Weekly Character Discussion: Luigi

[jehonaker]

I love Luigi...he's always been a main or secondary.

It seems that Luigi has a distinct vertical and aerial bias in his attacks. To wit:

+His aerials are pretty amazing, and his two best aerial moves (neutral and downwards aerial) have vertical knockback. The forward aerial can be used four times in one jump, and his other two aerials are decent.
+His ground game is deceptively solid: low traction can help him slide in and out, and his smashes are very, very good.
+His horizontal movement isn't good at all. He gains altitude faster than he gains lateral distance. Green Missile and Luigi Cyclone can help, but still...
+Fire Jump Punch is a vertical killer, and Luigi fires straight up as a result of it.

Conversely, Luigi's lack of range and an effective projectile both prove an impediment to his efficacy. He wishes his forward aerial from Melee was still there, but he's fine without it.

His weaknesses are clear (poor range and no disjointed hitboxes), but most of the tournament stalwarts can exploit these weaknesses. Wario is the easiest match for Luigi of the top 10, but the others are just ghastly.

He may be the most underrated character in Brawl at the present, but it's ultimately tough to tell. Luigi either destroys or gets destroyed...there's not much of a middle ground with him.

 

[Rickerdy-doo-da-day]

When I first fought a decent Luigi I was terrified. You don't actually realise just how deadly Luigi can actually be.

Some of his moves are ridiculous, both in killing power and priority. His aerial game is pretty incredible thanks to powerful, high speed aerials.

A lot of what can be said has been said so yea...Luigi is, like his personality, a very extreme character. He is an elaborate and bizzare character. If he does well, he owns hardcore. If he does badly, he gets owned like nobodies business

 

[Pompi]

Mostly everything on luigi has been covered already by my fellow luigi players , but i will like to add my 2 cents. Besides everything you said i personally, as a luigi player sometimes try to give a twist to my gameply and use the misfire surprise factor ,its a bit risky but it has won me matches. I think luigis most notbale weakness is the fact that he lacks range , characters with notable disjointed hit boxes like marth tend to think of us as an easy matchup, and the fact we dont have much chances against mk , and chaingrabbing d3 ( which is mostly every d3 nowadays) is what keep us from being top tier, but we also have great matchups like wario and we can do farily well against other cahracters. Luigi isnt an easy character to learn , but i think it pays off.

 

[-Mars-]

Lol, I don't think any of the SBR knew enough about luigi to comment a lot on him. This was probably the shortest of all the character discussions.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Whenever I use Luigi, I find myself using his fireball a lot trying to make openings. My success is mixed at best, but I get a feeling that the move is more useful for Luigi than it gets credit for since he can smartly space it to be able to attack from out of range of several otherwise big problems (Meta Knight, Marth, Mr. Game & Watch). It's actually a bit of a trap against Mr. Game & Watch since poor Mr. Game & Watch players will bucket it which gives you a free Fire Jump Punch (very likely giving him a charge in the bucket for a stock).

Also, to clarify on an earlier point someone made, Luigi cannot duck or crawl under lasers from any of the Star Fox characters, but he can crawl under unangled Pit arrows which is of some use (it mostly just forces the Pit players to slow down on their spam). Luigi also has the best crawling animation ever, for the record.

To further clarify, King Dedede definitely has to jab Luigi to keep up his standing infinite, and he can't even normally chaingrab Luigi so Luigi is not as vulnerable as he might seem. I'm pretty sure Luigi gets out at 50% (being grabbed); he may even get out higher if he mashes optimally.

 

[Greenstreet]

Ok. I just wanted to comment on some posts that I liked that are arising out of this bit of hype over Luigi.

First one was WIGI's, although I don't know him that well, from my lurking he seems a pretty competent Luigi.

Luigi is not going to miracuously gain a new move in his arsonal to out range meta and marth and stuff in the air or on the ground. hes not going to whip out his hammer and smack you in the face. What we have to do instead is find new methods to use the setups/moves we already know in a way that provides a mroe reliable method against such characters. if it even exists. the only thing we ahve against meta is camp and punish when we can, witch again is not often.

I agree with pretty much the whole statement here. And I guess that's the problem with metagame in general. A character is never going to get a new move that thrusts them into a higher tier. But what will be developed is a new aspect or property of a move that, when used in a given situation, provides a higher benefit than the previous use for that move. With Luigi though, I'm not sure where this is going to happen. I've been messing around against his harder matchups for a while trying new approaches and thought processes, but I nothing has jumped out at me yet. Hopefully the Luigi boards will find the answer before the next tier list pops out.

IMo I think luigi has the potential to make it to at least somewhere lower high tier. He does pretty decent against the top/high guys, but the popular tourney played characters such as D3, MK, Marth and GaW is what holds luigi back from attaining that position.

I'm not sure I agree fully with this statement. He does ookkkaayy against top tier characters, but that's not enough to thrust him into a high tier position. I think is greatest potential could throw him up around the top of middle tier. It's not much of a jump, but I think it's realistic. His poor aerial movement is really his kryptonite IMO. Having said he can get there, the only way its gonna happen, is if someone changes his gameplay significantly, and soon.

Oi Oi, not only that, but if you shield a hit close to the edge, you'll bounce off and grab the edge. That makes for some quick counterattacks.

Crappy when your playing an MK or Peach, or any character will projectiles though. At high %'s, Luigi can slide off the edge from alot further away, this annoys me, as I do like to counter-attack, and unless the are dumb enough to approach with there eyes closed, a fireball will probably be dodged or shielded. But grabbing the edge is useful in some situations ie dropping to u-air etc...but like everything you need to pick the right time for the right move.

To further clarify, King Dedede definitely has to jab Luigi to keep up his standing infinite, and he can't even normally chaingrab Luigi so Luigi is not as vulnerable as he might seem. I'm pretty sure Luigi gets out at 50% (being grabbed); he may even get out higher if he mashes optimally.

This ^^^
I just wanted to point out that as long as we are careful we shouldn't have too high a risk.

 

[mimic_king]

I have to agree. Luigi's recovery isn't all that great. He has a decent ground and aerial game though. His projectile game isn't very good. Fireballs can be useful, but they go straight ahead. That may have some advantages like not accidentally missing the fireball like with mario, but its disadvantages include the fact that you can only hit people in front of you. And it has a decreased range from Mario's.

Overall, Luigi is a good character. In the other two games, he was terrible, worse than Mario. In this game, he is really good and makes Mario look like crap. Not really, but he is better than Mario.

 

[WIGI]

luigis fireball is same distance when standing as fireballs if i remember corectly, and luigi recvery i find to be really good, be smart and you wont get gimped alot.

 

[darkserenade]

Luigi is a fairly easy character to pick up, what with his three step recovery and well-known combos. They made him quite the weirdo in this game, both moveset-wise and personality-wise. He is great in the air, and can sometimes fit two aerials into a short-hop. Though when you first use all his moves, you might think "Mario's was better," you'll soon find that everything fits together.

 

[chic]

his short range is pretty bad, but theres many ways around it... tornado to get close, fireball spam, fake attack to create an opening.

now...luigi trying to recover from off the stage + marth edge guarding = lose
yea he has a TERRIBLE recovery. thats the biggest weakness part about him imo

 

[Locuan]

now...luigi trying to recover from off the stage + marth edge guarding = lose
yea he has a TERRIBLE recovery. thats the biggest weakness part about him imo

QFT.

Although, a safer approach into recovering has always been sweetspotting the side-b. Of course, his recovery still lacks but this is an excellent way of getting back on stage, (this is assuming you are close to the ledge. Recently, I have been recovering while using the 'nado first, (I'll leave you guys to figure out why it's, at times, a better alternative.)

A few things to point out that I didn't see mentioned.

Falling 'nado outprioritizes a lot of projectiles. So it is an amazing approach against projectile users, wait for the projectile and nado to reach in while he/she recovers from the end lag of his/her launched projectile.

Note: we need a matchup list, an updated one...

 

[-Nana-]

I think Luigi is a great character and should definately be high tier. He has amazing priority in the air and ground, up b kills at 50% at times depending on the stage/DI. He can do 3 fairs and 2 u,d,bairs in one short hop. Although his fireballs aren't great they can be used to keep distance and rack up small amounts of damage and with Luigi, that's sometimes the difference between winning and lossing.

I completely disagree with these recovery discussions. Luigi's recovery is great if done in a smart manner and you are worried about being edguarded by some of the characters with great airplay such as Marth, ZSS or MK, you can use the down b from a distance and DI toward the stage once your above it or use another over b. It may not be great for edgeguarding but sometimes well placed bairs or fairs get the job done and I personally think it's more important to keep in mind all your possibilities on the stage once your opponent recovers. Luigi's priority and quick start up attacks both in the air and on the ground limit your opponent's possibilities of getting on the stage. Other than attacks Luigi's grab game is pretty solid. Down/ up throw lead to some awesome combos and a back throw at high percent can also get a kill in. Luigi is not as tight defensively, but a smart player can work around this and utilize all of his options. All around great character IMO.

 

[Locuan]

I completely disagree with these recovery discussions. Luigi's recovery is great if done in a smart manner and you are worried about being edguarded by some of the characters with great airplay such as Marth, ZSS or MK, you can use the down b from a distance and DI toward the stage once your above it or use another over b.

This is what I meant by using the nado first .

As for his grab game, it is awesome but tricky considering his low traction. Either way as you said it leads to great combos.

 

[cutter]

I don't understand why people think Luigi is a high tier character when he gets completely wrecked by most of the top tier characters; ESPECIALLY Meta, D3, G&W, and Marth.

 

[chic]

I dont think he's been used enough in tournys to really make an accurate tier decision...

 

[cutter]

I dont think he's been used enough in tournys to really make an accurate tier decision...

Think about it though. Why isn't Luigi really used in tournament play? I'm almost certain one of the reasons is because of his nightmare matchups against Meta, D3, G&W, and Marth.

 

[chic]

bah my net froze during the posting!


to recap what i was going to say...

i think the reason most people don't like using Luigi is because unlike other characters that are easy to be good with such as mk/snake in order for a luigi to win some of these top tier match ups you have to play a near perfect games over and over and be an amazing all around player. maybe most people don't want to go through all of that to win tournys... i dont know thats just what i think anyway lol

 

[Locuan]

G&W is not a nightmare match-up as you claim it to be, it is still in G&W's favor but not by a wide margin. D3 is not as hard as a lot of people think it is, yes he can be "chaingrabbed" but not infinited. As someone earlier sayed (he does not want to be quoted), if one DI's away and mashes sufficiently it can be escaped. Therefore, the matchup becomes a bit more favorable.

Now MK and Marth, one has to work around these but they are really hard matchups for Luigi.

 

[hippiedude92]

Lol, I don't think any of the SBR knew enough about luigi to comment a lot on him. This was probably the shortest of all the character discussions.

They know nothing about him T_T other then the fact his Fsmash is the most noticeable one that kills majority of the cast around 80%s-90%s and has IASA frames :/

QFT.


Falling 'nado outprioritizes a lot of projectiles. So it is an amazing approach against projectile users, wait for the projectile and nado to reach in while he/she recovers from the end lag of his/her launched projectile.

Note: we need a matchup list, an updated one...

I remember this, but I didn't think it wasn't mentioned surprisely. If you do a SH tornado, it'll outprioritize alot of low priority projectiles. (I just basically re-said what you said lol)

 

[cutter]

G&W is not a nightmare match-up as you claim it to be, it is still in G&W's favor but not by a wide margin. D3 is not as hard as a lot of people think it is, yes he can be "chaingrabbed" but not infinited. As someone earlier sayed (he does not want to be quoted), if one DI's away and mashes sufficiently it can be escaped. Therefore, the matchup becomes a bit more favorable.

Now MK and Marth, one has to work around these but they are really hard matchups for Luigi.

G&W, like Marth and Meta, has disjointed hitboxes. How is Luigi suppossed to answer disjointed hitboxes when his own attacks extend his hurtboxes?

The matchup against D3 pretty much goes like this:
- Approach D3 with aerials? Powershield and you get grabbed.
- Try to approach D3 again? Sidestep and you get grabbed.
- Once more? You'll get punished again.

D3 doesn't have to rely on the infinite to win, but the fact that he can cause an automatic stock loss when Luigi is at ~35% and above makes the matchup nigh impossible for Luigi to win. Because D3 can abuse Brawl's defensive mechanics and his grab range means he can shieldgrab Luigi's approaches consistently. I don't know if Luigi has a SAFE approach (I know his Fsmash is safe on block but you want to save that for quick kills) against D3; can a Luigi main elaborate on this further?

D3's infinite is impossible to DI. As soon as you're out of hitstun and you can react, you've already been grabbed again. I think you're talking about though breaking out when D3 grab attacks you at very low %, which is plausible when you're at like <35%.

 

[Locuan]

G&W, like Marth and Meta, has disjointed hitboxes. How is Luigi suppossed to answer disjointed hitboxes when his own attacks extend his hurtboxes?

The matchup against D3 pretty much goes like this:
- Approach D3 with aerials? Powershield and you get grabbed.
- Try to approach D3 again? Sidestep and you get grabbed.
- Once more? You'll get punished again.

D3 doesn't have to rely on the infinite to win, but the fact that he can cause an automatic stock loss when Luigi is at ~35% and above makes the matchup nigh impossible for Luigi to win. Because D3 can abuse Brawl's defensive mechanics and his grab range means he can shieldgrab Luigi's approaches consistently. I don't know if Luigi has a SAFE approach (I know his Fsmash is safe on block but you want to save that for quick kills) against D3; can a Luigi main elaborate on this further?

D3's infinite is impossible to DI. As soon as you're out of hitstun and you can react, you've already been grabbed again. I think you're talking about though breaking out when D3 grab attacks you at very low %, which is plausible when you're at like <35%.

Look nevermind on the D3 infinite it has still not been proven and I am not one to talk. The tester told me he wanted to keep it secret so that's what I'll do.

So in any case it is infinite until proven otherwise.

D3 is normally the reason a lot of Luigi mains have a secondary, so that they can retaliate a D3 attack.

G&W, I never said it wasn't in his favor but Luigi can keep up a good fight. It's not as hard as you might think. Marth and MK are obviously in their favor not in Luigi's, you said it yourself disjointed hit-boxes.

As with all, spacing and zoning is key but you put every match-up at an invincible level, I just can't cope with that even when speaking about MK being broken and unbeatable.

As said, G&W has disjointed hit boxes but you can work your way around them.

Dair can be evaded quite easily, Fair can be blocked and punished while on the ground, a smart recovery by a Luigi player can put him back on stage before G&W can edgeguard. G&W is light and a well placed Fsmash by Luigi can severely hurt him not to mention KO him quite early. Still G&W has more KO options and notably the upper hand.

I want to make clear that I never said that G&W was a hard matchup it's just not as difficult as you claim it to be.

 

[-Nana-]

GAW is a pretty even matchup for Luigi you need to utilize his high priority attacks though to counter his disjointed hit box. Luigi does tolerably against MK and awesome vs Snake because he falls fast and MK can be combo'd decently' broken out of tornado and he's light for quicker kills. DDD may be tough due to CG but he can be combo'd and kept close for up b's like crazy. I don't think it's as grossly one sided as everyone says.

 

[Locuan]

GAW is a pretty even matchup for Luigi. Luigi does decent against MK and awesome vs Snake. DDD may be tough due to CG but he can be combo'd and kept close for up b's like crazy. I don't think it's as grossly one sided as everyone says.

This is what I've been trying to say.

Agreed on the Snake matchup, Luigi does amazingly.

He's ok against MK but eh...

Marth well it's another story but Luigi has his plus sides.

 

[-Nana-]

Agreed on Marth. Once again it's a priority battle. Also Marth is pretty gimpable.

^^I edited my post since it was a bit vauge before heh.

 

[-Mars-]

Agreed on Marth. Once again it's a priority battle. Also Marth is pretty gimpable.

^^I edited my post since it was a bit vauge before heh.

It's not just that, he just completely zones Luigi in the air and on the ground. He also has frame traps that Luigi simply has no answer for.

Another thing about Luigi, jab to upb can be powershielded.

 

[LuigiKing]

Marth is a crazy hard matchup for Luigi. A good marth is going to zone you out so bad you'll want to throw the controller. It sucks but its true. Marsulas is right though, you can powershield jab to upB, but you can't powershield Dtilt trip to UpB, or weak nair to UpB. Both of the latter are much harder to pull off on a good opponent mind you.

 

[Karptroopa]

I haven't a clue why, but I always lose against decent Olimars with Luigi.

Which is weird, seeings as he's supposedly one of the best matchups in favor of Luigi.

Staying in the air is a no-no when fighting an Olimar, I believe.
Reason is those pikmin make it hard to approach him in the air.

And when I play Luigi, it's because of his air game. Fun fun fun.

So I have to employ more mindgames against Olimars, and have to be quick on the nunchuk. And be quick to deploy an edgehog whenever he's off the stage.

And has anyone noticed that Luigi Cyclone can be used very nicely against edgehoggers? (from below, that is)

EDIT: Ah good, nice to know I'm not the only one who has trouble against Marth.

 

[mimic_king]

Luigi is an easy character. Anyone can become a master with him in a matter of 5 minutes. His taunt can be used as a spike if someone is on the edge. His taunt is also much better since it doesn't just make them flinch and it has knockback.

 

[-Nana-]

^ LOL. You can't master any character in 5 minutes that's ridiculous especially not Luigi. His taunt is also a joke. Who is honestly going to wait along the edge long enough for the invincibility frames to end and get hit by his taunt for a spike? His taunt is next to useless.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I don't think Luigi goes close to even against G&W. At best it's a 6/4 matchup for him, but I personally think it's more likely 65/35.

One thing I don't get is why people say Luigi's priority is ridiculous. Sure he doesn't have Sonic or Falcon's fail priority...but really, his hitboxes don't really extend that much farther than his body. And he has really bad range to begin with. Especially on his kill moves.

A good G&W is hard for Luigi to touch. His D-tilt pretty much cannot be punished by Luigi, since it outranges all of Luigi's ground moves and clashes with anything that it doesn't beat. G&W also doesn't have a particularly hard time edgeguarding Luigi since his Up-B will reliably beat out most of Luigi's attacks, and his D-air will stop Luigi from recovering from below.

Luigi's one advantage is better attack speed, which is nice if he gets inside G&W's range, but can he do that reliably? I find that questionable considering his mobility is fairly low.

His low traction means that if he shields something near the ledge, he is easily pushed onto the ledge. Vs a character like G&W who is very good at punishing people at the ledge, he doesn't want to be there.

Personally me, I find that most G&W players get lazy with spacing, and I myself have fallen into that trap many times.

 

[hippiedude92]

I don't think Luigi goes close to even against G&W.

One thing I don't get is why people say Luigi's priority is ridiculous. Sure he doesn't have Sonic or Falcon's fail priority...but really, his hitboxes don't really extend that much farther than his body. And he has really bad range to begin with. Especially on his kill moves.

A good G&W is hard for Luigi to touch. His D-tilt pretty much cannot be punished by Luigi, since it outranges all of Luigi's ground moves and clashes with anything that it doesn't beat. G&W also doesn't have a particularly hard time edgeguarding Luigi since his Up-B will reliably beat out most of Luigi's attacks, and his D-air will stop Luigi from recovering from below.

Luigi's one advantage is better attack speed, which is nice if he gets inside G&W's range, but can he do that reliably? I find that questionable considering his mobility is fairly low.

Personally me, I find that most G&W players get lazy with spacing, and I myself have fallen into that trap many times.

Luigi has the 2nd slowest air mobility IIRC, in the game. Oh btw, I hope nana was joking on how GaW was even with luigi when its basically one of his hardest matchups (but not by alot) for him.

Turtle > Nair's jet li kick sorry =/

 

[mimic_king]

^ LOL. You can't master any character in 5 minutes

It was an exaggeration. It really can take much less than 30 minutes to master a character.

 

[A2ZOMG]

It was an exaggeration. It really can take much less than 30 minutes to master a character.

Mastering a character?

Picking up a character usually isn't hard in Brawl (although I think Falco might be an exception to that personally), but mastering a character for high level play takes longer.

 

[elheber]

Luigi is perhaps the most underrated Brawl character. There's such a huge gap between the skill of the average Luigi mainer and the top Luigi mainers that the average opinion of what Luigi can do is far below what he can actually do. Add to that the low number of Luigi mainers, and you have an underrated, underutilized, and misunderstood character.

I've seen amazing things done by Luigi that are mostly seen on YouTube and not so much in tournaments. Props to Luigi for being so great yet so obscure.

 

[Greenstreet]

^^^^^^ This.

 

[-Nana-]

It was an exaggeration. It really can take much less than 30 minutes to master a character.

No it cannot. It may be easier to pick up a character in Brawl than in Melee but "mastering" any character in any game takes time and effort.

 

[mimic_king]

what about mastering MK? does he take much skill to master?

 

[hippiedude92]

if you wanna play like every other nooby mk out there then sure... go ... right.. ahead.... lolmk.

 

[Delta_BP26]

On the topic of Luigi's Sacred Seven match ups, I have a couple of things to say.

For the Gayman, he is certainly difficult for Luigi. He is pretty much the same as Luigi, with the good ground game and kill options and **** aerials and what not, but better. Luigi must space himself correctly, perhaps with B-Airs or hit-and-run F-Tilts. But seriously, it'll take some time before we know how to beat the Gayman.

Marth. I've faced some good ones before, and I'll tell you now, it's no unplayable. Marth's range can completely crush Luigi, so you have to play very defensive; and that's where the problem arises. Eventually, SOMEONE will learn how to play a good defensive Luigi, so we have to work on that.

Dedede would be pretty easy if it weren't for the infinite. If TO's find a way to ban it without problems, then good. But for now, we're going to need a secondary.

I don't know much about ROB. Only played a good ROB once, but it was a long time ago when I was a nub. So I'll leave that to someone else.

Snake is pretty easy, he is ***** by Up-Tilts and Luigi's air game makes Luigi's lol at Snake's anger. I think it's even, but the general consensus here is either 55/45 or 6/4 in Snake's favor.

Falco, well, uh, I haven't faced a good one, but I think Luigi's good against him.

And Metaknight. He's another reason we have secondaries. Luigi can do nothing against his blazing speed, disjointed hitboxes, wh0re-n4do, and the fact that he can gimp Luigi to hell, then up to heaven, back to Earth, hell again, then back to Earth. Then Luigi cries for mommy and is brought to Heaven where he is rejected by the MK's that have taken over Heaven and is forced to hell where MK's will 3 stock him forever.

 

[hippiedude92]

Er uh.... Whose the gayman? O_o (is it captain falcon) Cause i dunno who you talking about lol.

Robs is like 45:55 matchup i think