness now physically charges his yoyo on stage again, I like to go over to the ledge and charge down smash so that the yoyo hangs down and when they try to recover they get hit by the charging yoyo and you can release to get the actual knockback from it. Having the increase in time that you can charge smash attacks helps a lot.

Hope this helps!
 
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MG_3989

Smash Lord
Joined
Jan 1, 2019
Messages
1,130
Location
New Jersey
Switch FC
SW-8397-3391-6411
I posted this in the sticky thread but I think it’s good advice for any new Ness player


First of all see if he’s intuitive to you. Ness is one of those characters that you either immediately click with or makes no sense you (according to friends, Ness has always felt perfect to me even before I started practicing him). The absolute first thing you should do is practice recovering with pk thunder from every angle imangiable. You should also get used to your other movement options, most importantly your double jump (a lot of the time you don’t have to use pk thunder to recover, Ness has a great double jump and air dodge and you can use them to magnet onto the stage).

Next I’d practice short hope aerials, especially fair and nair. Nair is a get off me move and fair chains into itself and other aerials. Practice short hop chaining fair into itself. All Ness’s aerials are good though. His up air is multi hit and it can drag down if you hit it right into combos and kill at higher percents. His dair is a spike and you can spike somebody into the stage and combo them or try to catch them off stage with pk fire and spike them for the kill. Sweet spot Bair is a reliable kill move and I’d practice landing it

Next I would work on landing pk fire and your grab set ups because Ness’a grab game is extremely important. His down grab and back grab being the best. His down grab leads to fair chains and after a pk fire it does about 30 damage but you have to mind game people into it. His back grab kills most of the cast reliably at about 120 percent even with good DI but don’t use it on heavies until about 150 or so so you don’t stale it. His forward grab is good for launching people off stage and harassing them. You won’t use his up grab. PK Flash his neutral b is a meh move but has some edgegurding uses.

Ness’s smashes are pretty good. His bat has a lot of kill power on the sweet spot but it’s slow. If they’re bad at DI you can hit it on pk fire sometimes. It also knocks back projectiles. His up and down smashes are very good in this game. The main purpose of his down smash is to dangle the yo-yo off the edge and when a player tries to recover let go of it and launch them. His up smash is a great anti air that controls the whole air space around him and kills at about 100. His tilts are nothing to write home about and you’d usually rather be using neutral air but side tilt can kill at high percentages and down tilt can jab lock a player into a side smash if they don’t tech. Up tilt is just your basic get the opponent in the air move. Jab is just a get off me attack but it’s not as good as short hop nair.

Finally I’ll get into Ness’s arguably most important tool, pk thunder. One of your main goals as Ness is to stay in the stage yourself and get your opponent off stage. You don’t wanna be off stage pretty much ever. Use pk thunder to edge guard them. You can bounce them around with the head at high percentages it even kills. You can also gimp their recovery with the tail. Try to switch up the way you move it around so it doesn’t become predictable. It’s a phenomenal move. Lastly you have PKT2 where you hit PKT into yourself. You’re already using this to recover but if you hit somebody with Ness’s body when he’s in PKT2 it kills at obscenely low percentages. You probably won’t be landing those at first but once you get good with PK thunder it can be really useful. Just the threat of it scares people off sometimes.

I think that pretty much covers it. Like I said a lot of this was just intuitive to me but if you can nail down these fundamentals you’ll be a good Ness player
 
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