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Which characters benefit more from smash stick over tilt stick?

Omastar

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With many pros advocating for tilt stick and outright exclaiming it is better, what characters in your opinion can get away with smash stick over tilt? Keep in mind I understand that a person's preference should always outweigh whatever the general consensus is, but I would love to hear everyone's thoughts and explanations as to why!
For eg. I think Olimar :ultolimar: benefits more from Smash stick because his tilts besides down tilt don't have great utility and being able to space with pivot f smash is also very important.
 

EoleNoveau

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Any time where a character's smashes are as good or better in most situations is when you should be using the smash c-stick to get out quick punishes. The one character I can think of off-hand is Marth, since that's what he's known for .
 

Omastar

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Any time where a character's smashes are as good or better in most situations is when you should be using the smash c-stick to get out quick punishes. The one character I can think of off-hand is Marth, since that's what he's known for .
I actually disagree, I think most people would argue tilt stick is much better for Marth than smash stick. Ftilt, down tilt, uptilt are all great spacing tools. Spaced aerials are also very important when it comes to Marth's neutral and edgeguarding where tilt sticks are better for aerial momentum. Swordies especially Marth I would argue benefit most from tilt stick over smash.
 

DavemanCozy

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tilt sticks are better for aerial momentum.
That used to be true in S4 where smash stick would cause you to lose momentum using aerials with it. In Ultimate that's been fixed, both maintain aerial momentum, so it's honestly just preference now.

If I had to pick one, I'd say Mega Man benefits the most out of Smash stick, purely because of the way his tilts are designed.
 
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Idon

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Marth main/secondary here.
Tilt stick all the way.
All my tilts are useful whereas only fsmash is occassionally useful.
 

Omastar

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Smash stick in S4 would cause you to lose momentum using aerials with it, making spacing aerials very difficult. That's been fixed in this game, so it's honestly just preference now.

If I had to pick one, I'd say Mega Man benefits the most out of Smash stick, purely because of the way his tilts are designed.
Its funny you say this because when consulting the "What's your Controller Set up for Mega Man" on Smashboards the majority opt for tilt stick. Also discussed with members of the Discord and they have said the same.

I've heard conflicting opinions about this. Apparently the difference has been reduced, but you still get more momentum from tilt stick than you would in smash stick. Of course its based on preference, but if you could provide evidence of the contrary, I would happily change my opinion on the matter.
 

DavemanCozy

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Its funny you say this because when consulting the "What's your Controller Set up for Mega Man" on Smashboards the majority opt for tilt stick. Also discussed with members of the Discord and they have said the same.

I've heard conflicting opinions about this. Apparently the difference has been reduced, but you still get more momentum from tilt stick than you would in smash stick. Of course its based on preference, but if you could provide evidence of the contrary, I would happily change my opinion on the matter.
Haha yea I was actually just there, and lots like tilt stick for moonwalked pellets.

I'll see if I can find anything about the tilt vs smash stick. I only have my personal experience when I forget to set my tag and realize I'm using smashes. As far as I could tell though, I felt no difference when doing aerials.
 

Omastar

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Its kind of a mixed opinion on the Discord, but I see Ness benefiting from Smash stick over tilt stick in many scenarios. Down smash or upsmash on ledge, pivot f smash for projectiles or a hard read and Ness' tilts aren't too great. His F tilt can set up for jab locks, but his nair among other things can do the same. D tilt from what I've seen doesn't trip anymore and can rack up great percent also jab locks, but gets punished more often than not and his uptilt can combo into itself at lower percents, but for the most part is situational. If the loss of aerial momentum with smash stick is true, I can see using magnet and djc aerials being less effective. I've also asked Best Ness, and he has told me he personally uses tilt stick, so its kind of a crap shoot haha.
 

Omastar

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Haha yea I was actually just there, and lots like tilt stick for moonwalked pellets.

I'll see if I can find anything about the tilt vs smash stick. I only have my personal experience when I forget to set my tag and realize I'm using smashes. As far as I could tell though, I felt no difference when doing aerials.
Its funny you say this because when consulting the "What's your Controller Set up for Mega Man" on Smashboards the majority opt for tilt stick. Also discussed with members of the Discord and they have said the same.

I've heard conflicting opinions about this. Apparently the difference has been reduced, but you still get more momentum from tilt stick than you would in smash stick. Of course its based on preference, but if you could provide evidence of the contrary, I would happily change my opinion on the matter.
Alrighty so they are virtually the same from what I can gather, I still can't definitely however because there are too many placebo examples. I wish a lab monster could join the discussion and endow us with some knowledge haha.
 

Madison Turner

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...what characters in your opinion can get away with smash stick over tilt?
I use smash stick for Diddy Kong because I'm throwing that f-smash out pretty constantly, whereas I rarely see the need for Diddy's f-tilt in this game. Also, the u-smash is a good move to throw out quickly as well, and ocassionally d-smash too. u-tilt & d-tilt are useful, but are very easy to just use the directional input+A to perform; I'll often throw out the u-tilt for the kill after a banana at high percentages for instance, and never accidentally throw a u-smash out instead (though I don't think it would matter by that percentage anyways even if I did).

I use tilt stick for every other character that I play, which is Chrom & Inkling, and ocassionally K. Rool & Mii Brawler.
 

Cheryl~

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One character who loves Tilt Stick over Smash Stick is :ultwolf:imo, being able to easily do F-Tilts out of a dash is incredibly useful for Wolf even if his other tilts aren't the greatest. I suppose Smash Stick could work though, to be able to more easily pull out Down Smashes at ledge for 2-frame attempts and such. Personally I just find easy F-Tilts make up for everything lost from going Tilt > Smash Stick on Wolf though, that move is just amazing.
 

Mischiiii

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I think it’s viable for characters with useless tilts. But i don’t know any. For me it’s harder to do a tilt than a smash. That’s why i keep it on tilt for everyone. Also i think i would be too stupid to a. Change it depending on the character im playing and b. Not get confused because i constantly need to think about whats on the stick.
 

MG_3989

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I use the tilt stick because I can do a smash with the A button just as fast as the c-stick and having tilts on the c-stick is really nice and just feels more intuitive to me. With the tilt stick I never do a smash instead of a tilt by accident which can straight up lose games. I’m a Ness main and I recently picked up Lucina as a secondary. For Ness it’s nice because although his tilts aren’t his best moves they still have their uses, for Lucina it seems mandatory to me. It’s so much easier to throw tilts out of dash with the tilt stick and I couldn’t see playing her not using it. Of course it’s personal preference and people use all kind of control set ups and are successful with them the tilt stick is just much more intuitive to me
 
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Diddy Kong

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I say Diddy. Been playing Smash stick all the time. It helps cause I use C for banana throw and with this, I can follow up with a running F Smash which leads to many of my KOs. Diddy also doesn’t have the best F Tilt. So only advantages.
 

ZephyrZ

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If I played Ganondorf I'd probably use Smash Stick, not because I think it's necessarily more optimal but because I really wouldn't want to risk throwing out an accidental U-tilt.

With Charizard I want to use his Up Smash a lot, but being able to turn around D-tilt with Ivysaur is just too useful to justify using Smash Stick. Charizard and Squirtle both benefit from that pivot boost tech to, with Squirt having an F-tilt that combos and Zard having an F-tilt that kills. Everyone's tilts are just so useful in this game it's hard to justify using Smash Stick on anyone, although I suppose it still is possible to use all that fancy tech without Tilt Stick to.

...Although now that I think about it Robin's tilts don't seem all that great, but I don't play him in Ultimate so I could be wrong about that one.
 

Volfang

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I personally find :ultridley:Ridley benefits more from stick smash. I tried him with tilt stick and it was practically useless, he doesn't benefit from pivot cancels and stick smash lets him use his really good smash attacks.
 
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Fell God

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Probably Robin since his tilts aren't that good and being able to easily switch to Levin aerials is useful.
 

Sean²

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It's threads like these that remind me that I really wish they would implement more granularity to the C Stick than they do now. I get a lot more mileage out of Wolf's utilt and ftilt than I do his dtilt. And I get more mileage out of his Dsmash than I do any other smashes, and it would be nice to just throw one out with a quick stick flick and not have my control stick tied up for the split second that it is. So it would be amazing to be able to set one direction to smash but set the rest to tilts, or something otherwise similar.
 

Omastar

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It's threads like these that remind me that I really wish they would implement more granularity to the C Stick than they do now. I get a lot more mileage out of Wolf's utilt and ftilt than I do his dtilt. And I get more mileage out of his Dsmash than I do any other smashes, and it would be nice to just throw one out with a quick stick flick and not have my control stick tied up for the split second that it is. So it would be amazing to be able to set one direction to smash but set the rest to tilts, or something otherwise similar.
A great idea I saw in the reddit thread was to press the control stick to switch from tilt to smash or vice-versa. Being able to switch control schemes mid match via a button would really be great
 

Baby_Sneak

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Well, I main dark pit, and I feel like he kinda exposes the flaws in the control scheme.

all of his smashes are pretty good (Fsmash is good for whiff punishing and surprise punishes due to range, plus can be kinda safe depending on the situation. Usmash is amazing for AAs and juggling. Dsmash is fast and can catch people off guard), and so are his tilts (Dtilt is pretty safe and can lead to followups, Ftilt is a poking tool, and Utilt is good for AAs and followups).

I need both. I'm decent at doing tilts (besides Ftilt), but can't do smash attacks without C stick.
 

DavemanCozy

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For what it's worth, I play both Fox and Snake myself and imo both definetely need tilt stick.

If you have trouble doing smashes then play around with stick sensitivity settings.

I have tried looking for differences in momentum as well, but I can't find any thst suggests smash stick throws it off the way it did in Smash4. What I did notice was that short hop attack aerials do that... but it is consistent with both types of stick options.
 
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Semako

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I play Ike and the Dong, and prefer tilt stick for both. I don't have problems with smashing with the left stick and A, and their tilts are really important tools, and especially for ike an accidential smash attack can lead to a heavy punish.
 
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BTHK_Nydus

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I play tilt stick now, but on characters that I played too much in melee and don't play enough now (didn't play Brawl more than a week or 4 at all) I have too much muscle memory to ever change. But I think objectively the characters that would be better with smash stick are ones that need quick smashes for kill confirms (fox/falco or pikachu up smashes), or easier/faster doing upsmash out of shield (charizard, pikachu, and fox/falco).

Also, I have to play tilt stick if I want easy up-tilts since I can't turn off stick jump; i used it too long in melee for jump attacking off ledge and for timing marth downspikes to ever switch (and jumping out of fox shines, which would now be closer to fair/nair out of shield).
 

shade3134

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Any time where a character's smashes are as good or better in most situations is when you should be using the smash c-stick to get out quick punishes. The one character I can think of off-hand is Marth, since that's what he's known for .
Dude.. use proper grammar. What are you even trying to say?
 

Lord_Ghirahim

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Surely it's just personal preference? It makes no difference what character is used, you can do both Smash attacks and tilts regardless. Coming from older Smash games I don't see any need for me to change it to tilt attacks, but if someone prefers doing their smashes with the left stick and 'A' they have the option.
 

Drwatson64

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I nearly always uses tilt stick, smashes are not hard to perform using the directional stick and A button and more often then not I perform a smash when a mean a tilt using that method. but it is really up to you
 

Sean²

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Dude.. use proper grammar. What are you even trying to say?
He’s saying if a character’s smash attacks are better than their tilts, then you should use smash stick for them. It wasn’t remotely hard to read tbh
 

Dsull

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only character i can think of that would prefer smashstick is little mac, because his tilts are stupid and his smashes are better than most tilts in speed plus have armor.
I cant think of another character that truly would prefer smashstick.
 

Omastar

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only character i can think of that would prefer smashstick is little mac, because his tilts are stupid and his smashes are better than most tilts in speed plus have armor.
I cant think of another character that truly would prefer smashstick.
I've already kind of alluded to it above, but Olimar is the perfect character to use smashstick with. Asked Myran and Dabuz myself. Two of the best Olimar mains in the world.
 

Perfect patricia

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With many pros advocating for tilt stick and outright exclaiming it is better, what characters in your opinion can get away with smash stick over tilt? Keep in mind I understand that a person's preference should always outweigh whatever the general consensus is, but I would love to hear everyone's thoughts and explanations as to why!
For eg. I think Olimar :ultolimar: benefits more from Smash stick because his tilts besides down tilt don't have great utility and being able to space with pivot f smash is also very important.
Robin
 

Up0n

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Any time where a character's smashes are as good or better in most situations is when you should be using the smash c-stick to get out quick punishes. The one character I can think of off-hand is Marth, since that's what he's known for .
I think in almost any situation tilt stick is better; correct me if I'm wrong
 

Vic

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I personally find :ultridley:Ridley benefits more from stick smash. I tried him with tilt stick and it was practically useless, he doesn't benefit from pivot cancels and stick smash lets him use his really good smash attacks.
Interesting, I have a much greater preference for him with tilt stick on. It probably has a lot to do with my preference of A + Stick smash attacking, but for me the tilts (especially ftilt and dtilt) are so useful for both racking up easy tipper damage from baiting opponents or to start up combos respectively.
 

2 C H i L L E D

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Hmmm I see what you are saying, but wouldn't tilts be better for MK? Running d tilt for neutral and jab locks, running up tilt to set up for combos?
Honestly it comes down to preference on him. D-Tilt is already pretty easy to do out of a dash same for jab and u-tilt. U-tilt is also pretty slow and laughable compared to what it was in Brawl.

Then with tilt stick on you still have to hit A or Grab to get your entire f-tilt. I still use tilt stick on him so i don’t screw over my other chars but I prefer smash stick on him.
 

Justin Allen Goldschmidt

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Robin is the only character I can think of that *needs* smash stick, but otherwise I think basically every single character is better-off with tilt stick. This is coming from someone that had to reeeeaaalllly force themself to make the change to tilt stick after years of Melee and Project M, then a few years of staying with smash stick for Smash 4. Now that tilts can be done out of running, I absolutely think it is more optimal to have them on stick.
 

MG_3989

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Ok so I’ve been experimenting with using the smash stick for Ness because his tilts really aren’t all that good (they all have uses but his smashes are just better) and I use his smashes a lot more

The main reason I did this is for more consistent yo-yo ledgeguards so I don’t end up doing a dtilt by accident which happened once in a while and for using the bat as a reflector more consistently. I still haven’t decided if I’m gonna completely stick with it but I’m heavily considering it for Ness and it may be the optimal control scheme for him
 
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Omastar

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Robin is the only character I can think of that *needs* smash stick, but otherwise I think basically every single character is better-off with tilt stick. This is coming from someone that had to reeeeaaalllly force themself to make the change to tilt stick after years of Melee and Project M, then a few years of staying with smash stick for Smash 4. Now that tilts can be done out of running, I absolutely think it is more optimal to have them on stick.
I've already kind of alluded to it above, but Olimar is the perfect character to use smashstick with. Asked Myran and Dabuz myself. Two of the best Olimar mains in the world.
 

MG_3989

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I've already kind of alluded to it above, but Olimar is the perfect character to use smashstick with. Asked Myran and Dabuz myself. Two of the best Olimar mains in the world.
I definitely understand that one

I wonder what pro Ness mains use especially with yo-yo being so important and vital to land on ledge
 
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