If you pick one character and stick with it, then your moves versus every possible opponent's move results in 14,450 combinations, not the astronomical numbers you are pulling out.
If I could accurately initiate my moves with 1/60th of a second precision, then I would give a shit. Old Man Scott is hung up on knowing which move has priority over another in the highly unlikely situation that they are initiated in the same exact frame, with two characters at the perfect range to create a near-simultaneous hit. Were you this cranky in the Melee days?
Ren is absolutely correct, that by playing around with each of the characters, you can absolutely develop a "90% effective" rule of thumb for the general speed and range of your opponents. You can then be very competitive with proper positioning, blocking/rolling, and knowing how long the stun lasts on opponents damaged by your own moves.
This is not a game where I am going to show up at tournaments and hope to be a world champion, but I've got a lot of friends who play, and the online play now works rather well, too. Smash is a game that rewards effort with improvement, even if it does take insane study to eek out that last 10%. I'm happy to put some effort in to stay on top of my friends as they improve, and win a higher percentage of online battles over time.
Yep, if you know that Fox can up-smash Kirby at 80% then you should have a good time Those are the things that competent players know. Sure, Pro's may get more into priorities and hit boxes, but if you know your basic matchups, you will LOOK like a pro.
Smash is not really about learning combinations of moves, it's more about knowing characters weaknesses, or even the play style of the person themselves. It's much more about getting into their head. As said above, most moves have predictable priorities.
If you know how to edge guard, know the basic match ups of each character, and know how to recover, you should be able to put up a good fight.
Knowing those sorts of things is a higher level concept for when you already have the fundamentals. You aren't noticing the lower level concepts that have to be mastered first, probably because they are already intuitive and unconscious for you.
A pro basketball player doesn't have to think about dribbling. If you asked them how to dribble, they might even have a hard time explaining it even though they can do it at a master level.
Being at a lower level, I'm not even ready to think about edge guard or recovery. I still need answers to more fundamental questions, the equivalent of "how to dribble." But people who actually know can't explain it because it's just natural and unconscious for them.
When I play Smash I spend most of my time moving around trying to avoid getting hit, and also trying to be in a position where I can land a hit on someone. Of course, when I'm in position to hit someone, they are usually also in position to hit me. There are many times when I attack that I fail because I'm just too slow. That's fine and not frustrating at all, because I know why I failed. What's frustrating is the majority of the time I attack and the other person also attacks seemingly simultaneously, and I end up being the only one taking damage. This isn't a matter of slowness, because I still see both animations happening, often my animation even happens first!
If I knew, for instance, that my opponent's up attacks did not have priority over my down attacks, I would attack them from above very often because their only option would be to get out of the way, block, or get hit. My co-worker plays villager, his upward fireworks beat pretty much every downward attack in the game that I have tried. If I'm up in the sky, I have to land far away and attack from the side or below.
Most of the people I play against, especially Rym, use the strategy of staying away. They just hang out far away taking pot-shots and using projectiles. They make you come to them. No matter who I seem to play, when I come in for an attack, I end up being the only one who gets hit. Nobody can answer my fundamental question of how do you safely get close enough to an opponent to hit them without being hit?
If you tell me it depends on which character you are playing and who your opponent is, then I refer you to the math in my previous post that you claimed I did not have to memorize.
Most of the people I play against, especially Rym, use the strategy of staying away. They just hang out far away taking pot-shots and using projectiles. They make you come to them.
Sounds like he's playing the type correctly. Most characters that have ranged attacks aren't particularly fast and rely on keeping range. Sheik is one of the characters that does have ranged attacks and is also super fast. But when to use them is highly circumstantial. A majority of the time you won't ever use them. They're usually a "plan B" type of attack. Other characters like Link will use a combination of their projectiles to trap other characters into their range of melee attacks, they should be using projectiles pretty frequently. Others like Samus you're best strategy is to constantly have projectiles going at almost all possible times. She has some pretty strong melee attacks but her strategy is keep range, play defensive, rack up damage fast, and then (used to be) spike the opponent off the stage.
The strategy against these people with strictly melee attackers is to keep on them as much as possible. It's a strategy you'll just need to figure out. Once you can approach effectively then you just stay on them and they lose all advantage. That's where characters like Sheik excel, she can get off multiple attacks at a time and you constantly assault the opponent. If you let them recover their position at all you immediately lose advantage so its in the best interest to minimize that time.
Nobody can answer my fundamental question of how do you safely get close enough to an opponent to hit them without being hit?
Use all the tools in your toolbox. Dashing/running is very important, and being able to short-hop jumps when needed so you are not always coming on a straight line. Mix it up with some blocking and rolling. You can get in there with that generic advice and not being predictable, then after a while, you'll also figure out a few additional approaches that lean on your character's specific moves.
For your Villager problem, have you considered using the air dodge if you know he is always gonna bust out those fireworks?
Nobody can answer my fundamental question of how do you safely get close enough to an opponent to hit them without being hit?
Use all the tools in your toolbox. Dashing/running is very important, and being able to short-hop jumps when needed so you are not always coming on a straight line. Mix it up with some blocking and rolling. You can get in there with that generic advice and not being predictable, then after a while, you'll also figure out a few additional approaches that lean on your character's specific moves.
For your Villager problem, have you considered using the air dodge if you know he is always gonna bust out those fireworks?
I use the air dodge quite often. About half the time, it works! When it doesn't work, bad things happen. Sometimes the dodge simply doesn't work and I get hit anyway. Sometimes I dodge and am vulnerable because I just dodged. The attack I dodged ends, and they hit me with something else while I can't do anything about it.
Nobody can answer my fundamental question of how do you safely get close enough to an opponent to hit them without being hit?
Use all the tools in your toolbox. Dashing/running is very important, and being able to short-hop jumps when needed so you are not always coming on a straight line. Mix it up with some blocking and rolling. You can get in there with that generic advice and not being predictable, then after a while, you'll also figure out a few additional approaches that lean on your character's specific moves.
For your Villager problem, have you considered using the air dodge if you know he is always gonna bust out those fireworks?
Short hopping is pretty much a must know skill. A lot of characters have very powerful sending moves in their aerial arsenal. They are also much faster than smashes. Use the air dodge sparsely. Pretty much never if you can help it. And if you do try to use it at the last minute. It opens you up a lot.
Nobody can answer my fundamental question of how do you safely get close enough to an opponent to hit them without being hit?
Use all the tools in your toolbox. Dashing/running is very important, and being able to short-hop jumps when needed so you are not always coming on a straight line. Mix it up with some blocking and rolling. You can get in there with that generic advice and not being predictable, then after a while, you'll also figure out a few additional approaches that lean on your character's specific moves.
For your Villager problem, have you considered using the air dodge if you know he is always gonna bust out those fireworks?
Short hopping is pretty much a must know skill. A lot of characters have very powerful sending moves in their aerial arsenal. They are also much faster than smashes. Use the air dodge sparsely. Pretty much never if you can help it. And if you do try to use it at the last minute. It opens you up a lot.
Yeah, I often use the air dodge at the last minute. Especially against the aforementioned fireworks. Their range is really short, so you have to use it at the last second. Basically, don't attack villager from above.
I think everyone does it differently. I had figured out an effective method before most of my friends who are much better than me now. The way I explain it (on a GC controller) is to sort of slide your thumb off the X button. If you slide it off the edge the contact tends to be minimal on the connection. I know some people use the up on the stick to do it as well and I've gotten to the point where I just know how quickly to press the button to get the right type of hop.
I turn up the twitch to 11 and just sort of stab the jump button, pulling my thumb back off of it as quickly as I can after pressing it. Gets me that little tiny jump rather than the full height.
As for the importance of combos and such, I agree with what was said before about how Smash is not a big combo game, but there is one exception. You do want to make good use of your throws, and know exactly how to get 1 or 2 free hits on your opponent based on where you are throwing them and how high their percentage is. For instance, I know that under 60% or so, I can up- or down-throw with Pikachu and my down-B lightning should be unavoidable if I get it out as quickly as possible.
It's almost never a good idea to fall directly on an opponent from a height (ie: not a short hop) and try to hit them with an air move. They will move and punish you, shield and grab you, or otherwise out-prioritize you.
For Ness's high priority up-smash, for instance, if he's using that every time you're in the air and descending, dodge diagonal-down to the side and punish with a jab (or grab) as soon as you land and as quickly as possible. If you connect even one time you'll force them to change their tactic or die, because you've signaled that you've figured them out.
Also, in particular, I know with Samus you can down-b to drop bombs as you descend to make your landing less predictable and create space between you and your opponent.
Alternatively, get good at ledge-play and go for the ledge. He can't up-smash you there and his recovery is so bad that it he'd be taking a bigger risk than you to come off the ledge and fight. I could teach you some swanky recovery techniques to make it worth your while.
They really fucking amped up g&w. He can actually do damage now. He also has much less recovery on his attacks. Strangely, I might be the best playing him right now. I've been trying really hard to get good with duck hunt as well. The timing on a lot of his attacks are sort of delayed and they have really specific range and area so it's a bit tough learning to be precise with him. He also has a pretty good meteor attack but the timing is absurd. Im having a tough time figuring out a good finish for sheik since they sorta changed how her forward a works. Back a is still powerful but setup is really predictable. Her down b seems to be the key but I'm getting used to when I should use it.
Ryu seems kinda crazy since apparently you can do simple Smash commands but also you can input original SF2 commands for stronger versions of the attacks.
Ryu seems kinda crazy since apparently you can do simple Smash commands but also you can input original SF2 commands for stronger versions of the attacks.
Well, pro players are only going to do the latter. OP?
Ryu seems kinda crazy since apparently you can do simple Smash commands but also you can input original SF2 commands for stronger versions of the attacks.
Well, pro players are only going to do the latter. OP?
It's objectively slower to input them that way no matter how good you are.
Ryu seems kinda crazy since apparently you can do simple Smash commands but also you can input original SF2 commands for stronger versions of the attacks.
Well, pro players are only going to do the latter. OP?
It's objectively slower to input them that way no matter how good you are.
Yeah, they get you an extra 1-2% - you can also input half-circle for a red fireball that hits twice. Doing a SRK motion (instead of up+B) also results in you dashing forward, which might not be what you want.
It's weird inputting Street Fighter commands on an analog stick in Smash, plus you have to worry about facing (QCF / QCB are relative to the direction you are facing, not where your opponent(s) are). And air Tatsumaki can end up with Ryu just sailing off the edge of the stage, where his poor recovery won't save him. It's pretty fun, but I'm also pretty bad at Smash.
Yeah, they get you an extra 1-2% - you can also input half-circle for a red fireball that hits twice. Doing a SRK motion (instead of up+B) also results in you dashing forward, which might not be what you want.
It's weird inputting Street Fighter commands on an analog stick in Smash, plus you have to worry about facing (QCF / QCB are relative to the direction you are facing, not where your opponent(s) are). And air Tatsumaki can end up with Ryu just sailing off the edge of the stage, where his poor recovery won't save him. It's pretty fun, but I'm also pretty bad at Smash.
Wouldn't you use the air hurricane kick as recovery?
I will be buying all three of these new characters today, and then continue very rarely ever playing Smash.
Maybe I'll get back into Smash if I try the online again and it is less jittery now that we are further from launch. As it stands, friends show up, and it's all about that Mario Kart 8. DLC track packs for that have been nothing short of stellar. The same love and attention you saw put into Ryu for Smash is put into every MK8 track layout.
Apparently I forgot to redeem the mewtwo code I got for buying both games. They expired on the 31st so I contacted customer service and they were like fuck you we told you they'd expire duh. But then looking at any of the DLC packs you basically get mewtwo with any of them. Also the DLC is kinda expensive and padded with a bunch of Mii bullshit.
Comments
If I could accurately initiate my moves with 1/60th of a second precision, then I would give a shit. Old Man Scott is hung up on knowing which move has priority over another in the highly unlikely situation that they are initiated in the same exact frame, with two characters at the perfect range to create a near-simultaneous hit. Were you this cranky in the Melee days?
Ren is absolutely correct, that by playing around with each of the characters, you can absolutely develop a "90% effective" rule of thumb for the general speed and range of your opponents. You can then be very competitive with proper positioning, blocking/rolling, and knowing how long the stun lasts on opponents damaged by your own moves.
This is not a game where I am going to show up at tournaments and hope to be a world champion, but I've got a lot of friends who play, and the online play now works rather well, too. Smash is a game that rewards effort with improvement, even if it does take insane study to eek out that last 10%. I'm happy to put some effort in to stay on top of my friends as they improve, and win a higher percentage of online battles over time.
A pro basketball player doesn't have to think about dribbling. If you asked them how to dribble, they might even have a hard time explaining it even though they can do it at a master level.
Being at a lower level, I'm not even ready to think about edge guard or recovery. I still need answers to more fundamental questions, the equivalent of "how to dribble." But people who actually know can't explain it because it's just natural and unconscious for them.
When I play Smash I spend most of my time moving around trying to avoid getting hit, and also trying to be in a position where I can land a hit on someone. Of course, when I'm in position to hit someone, they are usually also in position to hit me. There are many times when I attack that I fail because I'm just too slow. That's fine and not frustrating at all, because I know why I failed. What's frustrating is the majority of the time I attack and the other person also attacks seemingly simultaneously, and I end up being the only one taking damage. This isn't a matter of slowness, because I still see both animations happening, often my animation even happens first!
If I knew, for instance, that my opponent's up attacks did not have priority over my down attacks, I would attack them from above very often because their only option would be to get out of the way, block, or get hit. My co-worker plays villager, his upward fireworks beat pretty much every downward attack in the game that I have tried. If I'm up in the sky, I have to land far away and attack from the side or below.
Most of the people I play against, especially Rym, use the strategy of staying away. They just hang out far away taking pot-shots and using projectiles. They make you come to them. No matter who I seem to play, when I come in for an attack, I end up being the only one who gets hit. Nobody can answer my fundamental question of how do you safely get close enough to an opponent to hit them without being hit?
If you tell me it depends on which character you are playing and who your opponent is, then I refer you to the math in my previous post that you claimed I did not have to memorize.
Turn based only for the rest of your life?
The strategy against these people with strictly melee attackers is to keep on them as much as possible. It's a strategy you'll just need to figure out. Once you can approach effectively then you just stay on them and they lose all advantage. That's where characters like Sheik excel, she can get off multiple attacks at a time and you constantly assault the opponent. If you let them recover their position at all you immediately lose advantage so its in the best interest to minimize that time.
For your Villager problem, have you considered using the air dodge if you know he is always gonna bust out those fireworks?
How to short hop?
As for the importance of combos and such, I agree with what was said before about how Smash is not a big combo game, but there is one exception. You do want to make good use of your throws, and know exactly how to get 1 or 2 free hits on your opponent based on where you are throwing them and how high their percentage is. For instance, I know that under 60% or so, I can up- or down-throw with Pikachu and my down-B lightning should be unavoidable if I get it out as quickly as possible.
For Ness's high priority up-smash, for instance, if he's using that every time you're in the air and descending, dodge diagonal-down to the side and punish with a jab (or grab) as soon as you land and as quickly as possible. If you connect even one time you'll force them to change their tactic or die, because you've signaled that you've figured them out.
Also, in particular, I know with Samus you can down-b to drop bombs as you descend to make your landing less predictable and create space between you and your opponent.
Alternatively, get good at ledge-play and go for the ledge. He can't up-smash you there and his recovery is so bad that it he'd be taking a bigger risk than you to come off the ledge and fight. I could teach you some swanky recovery techniques to make it worth your while.
It's the Vanilla Coke all over again.
Ryu seems kinda crazy since apparently you can do simple Smash commands but also you can input original SF2 commands for stronger versions of the attacks.
It's weird inputting Street Fighter commands on an analog stick in Smash, plus you have to worry about facing (QCF / QCB are relative to the direction you are facing, not where your opponent(s) are). And air Tatsumaki can end up with Ryu just sailing off the edge of the stage, where his poor recovery won't save him. It's pretty fun, but I'm also pretty bad at Smash.
Maybe I'll get back into Smash if I try the online again and it is less jittery now that we are further from launch. As it stands, friends show up, and it's all about that Mario Kart 8. DLC track packs for that have been nothing short of stellar. The same love and attention you saw put into Ryu for Smash is put into every MK8 track layout.