Why do they make short hopping so difficult?

[Slappy Dee]

New Smash player here, I've been watching a bunch of videos and practicing fundamentals, and I can't understand why short-hopping is made to be so difficult to perform. Supposedly you have to press the jump button for no longer than 3 frames, or 1/20th of a second. Why? Why not make it 10 frames or something. As it is, its very hard to perform consistently and I don't understand why they developers would want such a fundamental move to be difficult to do. All of the other basic controls and moves are very accessible in this game, so this seems to go against the design philosophy of the game. I understand that I just need to practice so I'm not really asking "how do I get good at short-hopping?", I'm just genuinely curious on why they designed short-hopping to be hard. Is it a balance thing somehow?

 

[Orlando BCN]

To short hop easily, I quickly press the jump button instead of flicking tap jump. It helps me consistently.

 

[ZephyrZ]

The reason why is because three frames is how long a character takes to leave the ground, so whether not you're shorthopping or not has to be determined in those three frames. They could have made it longer but that would slow down the pace of the game somewhat.

Anyway, don't stress over mastering the shorthop immedietly. I'm still getting the hang of myself. It might take awhile, but it will come with practice. For the time being hitting attack and jump at the same time should be adequate in most situations.

 

[Xquirtle]

The reason why is because three frames is how long a character takes to leave the ground, so whether not you're shorthopping or not has to be determined in those three frames. They could have made it longer but that would slow down the pace of the game somewhat.

Anyway, don't stress over mastering the shorthop immedietly. I'm still getting the hang of myself. It might take awhile, but it will come with practice. For the time being hitting attack and jump at the same time should be adequate in most situations.

In the short term, do what this guy says and press jump + attack together. This performs a rising short hop aerial in the direction of your control stick and is a direct answer to traditional short hops being hard to learn. The main loss here is that you can't do a falling short hop aerial with the short cut input. short hop fast fall attacks bring the hitbox closer to the ground to hit shorter characters and can lead into different options since you are landing more immediately after the attack.