Utilities of the Moonwalk?

[Berble]

I'm a fairly new smasher and was wondering if the Moonwalk is actually something worth investing time into at this level. What exactly are its uses other than looking stylish?

I'm also having some trouble learning how to perform the inputs. What I'm trying to do is dash to the right then do a half circle so my stick is pointing to the left to moonwalk left but I can definitely see I'm not doing a full length moonwalk. Any advice would be great thanks!

 

[Zhea]

Gaining momentum for going off stage for a bair, and a mild movement mixup. You can also grab the edge with it. Other than that it's just flashy. Then again when you play Falcon, it's kind of the point.

 

[See Biscuit]

Moonwalking is just flashy, but very fun to show off and taunt opponents in between stocks. At least I haven't found any practical use for it.

 

[Madra Rua]

There are a few different ways to initiate the moonwalk, but as far as I know they are a matter of personal preference. Some people like to do it out of a dash dance, while I find it easier to do from a stand still. Either way, you want to move the control stick from one side to the opposite side as quickly as possible without moving it through the center of the stick; your half-circle motion isn't wrong, but it's not as fast as you want to be. Instead, try and move the stick from one side, sliding it just under center to get to the other side. It can be kind of tough at first, but with practice it will get more smooth and consistent.

One way to make sure you've got the right motion is to go to Final Destination in practice mode; spawn and wear a bunny hood, and you'll find that your moonwalks are much more pronounced. This isn't necessarily a good way to practice moonwalking for a real match (since items will of course be off), but it might help you find a good control stick motion that works for you.

 

[SAUS]

This one is actually incorrect, but the idea is to follow the green lines kind of like 1-2-3, starting from either the left or right. You never actually cross straight through the middle, so ignore that line (you make a U shape on your controller). This will get you a basic, crappy moonwalk.

This is a correcting image that shows you how to get good moonwalks. Here, it shows that you press right, then down to the bottom left, then straight left (moon walk to the left, facing towards the right).

I use it pretty much only for the occasional edge guard. I like to moonwalk, jump, back-air, then if they try to jump over me, I double jump into an up-air to get that semi-spike at the end of the move. Other than that, it is really just for stylin' on people. I recommend learning it later than other, more fundamental techniques, like dash dancing, wavedashing, L-cancelling, short hopping, and fast falling.

 

[Berble]

Thanks for all the replies and SAUS that picture really helped I had always been doing the green version but that is an awesome reference of how to do it properly

 

[SAUS]

No problem some guys in my area were discussing it and those images resulted from it. I just stole them :D

Also, check this out (use for moonwalking... totally):

 

[ToTs]

^^ that's Jeapie if you wanted to know who that was playing falcon. Check BEAST 3 - Jeapie vs Ice

 

[rjgbadger]

swag points are important

never forget this

 

[Cheebs]

Moonwalk to dair is a fun way to get things going

 

[ToTs]

Plus, why wouldn't you want to know everything about your char, you should wanna know how to execute everything, that's just me though

 

[Nicco]

If you learn how to initiate the moonwalk in all the different ways, it can be extremely useful. I personally use it alot (not with my current controller though) and it's a great way to phuck with ppls minds. When I use it alot in the neutral game, ppl say they don't know where the heck im going, which is obviously great. The thing about a moonwalk is, that you can always cancel it in many different ways, so you can use it as a baiting tool.

 

[General Heinz]

so i just started finally trying to practice moonwalking this morning because it's virtually the last tech that i could really learn with falcon, and after a good bit of trial and error as well as finding a really good old tutorial vid (this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDiQ0qJd1p4 which i have no ****ing clue why i have never been linked this video before when asking about moonwalking), i have gotten down the moonwalk -> ledgegrab consistently.

however, it all got me thinking. a lot of the other advanced techs in the game such as short hopping, wave dashing, etc., are eventually easier to understand in my opinion because people know why they happen. that is to say, the system underlying the advanced techs is understood. for example, we know that shorthops are the result of releasing the jump button before the character leaves the ground. we further know that the act of jumping puts every character in a standing animation for a specified number of frames that varies by character before leaving the ground, which moreover even explains why certain characters are "harder" to shorthop with than others (i.e., they have fewer standing jump startup frames). techs that are even more advanced, such as wavedash out of shield, virtually "fall out" of the theory of the game in the sense that if you took someone completely unfamiliar with the game and explained the mechanics of a wavedash, namely that it requires that the character jump and then cancel that jump into a grounded airdodge, and explained shield mechanics to him, crucially in this case that a character may jump directly out of shield, then he would know, in theory, that it is possible to wavedash out of shield without you telling him that it is.

as this relates to moonwalking: it seems to me (maybe wrongly) that the mechanics or physics behind it are either poorly understood or poorly articulated, because rather than giving straightforward explanations (e.g. "a character can wavedash out of shield because he can jump out of shield and all wavedashes start with a jump input"), people only ever try and explain moonwalk through honestly just a bunch of vague ****. yes the diagrams help somewhat, but it doesn't get at what precisely you're doing when you moonwalk and why you can do it.

from what very minimal experimentation i've done with it, and from what advice i actually saw on reddit ("do the half-circle as fast as possible"), it seems to me that if you were trying to moonwalk left say, you want two things: for the initial rightward input to be as brief as physically possible, and to make the time between the rightward input and the final leftward input to be as short as possible. this explains why the red-ink edit to the green moonwalk trapezoid is a more efficient input: the total distance that the stick travels is shorter, thus the overall input time is shorter.

now, still none of this explains what is really going on "behind the scenes" so to speak, and i wish someone would explain that part because i feel like that's really what's missing. it's kind of frustrating honestly and i know a lot of people who are just as perplexed by the fuzzy explanations a lot of people give on how to moonwalk.

 

[SAUS]

so i just started finally trying to practice moonwalking this morning because it's virtually the last tech that i could really learn with falcon, and after a good bit of trial and error as well as finding a really good old tutorial vid (this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDiQ0qJd1p4 which i have no ****ing clue why i have never been linked this video before when asking about moonwalking), i have gotten down the moonwalk -> ledgegrab consistently.

however, it all got me thinking. a lot of the other advanced techs in the game such as short hopping, wave dashing, etc., are eventually easier to understand in my opinion because people know why they happen. that is to say, the system underlying the advanced techs is understood. for example, we know that shorthops are the result of releasing the jump button before the character leaves the ground. we further know that the act of jumping puts every character in a standing animation for a specified number of frames that varies by character before leaving the ground, which moreover even explains why certain characters are "harder" to shorthop with than others (i.e., they have fewer standing jump startup frames). techs that are even more advanced, such as wavedash out of shield, virtually "fall out" of the theory of the game in the sense that if you took someone completely unfamiliar with the game and explained the mechanics of a wavedash, namely that it requires that the character jump and then cancel that jump into a grounded airdodge, and explained shield mechanics to him, crucially in this case that a character may jump directly out of shield, then he would know, in theory, that it is possible to wavedash out of shield without you telling him that it is.

as this relates to moonwalking: it seems to me (maybe wrongly) that the mechanics or physics behind it are either poorly understood or poorly articulated, because rather than giving straightforward explanations (e.g. "a character can wavedash out of shield because he can jump out of shield and all wavedashes start with a jump input), people only ever try and explain moonwalk through honestly just a bunch of vague ****. yes the diagrams help somewhat, but it doesn't get at what precisely you're doing when you moonwalk and why you can do it.

from what very minimal experimentation i've done with it, and from what advice i actually saw on reddit ("do the half-circle as fast as possible"), it seems to me that if you were trying to moonwalk left say, you want two things: for the initial rightward input to be as brief as physically possible, and to make the time between the rightward input and the final leftward input to be as short as possible. this explains why the red-ink edit to the green moonwalk trapezoid is a more efficient input: the total distance that the stick travels is shorter, thus the overall input time is shorter.

now, still none of this explains what is really going on "behind the scenes" so to speak, and i wish someone would explain that part because i feel like that's really what's missing. it's kind of frustrating honestly and i know a lot of people who are just as perplexed by the fuzzy explanations a lot of people give on how to moonwalk.

I actually have no idea why you can moonwalk in this game. My guess is that it is a strange glitch. For maximum distance moonwalk:
- Lets say you are moonwalking to the right (facing left).
1: Input left for 1 frame.
2: input the 'perfect wavedash to the right' angle for 2 frames.
3: input and hold right until the moonwalk ends.

I may be incorrect on some of that, but I am pretty sure that's how you get the longest moonwalks. I will look around a bit and correct myself after if I find out I am wrong. If someone else could step in, that'd be great as well.

Now, this input is probably impossible for humans. One 60th of a second to move the stick from left to just below right is probably not humanly possible (I could be wrong though). This is why people tell you to just do it as fast as you can.

Learning it is strange at first, and even now I can't really tell you how I get good moonwalks, but you eventually find a nice distance that you can get consistently through muscle memory, and then it doesn't matter anymore. It's like getting the perfect wavedash angle. I don't think about it, I am pretty sure I don't do it perfectly, but I do it well enough through muscle memory.

 

[Seetoe]

There's been a lot of posts here about how to do the moonwalk, and thats awesome, but as far as applications go. One of my favorite things to do with it is substitute it for dash dancing in tech chases. For instance, normally you sort of dash dance around where the player fell on the ground, but instead you just moonwalk through where they are and if they roll towards the direction falcon is heading, he keeps going and can grab or turnaround grab, and if they roll the direction falcon is facing he can cancel the moonwalk with a dash in that direction like any other dash and grab. Flashy, but also tricks opponents sometimes since they can't always figure that falcon will cancel a moonwalk with a regular dash.

Other apps - baiting rolls; if you're shield pressuring someone and you notice them rolling through you a lot, you can moonwalk and fsmash / dsmash cancel for some pretty cool mixups.

 

[Spaghetti]

I actually have no idea why you can moonwalk in this game. My guess is that it is a strange glitch. For maximum distance moonwalk:
- Lets say you are moonwalking to the right (facing left).
1: Input left for 1 frame.
2: input the 'perfect wavedash to the right' angle for 2 frames.
3: input and hold right until the moonwalk ends.

I may be incorrect on some of that, but I am pretty sure that's how you get the longest moonwalks. I will look around a bit and correct myself after if I find out I am wrong. If someone else could step in, that'd be great as well.

Now, this input is probably impossible for humans. One 60th of a second to move the stick from left to just below right is probably not humanly possible (I could be wrong though). This is why people tell you to just do it as fast as you can.

Learning it is strange at first, and even now I can't really tell you how I get good moonwalks, but you eventually find a nice distance that you can get consistently through muscle memory, and then it doesn't matter anymore. It's like getting the perfect wavedash angle. I don't think about it, I am pretty sure I don't do it perfectly, but I do it well enough through muscle memory.

sorry for the bump (if this counts as a bump?)

i always assumed that the moonwalk was a product of a character just converting momentum from dashing one direction to a dash in the opposite direction as fast as possible without triggering a dash in the other direction (which is programmed in the game by starting in the center of the analog and slamming a direction)? i mean maybe this is only making sense in my head but i dont see whats so unexplainable about it

 

[SAUS]

sorry for the bump (if this counts as a bump?)

i always assumed that the moonwalk was a product of a character just converting momentum from dashing one direction to a dash in the opposite direction as fast as possible without triggering a dash in the other direction (which is programmed in the game by starting in the center of the analog and slamming a direction)? i mean maybe this is only making sense in my head but i dont see whats so unexplainable about it

But why doesn't the character dash in the other direction? When moonwalking, I am clearly hold backwards (compared to my character). There must be something in the code that allows you to move backwards without turning you around, and something like that makes no sense to me (as a programmer).

My best guess is that they wanted some functionality with dashing where you can dash and then sort of stop the dash (just try tapping the stick left or right to see what I mean - don't hold it at all). Then there must be something they wanted to have happen when you press another direction during this - try running in the direction you did this tap-dash. Your character kind of does this slow running until he is full speed. I don't know why they wanted the player to be able to influence their character's movement here, but holding backwards will make you accelerate backwards similar to how you would accelerate forwards.

All in all, it is unexplainable because they would have to purposely have code in there to do this, and adding code like that doesn't really make sense.

 

[Spaghetti]

But why doesn't the character dash in the other direction? When moonwalking, I am clearly hold backwards (compared to my character). There must be something in the code that allows you to move backwards without turning you around, and something like that makes no sense to me (as a programmer).

My best guess is that they wanted some functionality with dashing where you can dash and then sort of stop the dash (just try tapping the stick left or right to see what I mean - don't hold it at all). Then there must be something they wanted to have happen when you press another direction during this - try running in the direction you did this tap-dash. Your character kind of does this slow running until he is full speed. I don't know why they wanted the player to be able to influence their character's movement here, but holding backwards will make you accelerate backwards similar to how you would accelerate forwards.

All in all, it is unexplainable because they would have to purposely have code in there to do this, and adding code like that doesn't really make sense.

i'm pretty sure that's just because it's programmed in the game to be hard as **** to dash, because they thought people just wanted full control of their walk speeds instead.

 

[Nicco]

If you wanna get good at moonwalking, just practice over and over and over and over and over.
If you wanna get good at applying moonwalk, just try and try and try and try to apply it until you become pr0 at it like this guy
http://gfycat.com/ViciousGraciousIndigobunting

 

[N9TMARE]

^^ that's Jeapie if you wanted to know who that was playing falcon. Check BEAST 3 - Jeapie vs Ice

it's not. because ice vs jeapie is a falcon vs shiek set

 

[ToTs]

it's not. because ice vs jeapie is a falcon vs shiek set

Yeah, it's still jeapie tho. I was saying just check him out. He plays crazy tech

 

[N9TMARE]

ten characters

 

[N9TMARE]

No problem some guys in my area were discussing it and those images resulted from it. I just stole them :D

Also, check this out (use for moonwalking... totally):

that is from

the clip starts at about 1:43

 

[AquaTech]

Mostly for style, but flying backwards can definitely have it's moments for ledge-guarding.

 

[Weet]

Being a mother****ing sorcerer is one good use.

 

[KingKirb]

http://gfycat.com/ConventionalIcyClingfish (Source: reddit)

I know Link can use it for edgeguarding. Pretty sure Falcon can do it too. It builds your momentum in a quicker way so it has its uses. I wouldn't recommend it until you get all the basics down though.

 

[Captain Cleveland]

i usually moonwalk only to look cool (not gonna lie).
back in the day, i would do it too much and it would be predictable.
now, i try to utilize it in the fear game. when falcon has momentum, hes scary.
i may sometimes use it to tech chase (follow up with grab or knee).

^thats just for style tho.
mainly i use moonwalk for edgeguarding, if the person is predictable in recovery, or if it covers options.
but more importantly, i use it to grab edge. if i connect a move where i know that person is going off of the stage, ill do a moonwalk to somehow grab.
whether it be across the whole stage with a full hop / midstage with a shorthop / or near edge with a ramen noodle.

ive been able to moonwalk for years and there wasnt much point to it besides looking sweet. and its hard to fit that kinda style into a game about position.
be wise about it.